Change in Co-Director
Kansas Energy Information System(KEIS)
NEW SERVICE AT ERC --CBD-ON-Internet
Seed Funds Awarded
Results of Seed Fund Awarded in 1996
Funding Opportunities
Upcoming Meetings & Deadlines
New Research Initiative Gas Research Institute
Activities of co-directors & Executive Director
Proposals Submitted Through ERC
Funded Proposals Submitted Through ERC
On October 1, 1996 Don Green resigned as Co-Director of ERC due to new commitments he has in serving as the Chancellor's representative for the Big 12 Conference and serving as Chairman of the Department of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering. Don also continues to be co-director of the Tertiary Oil Recovery Project and teaches within the department.
G. Paul Willhite replaces Don Green as the new Co-Director of the ERC joining Tim Carr. Paul is also Co-Director of the Tertiary Oil Recovery Project.
A new initiative, Kansas Energy Information System(KEIS), will be implemented at the ERC. The goal of KEIS is to 1) integrate electronic information on energy including funding opportunities and data sources, 2) provide electronic links to expertise in energy on campus, and 3) increase the presence of the University of Kansas as key point of access for energy information. KEIS will also leverage digital energy information now being provided to the center and its participating units, e.g., the PTTC program (the North Midcontinent Resource Center), Kansas Geological Survey, and Data Access and Service Center (DASC). KEIS will strengthen our program area in energy databases impacting both campus staff and those outside seeking information or contacts from KU energy researchers.
The ERC has a new subscription to the Commerce Business Daily (CBD) on the Internet. We have access to tomorrow's CBD even before it's published. What makes the CBD-on-the-Internet so great is that we can precisely isolate in seconds the CBD notices you're looking for. There are 99 different categories to search. Searches can be done by using keywords that are set up in profiles or by simply entering the entity you wish to search. Printed copy is available immediately on demand.
In the near future we will be contacting you to expand and confirm your areas of interest and will be setting-up profiles for energy researchers on campus for our KEIS initiative. You can call our office and request specific searches and we will send any information we find.
The Energy Research Center has made awards for its Energy Research Development Grants competition. ERC received 9 proposals from KU researchers in response to our notice distributed in January. The ERC advisory committee met in April and awarded four grants totaling $20,540. A total of $4,360 was derived from department funds. The successful projects and funds appropriated by ERC are as follows:
"Depositional and Paragenetic History of Arbuckle Strata in Kansas within a Sequence-Stratigraphic Framework: Isolating Controls on Reservoir Architecture," $4,800, Evan K. Franseen, Kansas Geological Survey.
"Utility of Ground-Penetrating Radar in Generating Detailed 3-D Images of Sandstone and Limestone Reservoir Analogs," $1,940, Joseph M. Kruger, Kansas Geological Survey.
"Development of High Performance and Long Life PEM Fuel Cells," $6,940, Trung Van Nguyen (PI) and Brian E. Thompson, Department of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering
"Obtaining Publishable Data on Alternative Fuel Blends and Cetane Improvers," $2,500, Galen J. Suppes, Department of Chemical and Petroleum Engineering
Last year ERC awarded 4 researchers a total of $10,000 including Evan Franseen, KGS, Joe Kruger, KGS, Galen Suppes, C & P Engineering and Judy Wu, Physics. A review of Judy's research follows.
Judy Wu, Department of Physics and Astronomy, was one of our seed-fund awardees in 1996. Judy is the Principal Investigator of KU's superconducting Thin Film group. They have been studying high temperature superconducting Hg-based cuprate thin films as well bulks. The Hg-based superconductors carry the highest superconducting transition temperature of 135 Kelvin therefore have attracted much attention due to their perspective applications in many electronic devices.
The research has focused on several topics: (1) understanding of the growth mechanism of the HG-based superconducting thin films and developing novel techniques to achieve high quality films for commercialization. (2) exploring new materials with higher Tc by chemical doping; (3) studying fundamental physical properties of the Hg-based superconductor including the mixed-state magnetic flux dynamics; and (4) applications of the Hg-based superconducting films in microwave and optical devices. The goal of this research is to achieve a thorough understanding on the fundamental physics of Hg-based superconductors and to develop them into practical forms for microelectronic applications.
The grant from KU ERC was used as seed money to start a research project on fabrication of Hg-based cuprate films using MOCVD process. Some preliminary results have been achieved recently which included obtaining IIg-1212 films with Tc 120 K using metal-organic chemical vapor deposition -MOCVD and building a liquid precursor supplying system for MOCVD aiming for continuous deposition of the film in NOCVD process. Results will be reported at the upcoming American Physical Society Annual Meeting in Kansas.
U.S.DOE, Federal Energy Technology Center. HIGH EFFICIENCY FOSSIL POWER PLANTS(HEFPP) CONCEPTUALIZATION PROGRAM SOL DE-RA21-97-MC34164, due 5/21/97. The goal of the project is to identify concepts which will produce affordable, safe, environmentally friendly electrical power at greater than 70 percent efficiency from fossil fuels. The end use application for the system is distributed power. One of the components must be a fuel cell which is fueled with natural gas. Request maybe submitted by Fax at (304)285-4683.
RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT OF HIGH EFFICIENCY GAS-TURBINE HYBRID POWER UNITS FOR HYBRID-ELECTRIC AUTOMOTIVE APPLICATIONS, SOL DE-FC02-97EE50455 due 9/27/97. DOE will issue a Program Research Announcement for development of high efficiency ceramic gas-turbine power units for hybrid-electric automotive applications. Final PRDA package will be issued on or about July 15, 1997. Interested and qualified organizations should submit a written request to: U.S. Department of Energy, Chicago Operations Office, Acquisition and Assistance Group, Building 201, 9800 S. Cass Avenue, Argonne, Illinois, 60439. Attn: David E. Ramirez, Contract Specialist. (630-252-2133)
3-D Seismic, For Engineers and Geologists, The University of Tulsa, to be held in Houston, May 13-16, Tulsa, Oklahoma, August 12-15, and New Orleans, Louisiana, October 14-17, 1997. For more information: The University of Tulsa, Division of Continuing Education, 600 South College Avenue, Tulsa, OK. 74104, (918)631-2347 or E-Mail: conted_cee@utulsa.edu.
The Practical Aspects of Reservoir Simulation Modeling, May 19-20, 1997, The University of Texas at Austin, College of Engineering. and Rock Properties and Heterogeneity, May 21-23, 1997. To register: Fax (512)232-1972, or call (512) 471-3506
Natural Gas Engineering, Continuing Engineering Studies, The
University of Texas, Austin, May 19-23, 1997. For more information:
Program: Dr. Miller at (512)471-3250 or Fax (512)471-9605. Registration
Desk: (512)471-3506.
E-mail:Mark_Miller@pe.utexa s.edu.
1st International Conference on Petroleum Data Integration & Management - Data Optimization, Applications, Data Fusion, June 16-18, sponsored by Geoshare User=s Group, Houston Marriott Wesstside Hotel, Registration ph. 214-220-9091, Philip C. Crouse and Assoc., 400 N. St. Paul, Suite 440, Dallas, TX 75201.
Fourth SIAM (Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics) Conference on Mathematical and Computational Issues in the Geosciences, June 16-19, Sheraton Old Town Hotel, Albuquerque, New Mexico, Pre-registration deadline June 2. Application at ERC. Mailing address: SIAM Conference Department, 3600 University City Science Center, Philadelphia, PA 19104-2688.
Computer Applications for the Petroleum Industry, June 23-27 at the Kansas Geological Survey, The University of Kansas, Lawrence. Sponsored by the KU Energy Research Center, Kansas Geological Survey as part of the Petroleum Technology Transfer Council with funds from the U.S. Department of Energy. Five workshops, each one-day long: Practical DOE Predictive Models for Improved Oil Recovery in Midcontinent Oil Fields (Monday 6/23), Internet for the Petroleum Industry (Tuesday 6/24), Well-log Analysis on a PC Using the PfEFFER spreadsheet program (6/25), Reservoir Simulation on a PC using U.S. DOE BOAST 3 and Computer Mapping Packages (Thursday 6/26), and Open-Access to Computers (Friday 6/27). See attached brochure for further information.
Nodal System Analysis, Production Optimization for Oil and Gas Wells, October 27-31, 1997, Houston, Texas, sponsored by The University of Texas, Div. of Continuing Education. For more information: The University of Tulsa, Division of Continuing Education, 600 South College Avenue, Tulsa, Ok. 74104 or call (918)631-3088 or e-mail: conted_cee@utulsa.edu
Coal Transportation How to profit from the new Dynamics, presented by Coal Outlook, May 13-14, 1997, Cincinnati, Ohio. Discount if registration is received by April 14, 1997. Send fax to 713-460-9150 or more information.
The Gas Research Institute filed an application with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission requesting approval of a new mechanism for funding its research, development and commercialization (RD&C) program beginning January 1, 1998.
The institute said the new mechanism would improve its ability to develop funding for the program, spread the burden of collection, and "unbundle" the base program into three sub-programs--supply, transmission and distribution operations/end-use. The overall program would continue to be governed by the GRI board of directors, composed of producer, pipeline, distribution and gas-user representatives. Other changes in governance to improve program efficiency and focus will be considered in the future.
Funding for the supply and transmission sub-programs would be through a FERC-approved discountable volumetric surcharge collected from shippers and interstate pipelines. The surcharge would apply when the volumetric rate being charged equals or exceeds the filed volumetric tariff rate. The first part of the funding mechanism is essentially the same as the commodity component of the current funding mechanism, in effect since January 1, 1994.
1996 Annual Report of GRI is available on their web site at www.gri.org.
Co-director Carr gave a presentation at the Geological Society of America meeting on electronic publication in the sciences. Two papers have been published as a result of this presentation. Tim gave a talk at the IOGCC meeting on providing oil and gas data and technology to the independent oil companies and operators. The booth at the Geological Society of America meeting in Denver was organized by Carr, he a gave talk at the same meeting. December found Tim in Bakersfield, CA giving a talk at the San Joaquin Geological Society of California, the presentation was on petroleum research. In March Tim attended the Reservoir Characterization Conference held in Houston, he co-authored a paper from that Conference. Also, in March, Tim, Lynn Watney and other KGS staff attended the Southwest Kansas Irrigators meeting held at Hugoton, Kansas. This meeting gave the ERC and KGS staff an opportunity to offer input into the current situation with Oil and Gas resources in Southwest Kansas. Co-Director Carr gave a presentation at the AAPG meeting in Dallas on the Midcontinent Petroleum Atlas and assisted with the presentation given on the Schaben Field.
Co-Director Paul Willhite attended the Annual Technical Conference and Exhibition of the Society of Petroleum Engineers, in Denver, October 4-6, 1996. He presented a paper on permeability modification of porous rocks using a new gelled polymer system at the SPE International Oilfield Chemistry Symposium in Houston, Tx. in February 1997.
In March Paul presented a seminar on research activities in permeability modification to Phillips Petroleum Production Research Branch in Bartlesville, OK, he also visited with BDM Oklahoma staff.
Paul was this year's organizer of the 12th Oil Recovery Conference sponsored by TORP in Wichita, March 19-20, 1997.
Lynn Watney, Executive Director of ERC presented a paper with Geoff Bohling and John Doveton at the 17th Annual Research Conference -- Stratigraphic Analysis: Utilizing Advanced Geophysical, Wireline and Borehole Technology for Petroleum Exploration and Production sponsored by Gulf Coast Section Society of Economic Paleontologists and Mineralogists Foundation, in Houston, TX, December 8-11. Lynn served as the co-organizer of a Petrofacies Workshop held at KU on December 17, 1996. Lynn presented a paper at the Fourth International Reservoir Characterization Conference sponsored by DOE, BDM-Oklahoma and AAPG, March 2-4 in Houston, Tx. Lynn was co-author of a paper on PfEFFER log analysis software presented by John Doveton at the 12th Oil Recovery Conference, in Wichita, March 20th. Lynn co-authored three papers at the Annual Meeting of American Association of Petroleum Geologists and Society of Sedimentary Geology held in Dallas the week of April 7th.
G. Suppes, C&P, Demo of New Cetane Improvers for Use with Diesel Fuels, KCC, $30,000.
D. Newell & B. Goldstein, KGS, Geology, Diagenesis and Porosity Evolution of Pennsylvania Strawn Formation in the Subsurface of the Val Verde Basin, Tx., Conoco, Inc., $46,483.
G. Suppes, C&PE, Testing and Processing of Corn Stover Based Fuels for Use in Diesel Engines, Ks. Corn Comm., $20,000.
G. Suppes, C & PE, Specialty Chemicals from Soybean Oil and Soy Biodiesel Phase 1 & 2, Kansas Soybean, $20,000.
G. Suppes, C & PE, J. Heppert, Chemistry, K, Bowman-James, Sorghum Stover Based Fuels for Use in Diesel Engines, Kansas Grain Comm., $20,000
G. Suppes, C & PE, J. Heppert, Chemistry, High Value Soydiesel Fuel Additives, USDA, $180,000.
G. Suppes, C & PE, Recycling Waste Polymers-Hydrolyzing Polymer to Produce Cetane Improvers, EPA, $125,000.
B. Goldstein/E. Franseen, Predicting the Distribution of Class I Aggregate from Geologic and Rock Properties, Kansas Department of Transportation, $32,000