Research Group's Organisation
The Reservoir Physics research group conducts fundamental and applied research aimed at developing innovative subsurface technologies for decarbonizing energy-intensive industries.The research group was established in 1982 at the Department of Physics and Technology at the University of Bergen with the main objective of developing technologies for enhanced oil and gas recovery on the Norwegian Continental Shelf. More recently, the group has revised its research goals, objectives, and vision to align with societal and industrial needs in response to climate change and the need for the energy transition. Since the group’s inception, the organizational structure has remained and is described below.
Main content
The group’s organization maintains an internationally leading position in innovative research and technology development on subsurface energy security and low-emission technologies. The group is organized with one main leader, supported by five team leaders. Prof. Arne Graue has been the group leader and administratively responsible since 1990. His main responsibilities have been to coordinate research, educational activities, international collaborations, and suggest strategies for developing the group according to the group’s visions and goals. In collaboration with the team leaders, he has also been heading the group’s efforts to generate external funding.
Team leaders are faculty members and/or research scientists who take leading roles in research and education while contributing to the group's strategic decisions. Each team leader is responsible for one or more topics in the research portfolio, and coordinates and heads research activities within each research team. Each research team consists of post-docs, PhD, and master students. Team members may participate in several different teams, to fully exploit cross-disciplinary and synergistic skills and competence. Each research team has designated goals and objectives, but all research topics are coordinated to contribute to the research group’s overall goals. Currently, the thematical research teams are: 1) CO2 foam (headed by Dr. Zachary Paul Alcorn), 2) Underground H2 storage (headed by Prof. Martin Fernø), 3) Carbon storage (headed by Prof. Martin Fernø), 4) Gas hydrates (headed by Prof. Geir Ersland), 5) Polymer/Gel research (headed by Dr. Bergit Brattekås), and 6) South American collaboration (headed by Dr. Jacquelin Cobos). All group members participate in the collaborative project with medical science on high spatial resolution imaging of multiphase flow in porous media.
Scientific and educational responsibilities for research and student activities are distributed among the group members: Prof. Martin Fernø has been responsible for national and regional collaboration, public dissemination efforts and coordinating operation and maintenance of the group’s in-house and external laboratory facilities. Prof. Geir Ersland has led the bachelor and master study programs, the continued education program in CCUS, and the MRI/NMR collaboration with Equinor. Researcher Zachary Paul Alcorn has been responsible for researcher training, participating in international research efforts, developing the master study program in collaboration with other board members, and coordinating the group’s high pressure/high temperature laboratory facilities. He is also the R&D Director for a large national Norwegian research center. Researcher Na Liu coordinates the H2 laboratory research, overseeing microfluidic and microbial studies in collaboration with master and PhD students. She is also one of the main contact points for collaboration with NORCE. Researcher Bergit Brattekås has been responsible for research collaborations with University of Stavanger and Petroleum Recovery Research Center (PRRC) at New Mexico Tech. She headed the interdisciplinary collaborations with medical science at Haukeland Research Hospital utilizing high spatial resolution medical PET/CT and MRI systems. Researcher Jacquelin Cobos is currently responsible for the NORAD project Norhed II for South American international educational collaboration. The group also employs two laboratory engineers responsible for maintaining laboratory facilities and ensuring a prominent level of health, safety, and environment (HSE).
The leadership strategy described above incentivizes early-career scientists to actively contribute and eventually take leadership roles in research projects. Delegating leadership tasks and project management responsibilities motivates early-career scientists and provides an important learning curve. This approach has proven very efficient in attracting promising faculty candidates to create new and relevant research topics. Researchers are encouraged early in their careers to establish their own scientific networks by participating in international conferences, collaborations, and professional societies. This contributes to research independence, international mobility, and positions the researchers to foster complementary research topics.