FESAus, the Formation Evaluation Society of Australia, is the Australian chapter of the Society of Petrophysicists and Well Log Analysts (SPWLA). It was born in July 2007 of the integration of the Formation Evaluation societies of different states of Australia. 

Its aims are to provide a technical monthly forum for geoscientists focused on all aspects of formation evaluation, from new tools available to new techniques and approaches to analysing reservoirs, and to encourage formation evaluation professionals to network.

In line with the founding principles of the SPWLA, FESAus is a non-profit organization dedicated to the advancement of the science of Petrophysics and Formation Evaluation, including well logging, coring, and other formation evaluation techniques and to the application of these techniques to the exploitation of gas, oil and other minerals, particularly in Australia. 

FESAus also aims to provide information services to scientists in the Australian petroleum and mineral industries, to serve as a voice of shared interests in the profession, to play a major role in education in Petrophysics, and to increase awareness of the contribution of Petrophysics to the Oil and Gas industry.

Currently membership (2016) is over 150 geoscientists from all over Australia and beyond. Join our free mailing list to stay informed of our events and activities – or better yet: become a member and enjoy the benefits of FESAus membership.  Membership is free for Australia-based SPWLA members in good standing.

We welcome your input, comments and feedback!  Our contact address is P.O. Box 7081, Shenton Park, WA 6008, and our trading address is 40 Commercial Road, Shenton  Park, Perth WA 6008, Australia.

We are proud that FESAus hosted the 51th SPWLA Annual Symposium in 2010 in Perth, Western Australia.  Other flagship activities include:

• A yearly FESAus “New Technology Day”, in September, with alternating focus on software and hardware;
• A yearly FESAus “Student Day”, in October, with the award of FESAus’s Hugh Crocker Scholarship to support and encourage a particularly meritous student of Formation Evaluation in Australia;
• Regular “Master Classes” which we also aim to take to every capital city of the Australian Federation active in the oil and gas industry;

and more… Read about all this on this website.

The Formation Evaluation Society of Australia (FESAus)  is a non-profit corporation, staffed and run almost exclusively by volunteers.  However it is also not a for-loss corporation.  The courses and other events that we offer are planned ahead, and the maximum number of participants to any event is frequently limited.  Hence the main consequences of a cancellation are that:

• an opportunity for someone interested to attend the event may be lost, and
• committed expenses must be paid even if the registered person does not attend.

Our cancellation policy aims to be fair to all parties.  Acceptance of the terms listed below is a pre-condition to registration and attendance to any of our events.

Normal registration policy: for any event organized by FESAus, our normal registration policy is to accept only registrations made through our website, with credit-card payment at the time of the registration, by the advertised deadline.  That deadline is not arbitrary: it is usually the last time at which we ourselves have to commit to outside companies for, e.g. catering and printing.

Cancellations should be done by email admin@fesaus.org, which goes to several FESAus administration person in case one is absent.  If you wish to have an acceptable proof that you sent the email on time, please set a “Read receipt” for your message before sending it, and any return message you get showing that your email was read will constitute an acceptable proof.

For cancellations sent 7 calendar days before the start of the event at the latest:

• For events with a base cost (i.e. not the discounted student cost) of A$ 50 or less, FESAus will reimburse the full cost of registration.
• FESAus will reimburse the full cost of registration, minus A$ 50 (fifty) to cover administration overheads associated with the reimbursement, and the risk that FESAus may not identify a replacement candidate in the time remaining.  

For cancellations sent between 7 calendar days before the start of the event and the registration deadline: FESAus will reimburse 75% of the full cost of registration, to cover the same as above, with the risk of not identifying a replacement candidate being much greater.

For cancellations sent after the registration deadline: the full cost of registration will be forfeited, i.e. no reimbursement.

Substitutions: if you cannot attend but you have identified a substitute participant (excluding subsidized participants such as students), you will be reimbursed in full shortly after the normal registration of the new participant.  The new participant will be issued with a normal tax receipt.  You need to document this by timely email to admin@fesaus.org.  Participant substitution without new payment, e.g. by someone from the same company, is normally possible, but it is at the discretion of FESAus.

Partial cancellations: if you can only attend a part of an event, no compensation will be made for the part that you did not attend, whatever the reason.

No-shows: FESAus will consider no-shows as last-minute cancellations, and the full cost of registration will be forteited.

Membership dues: membership dues are non-refundable.

Tax receipts for your payments are issued automatically at the time of registration.  If you subsequently cancel your participation, we will issue you with a new tax receipt for the corrected amount, if applicable, and we ask that you destroy or do not use the original tax receipt.

Method and timing of reimbursements:  it is our policy to make reimbursements to the credit card used for the original payment, and to do so without delay.  We will  process the refund electronically as soon as practically possible. We will then issue a Refund Receipt, which contains a Bank Authorization Code from the issuer of your credit card company confirming the refund is authorized. We cannot make any guarantee regarding the time at which the reimbursement will actually be credited to the credit card. Should you have further questions about the refund, you should contact the issuer of the credit card and quote the Authorization Code provided in the Refund Receipt.

Exceptions: it is our policy not to make exceptions to the above rules.  If, however, exceptions are made, these will always be in the favor of the participants rather than of FESAus, and they are at the discretion of the FESAus administrators.

Comments or complaints: you are welcome to comment on the present Terms and Conditions policy, or if you have any complaint – by email, to admin@fesaus.org, treasurer@fesaus.org.

Every year, FESAus awards the Hugh Crocker Scholarship to a full time MSc or PhD student in Australia, who is undertaking a project: with relevance to Formation Evaluation, and that has strong scholastic merit.

Students undertaking projets in the following areas of study are encouraged to apply:

• Reservoir Characterisation
• Seismic-based Geophysics
• Geomechanics
• Petrophysics
• Unconventional Resources
• Sedimentology
• … or anything related to Formation Evaluation.

Applications are judged on technical merit, quality of submission and the potential of the candidate’s overall contribution to and impact on the formation evaluation community.

The recipient receives a substantial monetary award (currently AUD 5,000), and the opportunity to present the project at the FESAus monthly technical meeting.

Applications for the 2016 Hugh Crocker Award are now open. To apply, fill in the application form and submit to scholarships@fesaus.org.

Applications close: 31st September 2016

See flyer for full details.  Please distribute it widely!

For any clarifications, contact: scholarships@fesaus.org.

Previous winners of the Hugh Crocker Scholarship:

• 2015: Not awarded.
• 2014: Mojtaba Rajabi, for his research on “Present Day Stress Field Australia”
• 2013: Michael Gray, from the Australian School of Petroleum (University of Adelaide) for his research on “Evaluation of seal potential for carbon dioxide storage in the present day near-shore coastal zone: Gippsland Basin, Australia.”.
• 2012: Igor Shikov, from the University of New South Wales, for his research on “The use of Low Field NMR for Unconventional Resources” (webcast).
• 2011: Medhi Alizadeh, from the University of New South Wales, in support of his research on “Numerical Rock Physics: an Image-Based Analysis of Stress-Dependent Permeability of Analog Reservoir Rocks”.
• 2010: Sefer Yanici, PhD candidate at the University of New South Wales, in support of his research on “Understanding non-Archie Behaviour at low water saturations using micro-CT analysis and Laboratory experiments”.  Sefer presented an overview of his research at the FESAus Technical Meeting in Perth, on 1st March 2011 (webcast).
• 2009: Alon Arad, PhD Candidate at the Australian National Univesity (ANU) Research School of Earth Sciences, in support of his on-going research on Finite element modeling of geophysical and petrophysical properties of reservoir core.  His award was presented at the SPWLA-2010 Conference in Perth.
• 2008: Judith McRobb, of the University of Adelaide, for her work on Improved Interpretation of Cooper Basin Facies.
• 2007: Megan Halbert, of the Curtin University of Technology School of Science and Technology, for work on Rock Physics Workflows & Inversion Feasibility Templates.