An Interactive 5-Day Training Course

Upstream Exploration and Production Engineering for Oil and Gas

Upstream Exploration and Production Engineering for Oil and Gas

Scheduled Dates

19 - 23 Oct 2026
Lisbon - Portugal
$5,950

Why Choose this Training Course?

This Upstream Exploration and Production Engineering training course gives you the complete upstream picture, from finding hydrocarbons to producing them safely and profitably. Exploration decisions shape what production engineers inherit, and production realities determine whether a discovery delivers value, so understanding both ends of the field life cycle is a real competitive advantage. You will follow the life of a field from petroleum geology, geoscience and basin exploration, through appraisal and economics, to well performance, completion design and production optimisation.

Production Engineering integrates subsurface and surface, and this course shows how geological understanding, uncertainty and economics drive well and production system decisions. You will study perforating, stimulation, sand management and artificial lift, and consider the health, safety and environmental responsibilities that run through upstream operations. Highly interactive theory, exercises and group work, with opportunities to share your own experience, culminate in brainstorming and troubleshooting real challenges that you can take back and apply to your own wells and fields.

This training course will highlight:

  • Petroleum geology, geoscience and basin exploration
  • Field appraisal and exploration and development economics across the field life cycle
  • The role and essential components of Production Engineering and the fundamentals of well completion design
  • Well performance, perforating, stimulation, sand management and artificial lift
  • How to maximise oil and gas production and recovery, safely and sustainably

What are the Goals?

At the end of this training course, you will learn to: 

  • Explain petroleum geology, geoscience and basin exploration
  • Analyse field appraisal and exploration economics
  • Describe Production Engineering's role and essential components
  • Apply fundamentals of well completion design
  • Optimise production and recovery safely and sustainably

Who is this Training Course for?

This course suits professionals who want to understand the upstream life cycle from exploration to production. It also benefits those aiming to broaden their skills into Production Engineering.

This training course is suitable to a wide range of professionals but will greatly benefit:

  • Exploration Managers and Engineers, Geoscientists and Petrophysicists
  • Production Engineers, New Production Technologists, Facility Engineers and other Surface Engineers
  • Reservoir, Well and Drilling Engineers and Well Services Personnel
  • Operations, Planning, Cost, Contract and Financial Managers and Engineers
  • Managers, Team Leaders and Supervisors involved in upstream operations who want to maximise production and recovery

How will this Training Course be Presented?

This training course offers a highly interactive learning experience, blending classroom learning, exercises, case studies, group work and discussion, supported by presentations and video. The instructor applies proven adult learning techniques that address participants' learning preference styles. Active participation is essential, as delegates share their experience and expertise with the tutor and each other. The course concludes by brainstorming and troubleshooting participants' real issues for application to their own wells and fields.

Organisational Impact

The Organisation will have the following benefits;

  • Estimate discovery size with sound geological understanding
  • Design appraisal programmes that safeguard investment
  • Manage risk using robust exploration economics
  • Improve well completion design and well integrity
  • Optimise production with skilled well performance analysis
  • Integrate well, reservoir and facility management safely

Personal Impact

At the end of this training course, the participants will gain the following;

  • Apply geoscience knowledge to engineering decisions
  • Create field appraisals and analyse exploration economics
  • Analyse well performance to optimise production
  • Recommend artificial lift and stimulation techniques
  • Apply completion design and integrated sand management
  • Lead integrated, safe production system optimisation

Daily Agenda

Day 1: Finding Hydrocarbons: Petroleum Geology, Geoscience and Basin Exploration
  • Introduction to the upstream field life cycle, from exploration to abandonment
  • The rock cycle and plate tectonics
  • Hydrocarbon generation and source rocks
  • Reservoirs, traps and seals: rock properties and the elements of a petroleum system
  • Gravity and magnetic surveying
  • Seismic
  • Basin potential evaluation and basin analysis
  • Unconventional resources
Day 2: Appraisal and Economics: Reducing Uncertainty and Valuing the Field Life Cycle

  • The role of appraisal in the field life cycle
  • Identifying and quantifying sources of uncertainty
  • Appraisal tools and expressing the reduction of uncertainty
  • Cost-benefit calculations for appraisal
  • Exploration economics and managing exploration risk
  • Development economics and project cashflow
  • Economic lifetime and abandonment
  • From appraisal to development: translating subsurface uncertainty into well and production system decisions
Day 3: From Discovery to Production: Well Fundamentals, Inflow, Outflow and Perforating

  • Production Engineering introduction: its role from the reservoir, through the well, to the production system and export
  • The DNA of a well: what makes a well?
  • PVT
  • Inflow theory
  • Inflow performance relationship
  • Outflow theory and vertical lift performance
  • Perforating theory
  • Perforating selection
Day 4: Enhancing Production: Stimulation, Sand Management, Artificial Lift and Field Management

  • Formation damage
  • Stimulation theory: matrix stimulation and hydraulic fracturing
  • Stimulation selection
  • Downhole sand control
  • Integrated sand management
  • Artificial lift theory, with a focus on gas lift and electrical submersible pumps
  • Artificial lift selection
  • Well, reservoir and facility management: theory and implementation
Day 5: Safe and Sustainable Production: HSE, System Optimisation and Finding Solutions

  • Health considerations in upstream operations
  • Safety culture
  • Safety management systems
  • Environmental considerations and current environmental concerns
  • Production system optimisation with an integrated team
  • Finding solutions: theory
  • Solutions selection
  • Participants' production engineering challenges: brainstorming and troubleshooting real issues

Certificate

  • Upon successful completion of this training course, delegates will be awarded an official PetroKnowledge Certificate of Completion, signed by the course facilitator. The certificate confirms successful participation and records the total learning hours completed.
  • Continuing Professional Education credits (CPE): In accordance with the standards of the National Registry of CPE Sponsors, one CPE credit is granted per 50 minutes of attendance.

Accreditation

NASBA Approved Training Courses

Would an alternative date be more suitable?

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