Government Sponsored Petroleum Recovery Research In Alberta

Abstract

Abstract I welcome the opportunity to review for you some of the government sponsored research related to recovery of petroleum and natural gas in Alberta, The title of my review refers to recovery research but I will broaden this somewhat and discuss research in related areas as well. I hope especially that the review will be of interest to our friends from Venezuela participating in this symposium as well as to the many Canadians who may not be familiar with much that has been done and is planned. A recent article which appeared in newspapers in Eastern Canada stated that there has been little research in Western Canada and certainly no new research, I would be extremely pleased if my message reaches this part of Canada. Early research work in Alberta related to petroleum was initiated by the Federal Government but from about 1920 onwards there has been increasing involvement of Alberta and the two Governments are continuing to co-operate. My brief review will deal mainly with research carried on here in Alberta and mostly supported by the Alberta Government, I do recognize the very great importance of work done by the Federal Government and 'particularly by the Department of Energy, Mines and Resources and by the National Research Council in Ottawa but I am not in a position to review this. Perhaps I could mention at the outset that the Alberta Research Council has been prominent in the research area related to energy resources since the 1920's. However, I will only touch on its achievements and leave the provision of details to Dr. Wiggins, the Director of the Alberta Research Council, in his paper on the work of this important institute which he will be presenting later this morning. PRINCIPLE AREAS OF ALBERTA RESEARCH Let me first make a few remarks about the principle areas of research carried out in Alberta and their importance, As I see it, as it affects the petroleum scene there are five important areas of research activity.ExplorationExcept in the case of the oil sands, the job of finding our oil and gas resources comes first. Alberta's geology, especially in the foothills, is unique and complex and a knowledge of this geology and its interpretation is of obvious importance.Recovery Recovery is the principle area of concern to us this morning, From the earliest days the need to improve the recovery processes for conventional oil and gas and to develop viable ones for the bitumen contained in the oil sands has been recognized. I think the importance of recovery research can be put in perspective if we recall that Alberta has some 29 billion barrels of proved remaining crude oil in place, that is in the reservoirs, of which we now expect to recover only 5,5 billion barrels. This means that there are 23 billion barrels of crude hydrocarbons that we expect cannot be recovered with our present technology.