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What is MPath?
MPath is a modeling framework for creating, risking, querying and visualizing high resolution datasets related to petroleum exploration and production. Complete with advanced querying and visualization tools, MPath is valuable to both the traditional basin modeler and reservoir characterization teams. MPath includes a suite of simulators, linking regional, basin and reservoir modeling. MPath's migration fluid-flow solvers are applicable to capillary-dominated flow operating under drainage conditions. MPath Migration predicts petroleum migration trajectories and highly detailed petroleum emplacement patterns by rapidly simulating multi-phase flow behavior in porous and fractured media. Using MPath Migration, you can model 3D, multi-scale, multi-million gridcell petroleum transport in a matter of minutes. MPath Migration provides very high resolution model realizations of petroleum emplacement, at multiple lengthscales, but it cannot model petroleum recovery. MPath Migration can tell you where petroleum is and how it got there, but not how it will behave under water flood. MPath's pressure, continuity, and mixing simulators, developed as part of Permedia's Fluid Mixing Research Program, close the loop. Not only can MPath predict where the petroleum is located, it can also provide information on its production properties.
It's fast. MPath Migration executes a 100 million gridcell model in minutes on a modest workstation. And it can be run on distributed computing grids for fast execution of multiple realizations. It works at high resolutions. With MPath, data doesn't have to be upscaled, averaged or simplified to use. It honors uncertainty in input data. MPath can be used for risking the impact of a given input or input scenario. In fact, it is probably the best petroleum systems risking tool available since it can quickly evaluate so many realizations and scenarios, all at non-degraded spatial resolutions. It's flexible. Using MPath, you can simulate single and multi-phase migration, identify rock bodies (e.g., pay zones), risk multiple realizations, and visualize the results in 3D. And MPath supports a variety of formats from other modeling packages while using open and well-described file formats for its own data. It's easy to use. MPath uses straightforward graphical user interfaces for building models, entering simulation data, risking, and querying and visualizing the results.
How high a resolution can MPath handle? The highest resolution model we've heard of is 850 million gridcells. A 1 billion gridcell model (and beyond) isn't out of the question due to the efficient way in which MPath handles memory resources. Essentially, data does not have to be "upscaled" to be used by MPath. If you have a basin model at seismic resolution, you can use it.
MPath has two migration simulators: single phase (constant fluid properties) and multi-phase (multi-component, multi-phase, dynamic properties). A 100 million gridcell model, using the single phase option, executes in about 5 minutes on a modest workstation. The multi-phase algorithm is about an order of magnitude slower (but the performance gap is closing).
What makes MPath Migration so fast? Basin modeling packages typically use the same set of flow equations and solvers that are used in reservoir simulators. However, the balance of forces operating at production timescales is entirely different to those operating at geological (migration) timescales. MPath's migration simulators honor the physics controlling petroleum migration and recognize that these fluids are moving at extremely low flow rates and are almost exclusively controlled by simple driving forces (i.e., buoyancy and external water pressures) and simple resistive forces (capillary pressure). The assumption of capillary equilibrium operating under drainage conditions allows MPath to avoid most of the numerical complexities of traditional migration solvers.
Are there any competing products for MPath Migration? No other product can model migration and reservoir filling at anywhere near the resolutions and speeds of MPath. Developed for more than 10 years, MPath Migration includes a host of supporting technologies to enhance petroleum system modeling. Others are starting to copy our work, but we see this as an endorsement of our technologies. If you want to honor all of your input data at the highest resolution possible, honor the controlling physics of petroleum migration and have simulation results fast, MPath stands alone.
Is MPath just about Migration? No. MPath effectively bridges the worlds of basin and reservoir modeling, providing a rich set of tools for simulating processes that occur at regional, basin and reservoir scales. MPath can be used to identify rock bodies (e.g., pay zones) in high resolution models. This type of analysis can be combined with migration results to answer queries such as: "Find all pay zones in a high-resolution input volume, charge the model with petroleum and tell me how much of my pay sees the charge." Or "find all high vertical coherency objects in the model, assume they're faults or fracture zones, and model them as such for migration purposes". MPath includes a fully coupled basin simulator, for forward modeling pressures and temperatures in an evolving mesh, along with basin model building tools that allow you to build sophisticated 2D and 3D models. MPath also includes a new high-resolution reservoir fluid pressure, continuity, and mixing solver. And MPath comes with Permedia Viewers, a powerful suite of tools for visualizing, querying and ranking results; mapping tools for terrain, closure and category analysis; and tools for extracting data from volumes and performing transform operations on volumes and maps. One user described Viewers as "Gocad-lite with added simulators."
Can MPath be used for reservoir modeling? Yes. Many clients use MPath to simulate the emplacement of petroleum into high-resolution (e.g., seismic resolution) reservoir models (so-called "reservoir filling" models). This is a new application of basin modeling and starts with the question: "given this high resolution petrophysical description of my reservoir, and assuming migration has taken place, where would I expect to see the petroleum? How much and what kind?" Because the migration routines assume drainage conditions (i.e., wetting phase decreasing), the existing migration algorithms can not be used to simulate petroleum recovery. MPath Migration can tell you where the fluids are, but not how they will behave under production. MPath's new mixing simulators are specifically targetted to understand compositional resevoir filling. We are also developing a Black Oil production simulator with our colleagues at InTerres.
What platforms does MPath support? MPath runs on Linux (RHEL 4 and 5), and Windows (XP and Vista), in 32- and 64-bit.
What data formats does MPath support? MPath can use a large variety of file formats, including SEGY files, Irap, Eclipse, PetroMod, TemisPack, Zmap, CPS3, Petrel, Gocad, and more. MPath also has seamless links with PetroMod and TemisPack, allowing you to run dynamic simulations on PetroMod and Temis models and then co-render the results in 3D Viewer and query the results using Permedia Viewers' post-processing tools, which are optimized for high resolution datasets. Permedia Viewers, the visualization and querying environment, supports dozens of industry formats, allowing you to co-render large, complex datasets from a variety of sources. More information on MPath's data handling can be found here.
How does MPath interact with other basin modeling tools? MPath supports PetroMod, Temis and Gocad meshes natively; you can run migration simulations directly on your basin models, without any conversion.
Why use coarse dynamic grids created in basin simulators in MPath? Using MPath's conditioning fabrics, you can infill coarse basin or reservoir models with fabric information derived from seismic, geostatistical models, or other data, at its original resolution. Conditioning fabrics allow detail to be added to models at a resolution that is independent of the main modeling grid. In effect, using conditioning fabrics lets you "downscale" coarse basin models. One consequence of this is that petroleum migration calculations can be done at a much finer (e.g., seismic) resolution than the main input grid.
MPath is protected by the FlexLM license management system. Consortium members receive two base (perpetual) licenses as part of the research program, and can purchase additional licenses. See Get MPath for more information. |
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Join the Permedia Research and Development Consortium and participate in the evolution of MPath. Membership provides a unique opportunity to shape the product you need.
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