New reservoir simulation capability reported by ExxonMobil and National Center for Supercomputing Applications scientists may reduce the amount of time previously taken to study oil and gas reservoirs.

The researchers achieved a breakthrough in parallel simulation by using 716,800 processors, the equivalent of harnessing the power of 22,400 computers with 32 processors per computer. ExxonMobil says its geoscientists and engineers can now make better investment decisions by more efficiently predicting reservoir performance under geological uncertainty to assess a higher volume of alternative development plans in less time.

The simulation generated data output thousands of times faster than typical oil and gas industry reservoir analyses. Reservoir simulations guide decisions such as well placement, and development of operational strategies to minimize financial and environmental risk.