Oil and Gas: Innovation, Patents, and the Future of an Industry

This article is written in support of the Society of Petroleum Engineers’ Annual Technical Conference and Exhibition. As of the time of this writing, the event is scheduled to take place in Houston, Texas, during the week of October 3, 2022. The ATCE is the SPE's flagship international event. The host facility will provide over 90,000 square feet of exhibition space along with numerous presentation rooms. It is an honor to be a part of this program. The author has been tasked with preparing an article that discusses the role that patents have played in the development of the oil and gas industry. As someone who has written hundreds of patent applications in various energy generation fields over the last 22 years, and as a degreed petroleum engineer himself, the author believes that he is uniquely suited for the task. A number of years ago, the author wrote an article for the Society of Petroleum Engineers entitled Intellectual Property for the Oilfield The article was written in connection with a presentation at an International Association of Drilling Contractors (IADC) Drilling Conference held in Dallas, Texas. A reciprocal article was published by a patent attorney in Canada the same year. See R.B. Caldwell, Patent Monopoly-Protecting Your Ideas (in Canada). The two articles focused much more on the patent process itself than the development of oil and gas technology and the role that the patent process has played. The author is unaware of any attempts that have been made, scholarly or otherwise since 2002 to discuss the role that patents play in the oil and gas industry. This paper is a humble attempt to fill that void.