
The Advanced Energy Consortium (AEC) hosted its 7th Biannual All-Projects Review at Halliburton's beautiful new corporate offices in Houston, November 14–15. More than 140 students, professors, and industry members from around the world gathered for this 2-day event at the new Life Center Building at the center of Halliburton's large campus. In addition to the 35 technical presentations were a number of topical poster sessions, guided tours of the facility, and an offsite reception. After Halliburton's keynote, the event kicked off with progress reports from the nanomaterial sensor projects, which now include smart tracers, reservoir reporters, payload delivery systems, and options for clocking and improving EOR. Then Carla Thomas introduced the oil industry's first coordinated program to test nanoparticle mobility using standard test materials and rigorous protocols, and she presented early results using AEC-developed nanosensors. Thursday morning Mohsen Ahmadian detailed how the AEC is preparing for its first field test, and he then introduced researchers who are synthesizing, characterizing, and modeling magnetic, acoustic, and dielectric nanoparticles that will change the future of geophysical interrogation. Finally, David Chapman outlined the AEC's microfabricated-sensor development strategy, followed by research teams who are creating new micro- and nanosensors and novel high-temperature power sources, while integrating all into a packaged prototyping platform for testing. Next year's invitation-only events will be held May 29–30, 2013, at Schlumberger's Doll Research Center in Boston and November 20–21, 2013 at Shell's Westhollow Technology Center.  |