Success at the SPE Student Paper Contest: 2nd Place for Fidel Lopez Gomez
We are proud to share exciting news from the international petroleum engineering and flow assurance community: Fidel Lopez Gomez (TU Clausthal / PSL Systemtechnik) was awarded 2nd Place in the SPE Student Paper Contest – Master Category at the East Meets West Congress 2026 in Krakow, Poland.
His paper, “The Effect of Heating Rate on Wax Disappearance Temperature (WDT) Measurements by the Cross-Polarization Translucency (CPT) Method”, investigates a fundamental question in flow assurance: How do heating and cooling rates influence the measurement of wax-related phase transition temperatures in crude oils?
The study was conducted using the Optical WAT Detector (OWD) from PSL Systemtechnik and demonstrates that while Wax Appearance Temperature (WAT) measurements are strongly influenced by cooling rates, Wax Disappearance Temperature (WDT) remains nearly independent of heating rate. These findings suggest that WDT may provide a more reliable basis for calibrating thermodynamic wax deposition models and predicting field behavior.
The paper was later highlighted in the SPE Germany Newsletter 2026 as one of the outstanding technical contributions presented during the SPE Student Technical Congress.
We are delighted to see Fidel’s work receive international recognition and would like to congratulate him on this outstanding achievement. The award reflects not only scientific excellence, but also the successful collaboration between academia and industry in advancing flow assurance research.
Read the Full Paper
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Learn more about the Optical WAT Detector
The measurements presented in the study were performed using the Optical WAT Detector (OWD), PSL Systemtechnik’s automated instrument for precise Wax Appearance Temperature (WAT) and Wax Disappearance Temperature (WDT) measurements based on the Cross-Polarization Translucency (CPT) method.
Congratulations again to Fidel Lopez Gomez on this well-deserved recognition. We look forward to seeing his future contributions to flow assurance research and the oil & gas industry.