Real-Time Operations Portal (Nibras): Another Step En Route to a Smart Field Management

Abstract

Managing oil fields in the best way possible has always been in the centre of interests for various oil companies; production maintenance and optimisation, deferment minimisation, efficient monitoring of well reservoir & facility performances, cross-function collaboration, and many other related issues, all represent the building blocks in a successful and efficient field management structure. The Fahud cluster of Petroleum Development of Oman has been running for more than four decades, and still contributes significantly to the company's total production. Hence, it is becoming more important than ever to ensure that the field is managed both optimally and efficiently to adequately handle the large stock of wells and facility units, and all other related issues, such as operations, services, human resources, etc. For this, a series of initiatives were adopted with the aim of achieving an efficiently monitored & controlled asset as well as highly synchronised multi-team actions. In this paper, a web-portal based tool is presented; Nibras is a "smart" platform for Well & Reservoir Management (WRM). The standard data sources, web-accessibility, multi-levels of data presentation, exception-based surveillance, and compatibility with third-party tools, are just some of the many features and capabilities that Nibras possesses. These features has made it possible to detect problems and\or outstanding issues earlier, react to them faster, and thus decide better. Nibras has become a key enabler of the Fahud Collaboration Centre (the first operational collaborative work environment in Petroleum Development of Oman), as it provides a common ground for various asset teams from which data and information can be retrieved from standard sources. This has eliminated confusion and miscommunication that may typically result from referring to different tools, retrieving data from different sources, and presenting data in different formats. Nibras has been approved for pan-PDO implementation, as it represents a leap towards a smarter management of oil fields. The implementation of Nibras –alongside other smart initiatives- has resulted in reduced well downtime (and hence reduced deferments), early detection of problems, more efficient decision making, and better cross-team knowledge sharing.