UT PGE Student Wins SPWLA International Paper Contest
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June 27, 2023
Hildebrand Department of Petroleum and Geosystems Engineering (UT PGE) student Julio C. Villarroel Salvatierra (MSPE 2023, PhD PE 2025) won first place in the master’s division of the Society of Petrophysicists and Well Log Analysts (SPWLA) International Student Paper Contest at its annual symposium in June. His study, “Accounting for Exterior Flow in Unconventional Basins: a New Flow Regime,” is based on his master’s research supervised by Professor Larry W. Lake and Associate Professor David DiCarlo.
Villarroel Salvatierra’s research shows the first evidence of a third late-time flow regime — a post-boundary-dominated flow regime coined “exterior flow” in unconventional wells. Exterior flow is defined as the linear flow of gas from the non-stimulated matrix feeding into the depleted stimulated rock volume at late times, far away. The study posits the future of shale gas production through diagnostics plots and a new decline curve model. A primary impact of the research is the possibility of including the category of “probable reserves” for unconventional resources, which is currently missing in the 2022 Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) Petroleum Resource Management System Guidelines, and significantly increasing the estimated ultimate recovery (EUR) of those resources. “This in-and-out itself could be a game-changer of the current state of the art of the shale gas industry,” Villarroel Salvatierra says.
Villarroel Salvatierra is currently a graduate research assistant in advanced reservoir engineering and formation evaluation with a focus on lithium. His doctoral research is supervised by Dr. Lake and co-advised by Professor Carlos Torres-Verdín. Prior to beginning his graduate work, he spent nine years as a reservoir engineer in Bolivia and in 2022 co-founded Xorn Mineral Insights, a start-up that strives to help South American companies take part in the energy transition by implementing advanced computing and engineering techniques that focus on lithium and geothermal resources. He also plays for UT Austin’s men’s rugby club, which is part of USA Rugby and competes in the Red River Division.
Founded in 1959, SPWLA is dedicated to the advancement of the science of petrophysics and formation evaluation. The organization provides information services to scientists in the subsurface exploration industry, serves as a voice of shared interests in the profession, plays a major role in strengthening petrophysical education, and strives to increase the awareness of the role of petrophysics in the scientific community and industry.
