Carbonate reservoirs contain over 60% of the world's remaining conventional oil reserves and account for over 30% of the world's daily oil production. However, most oil is left underground: on average less than 20% of available oil is recovered. A small (1% to 2%) increase will make a substantial impact on global hydrocarbon reserves. Due to their global importance, improved flow prediction and recovery in carbonate reservoirs are likely to be among some of the most significant developments for the oil and gas industry in the next decade.

Research projects

Our interdisciplinary research aims to improve our ability to characterise, model, and predict hydrocarbon recovery from carbonate formations, from pore- to reservoir-scale, using a range of state-of-the-art experimental, modelling, and simulation technologies, many of them developed in-house. We are currently working on three different themes, with several projects supporting each theme.

International Centre for Carbonate Reservoirs (ICCR)

This theme focuses on the static and dynamic characterisation and modelling of pore-scale processes in carbonates, the poro-perm evolution of carbonates due to chemical and mechanical processes (both at production and geological time-scales), and the geophysical characterisation of carbonate rocks. The theme is carried out in close collaboration with the University of Edinburgh and the University of Oxford, who are partners in ICCR. ICCR comprises Europe's largest and most interdisciplinary team of academics working on carbonate reservoirs.

IOR and EOR simulations in fractured carbonate rocks

In this theme we focus on fluid-structure interactions during IOR and EOR in carbonate formations (from pore- to inter-well scale), develop and prototype new model concepts to improve the simulation of IOR and EOR processes, and investigate the use of proxy models for robust optimisation of complex recovery processes in fractured carbonate reservoirs.