Dr. Saleri of QRI and former head of reservoir management at Saudi Aramco joins a panel discussion on peak oil. Participants discuss major energy challenges for the coming generation.

In a panel discussion today at Rice University's Earth Science department, Dr. Nansen G. Saleri, president and CEO of Quantum Reservoir Impact and the former head of reservoir management at Saudi Aramco, elaborated on the subject of "peak oil" and the technologies and forces which will change the oil industry in the foreseeable future.

Rice University's Student Chapter of the Society of Exploration Geophysicists and the American Association of Petroleum Geologists hosted the panel, entitled "Peak Oil and Future Challenges". Dr. Saleri was joined by Amy Jaffe, an Energy Studies Fellow at the Baker Institute for Public Policy, and Paul Wallace, Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at Hunton Energy.


Dr. Saleri focused his presentation on the assumptions behind current "peak oil" projections, which he predicts will occur sometime in the second half of the century. This prediction, compared with other estimates, is based on the assumption that recovery efficiencies will increase due to technological innovation, the increasing mobility of intellectual property and human capital across international borders, and the changing relationships between International Oil Companies (IOCs), National Oil Companies (NOCs), service providers, and new "mutant" entities providing a range of innovative solutions to the energy markets.

Among the new technologies which will push recovery efficiencies are next-generation wells, real-time decision-making ability, and "smart well" technology.

"In a $117 environment, are we really going to be satisfied with an industry average of 36% recovery when much higher recoveries are technically and economically achievable? At Saudi Aramco in my previous position as head of Reservoir Management, I would not have accepted such a premise," said Dr. Saleri.