Engineering and Geology
The engineering and geology group deals with oil and gas production. It provides services led by three senior petroleum engineers to three geographical areas - North, South and Central. A geologist and two engineering technologists provide support across all three geographical areas.
The group provides technical evaluations as part of the review and processing of leases at the ends of their primary and succeeding terms. The group also executes duties in the areas of volumetric compliance, production monitoring, economic evaluation and reservoir engineering. Close liaisons with other functional groups in the organization are maintained while performing these functions.
The activities performed in the compliance area include:
- ensuring that production volumes are measured accurately and correctly reported and inspecting production equipment located on reserves to ensure operation in an environmentally sound manner
- monitoring the drilling and status of wells around reserves to identify situations where First Nations oil and gas resources are subject to the risk of being drained and taking appropriate measures to lessen the risk of drainage
- ensuring that all necessary documents required by the Indian Oil and Gas Regulations, 1995 and which pertain to drilling, servicing and abandoning wells in which a First Nation has a royalty interest, are provided by permittees and lessees
- reviewing technical applications of various kinds which companies submit to the provincial regulatory authorities and which could potentially impact First Nations reserve lands
The activities performed in the reservoir engineering area include:
- providing yearly revenue forecasts to First Nations and the regional offices for budgeting purposes
- evaluating oil and gas leases for continuance
- processing applications to abandon wells and to convert wells for water disposal, fluid injection or use as observation wells
- providing advice to First Nations with respect to the economics presented by companies in support of their proposals for developing First Nation lands
- estimating the recoverable volumes of oil and gas under Indian reserves and maintaining current records of this information (known as the hydrocarbon resource inventory)