Production Engineer

Job Description

Within the Operations team, this Production engineering position based in Neuquen will report to the Surveillance Team Lead, supporting Shell-operated venture Argentina assets (Sierras Blancas, Cruz de Lorena, Coiron Amargo sur Oeste & Bajada de Añelo).

He or She will be the primary engineering resource for production surveillance and Ops support in the field area to which they are assigned, supporting increased production, minimal downtime, and high Safety standard performance. The Production Engineer is expected to closely work and proactively interface with other members of the Surveillance team, Production Operations, Facilities Engineering, Wells and Development teams.

Accountabilities:

• Work on an integrated team with operations staff, production engineers, reservoir engineers and facilities engineers to safely maintain maximized field production.
• Mentor and coach junior staff on developing and applying production engineering skills.
• Do well surveillance on 100+ Vaca Muerta Shell-operated developed wells and multiple water disposal wells: Identify, rank, plan and support the execution of production optimization opportunities.
• Independently design, monitor and optimize artificial lift systems (Rod pump, Plunger lift, Velocity Strings and gas lift).
• Identify, rank and propose well intervention programs. Track budget spend and performance vs. target
• Proactively contribute to the evergreen Production System Optimization (PSO) which includes annual review of WRFM Plan, update of surveillance activities, data acquisition, artificial lift recommendations, New Well choke policy.

Requirements

• Petroleum Engineer with 10+ yrs of relevant production engineer experience in Unconventional plays, well surveillance methods, inflow-outflow relationships and artificial lift optimization (rod pumping, plunger lift & gas lift technology).
• Demonstrated focus on commercial drivers and outcomes of technical work.
• Able to produce and take ownership of high-quality technical work, with rigorous discipline to agreed cadence of optimization updates and clear and focused KPI’s.

• Highly skilled in the application of production engineering tools for well & flow performance analysis (GAP, Prosper, Pipesim, XSPOC, SRod) and integrated production system modeling.
• A willingness to build digitalization skills within the Production engineering skillset: Digital skills and data science is a plus (matlab, spotfire, powerBI, python).
• Inquisitive nature, examining both Shell and external ways of working to implement best practices for well surveillance and field development.
• Strong interpersonal and communication skills to work with the full range of multi-discipline technical staff.
• Native Spanish speaker with strong proficiency in English and ability to work with an international network team (Houston, Calgary, Buenos Aires, Neuquen)