Biography

Jim Murtha presents seminars and training courses and advises clients in building probabilistic models in risk analysis and decision making. He is an industry-recognized expert on risk and decision analysis; he was named a Distinguished Membership of SPE in 1999, the recipient of 1998 SPE Award in Economics and Evaluation, and was 1996-97 SPE Distinguished Lecturer on risk and decision  analysis. Since 1992, more than 2,200 professionals have taken his classes. He has published Decisions Involving Uncertainty- an @RISK Tutorial for the petroleum professionals. In 25 years of academic experience, he chaired a math department, taught petroleum engineering, served as academic dean of a college, and coauthored two texts in mathematics and statistics. Murtha has a Ph.D. degree in mathematics from the U. of Wisconsin, an MS degree in petroleum and natural gas engineering from Penn State U., and a BS in mathematics from Marietta College.

Susan Peterson has more than 20 years' experience as a consultant, project manager/senior drilling engineer, and instructor. She specializes in the application of risk analysis and decision methods for full field development optimization and AFE time and cost models. As a consultant, she performs project specific risk analysis and provides training on decision and risk analysis. Peterson led a risk analysis and decision methods initiative, and has been responsible for the risk analysis on projects that ranged from fast-track remote gas field development to large capital expenditure oil development. She holds Ph.D. and MS degrees from Texas A&M University and a BS degree from Marietta College, all in petroleum engineering.