Geothermal Postdoctoral Fellow

About the role

The Bureau of Economic Geology, The University of Texas at Austin, invites applications for a 1-year Postdoctoral Fellow in Geothermal Engineering, focusing on reservoir flow conformance and flow control technologies for next-generation Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS).

Responsibilities

• Conduct research to characterize and manage fracture connectivity and optimize fluid distribution within granites and sedimentary rocks.
• Maximize heat sweep efficiency, reduce preferential flow through highly conductive fractures, delay thermal breakthrough, and enhance long-term thermal recovery from geothermal systems.
• Model, evaluate, and optimize innovative engineering solutions, including chemical, mechanical, completion-based, and operational flow control strategies.
• Write peer-reviewed journal publications and conference papers.
• Present at conferences.
• Identify new funding opportunities and help write proposals.

Requirements

• Ph.D. in petroleum engineering, geothermal engineering, earth sciences, and related disciplines with experience in geothermal energy or unconventional oil and gas well completions.
• Demonstrated experience in porous and/or fractured-media flow and subsurface fluid transport.
• Demonstrated experience in reservoir flow conformance, flow control, fluid diversion, and well completions.
• Experience with simulation programs such as CMG, TOUGH, MOOSE, ResFrac, or similar tools.
• Strong understanding of multiphase flow, heat transport, and fractured reservoir behavior.
• Programming experience in Python, MATLAB, or similar scientific computing languages.
• Excellent data management skills.
• Demonstrated scientific/technical writing and publications.
• Excellent interpersonal and communication skills, and professional demeanor.
• Able to work effectively with multiple disciplines, including geosciences and engineering.
• PhD must have been obtained within 3 years from date of hire.

Preferred Qualifications

• Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) and geothermal reservoir engineering.
• Unconventional well completions and multistage hydraulic fracture stimulation.
• Hydraulic fracture propagation modeling, characterization, and flow diagnostics.
• Reservoir conformance control, fluid diversion, and flow control technologies used in oil and gas, and geothermal reservoirs.
• Familiarity with polymer, gel, foam, particle-based, or smart fluid flow diversion technologies.
• Zonal isolation, selective injection/production, completion-based flow control, or other flow management strategies.
• Discrete Fracture Network (DFN) and Embedded Discrete Fracture Modeling (EDFM).
• Tracer design and interpretation.
• Machine learning or optimization for reservoir management.
• Experience working with field-scale geothermal or oil and gas datasets and industries.

Skills

• Experience with simulation programs such as CMG, TOUGH, MOOSE, ResFrac, or similar tools.
• Programming experience in Python, MATLAB, or similar scientific computing languages.
• Strong understanding of multiphase flow, heat transport, and fractured reservoir behavior.
• Experience with discrete fracture network (DFN) and embedded discrete fracture modeling (EDFM).
• Tracer design and interpretation.
• Machine learning or optimization for reservoir management.

Benefits

N/A

Pay

$65,000

Schedule

Weekly Scheduled Hours: 40