It is no secret that deepwater depositional systems hold some of the largest petroleum reservoirs on Earth. To get those reserves out safely, effectively and economically from such depths requires technology, expertise, and a little bit of luck. The challenges associated with doing that – determining the presence, distribution and quality of those reserves – is the work of the Quantitative Clastics Laboratory at the Bureau of Economic Geology at the University of Texas at Austin.
The moment is almost here – the time for all applied geoscientists to converge on Denver for the inaugural International Meeting for Applied Geoscience and Energy. More about this great new event in a minute. Yes, we’re still in the age of COVID and the delta variant is giving all of us pause as we consider how best to interact personally and professionally. But I’m pleased to share that I’m writing this column having just returned from my third in-person industry event in a four-week time period.
The discovery of oil in the Peruvian Amazon is an extraordinary story of perseverance, courage and resolve. The immense challenges of terrain, weather, finance and bureaucracy might never have been overcome had it not been for the vision of pioneering geologist Robert Moran. '
The AAPG Discovery Thinking program will celebrate a milestone this year with its 24th and 25th forums, which will be hosted at the IMAGE 2021 conference in Denver. Since Discovery Thinking began in 2008, more than 180 speakers worldwide have been invited to share their stories of exploration that have led to large, challenging and surprising discoveries. Over the years, more than 12,000 have attended and been inspired by the forums. This year, Discovery Thinking will host two forums specifically dedicated to giants.
For the past 20 years, the International Pavilion has been a standard fixture in AAPG’s annual convention and flagship international conferences. Visitors to the IP expect to see maps and flags and hear a variety of languages spoken in the area dedicated to connecting countries with hydrocarbon and mineral resources with companies seeking to explore and produce them. At the 2021 AAPG/Society of Exploration Geophysicists’ International Meeting for Applied Geoscience and Energy taking place in Denver this month, the traditional rows of white exhibitor stands will be replaced by a 60-square-meter IP Theatre showcasing energy opportunities around the world.
Strata-bound domino faults are a typical feature of fluid flow on salt-rich continental margins in southeastern Brazil. During their formation, strata-bound domino faults form significant conduits for migrating fluid into soft, porous strata away from regional and local structural traps.
Salt tectonics controls the distribution and architecture of deep-water reservoirs in many salt-influenced basins. This study improves our understanding of the controls on depositional systems along salt-influenced deep-water slopes, providing new insights into the tectono-stratigraphic evolution of the Santos Basin.
Innovative geoscience education was celebrated and a bit of AAPG history was made as Clemencia Gómez was announced as this year’s recipient of the AAPG Foundation’s Inspirational Geoscience Educator Award. Gomez, a tenured professor at the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Bogotá, is the first educator from Latin America to receive the Foundation’s annual honor. She’s taught there since 2017, teaching courses in geodynamics, field geology, Quaternary geology and the economics of mining and oil projects.
Throughout the past decade, Brazil’s pre-salt basins and giant deepwater oil discoveries have brought significant attention to the country and to the offshore South Atlantic. Though operating in the Brazilian pre-salt play promises billions of barrels of oil, it also requires billions of dollars in investment and technology, something just a handful of companies can bring to the table. While Petrobras and international companies focus their attention on the Brazilian offshore, a handful of Brazilian companies and foreign investors have focused inland, where they are quietly starting Brazil’s onshore revolution.
Following the 2015 price downturn, AAPG faced serious challenges. The AAPG regions are taking their own individual approaches to meeting these challenges. In addition to the trying times we’re all facing, each Region faces additional, localized challenges that need to be overcome to keep the Region, and the Association, viable.
This volume will prove useful to anyone interested in the methods for observing and quantifying the pore systems that control hydrocarbon storage and flow in unconventional reservoirs. (Product #1281. Member price $144 / List price $339.)
The volume documents shale tectonics from a variety of basins around the world, including the southern Beaufort Sea; the Krishna-Godavari Basin, India; the Niger Delta; eastern offshore Trinidad; offshore Brunei; and along the Spanish arm of the Mediterranean Sea. Product #1023. Price: Member $99/List $139
This Memoir presents a chapter on each main geological discipline involved in unconventional plays, and provides five case studies describing the workflow to obtain production. The ultimate goal of this Memoir is to contribute to the comprehension of unconventional plays by sharing the rich outcomes of our “socio-scientific” experiment of coopetition.
Comprised of 48 chapters, this Memoir covers the biostratigraphy, ichnology, stratigraphy, depositional facies, diagenesis, and petroleum and mineral resources of the GACB. Product #787. Price: Member $184/List $304.