By VERN STEFANIC
EXPLORER Managing Editor

See also:

Houston Awards

Houston Photos

Speakers:

Joe Barton
Representative, Sixth District, State of Texas

Mike Huckabee
Governor of Arkansas
Chairman of the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission (IOGCC)

Chip Groat
Director of the U.S. Geological Survey

Michel Halbouty
" Heritage of the Petroleum Geologist"

AAPG 2002 Hits 'A Home Run'

Big Crowds Boost Annual Meeting

A convention that celebrated the profession's golden days even while eyeing future exploration possibilities ended up being the largest AAPG annual meeting in nearly two decades.

Final attendance figures for the AAPG annual meeting at the George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston totaled 7,665, making it the largest association gathering since the 1985 meeting in New Orleans.

"I felt AAPG 2002 was a home run," general chairman Jeff Lund said, even before the final figures were released.

Lund, in praising the hundreds of people who were involved in planning, organizing and managing the meeting, said that "all delivered beyond my expectations.

"Our opening session went well ... and we immediately saw registration headed to the hoped-for 7,000-plus target," he said, "and that our fears of disappointing attendance due to the recession, low oil prices in the fall and '9-11' or possible new terrorist threats were going to be overcome."

The Houston attendance figures marked only the fourth time since the 1985 meeting in New Orleans (9,276) that an AAPG annual meeting drew more than 7,000 people. During that same period, annual meetings in Houston attracted 7,645 (1988) and 6,811 attendees (1995).

The large numbers made for considerable optimism during the meeting, despite current global conditions that could have been described as unstable at best, and volatile in the extreme.

Several technical sessions dealt with exploration opportunities in remote global regions -- in one case, an entire session on exploration in and from outer space -- and the exhibition hall was packed with its usual array of eye-popping technology and displays.

The total number of commercial and educational booths sold in the exhibit hall hit 836, including 65 booths in the International Pavilion.

In fact, even though Texans attending the meeting represented 59 percent of the total attendance (3,955), the meeting had a sizable international flavor. Non-U.S. attendees totaled 17 percent of the final number. Non-U.S. locales with the largest numbers of attendees were:

1. Canada -- 199.
2. England -- 171.
3. France -- 76.
4. Brazil -- 64.
5. Norway -- 54.
6. Saudi Arabia -- 42.
7. Venezuela -- 40.
8. Australia -- 35.
9. Netherlands -- 33.
10. (tie) Mexico, Nigeria -- 30 each.

The meeting's theme was "Our Heritage -- Key to Global Discovery," and Lund said a personal highlight for him was "getting to know Mike (Michel T.) Halbouty, who inspired our heritage theme."

Indeed, Halbouty, one of the profession's storied oilfinders, had a high profile in Houston, giving a technical talk, speaking at the DPA luncheon and receiving the American Geological Institute's Legendary Geoscientist Award at the All-Convention luncheon.

"Having Mike participate ... made me realize we succeeded in making our theme come alive," Lund said, "and we connected to the many students and young geologists who attended."

Are We Wimps?

Among the meeting's other highlights was the Presidential Address, presented by Robbie Gries during the opening session, which challenged the ethics and morality of geologists with a question:

"Are we ethical wimps," she asked, "or just prudent?"

Gries, in expanding on points made in her column in the April EXPLORER, said that "most AAPG members really are good people," but that she agreed with Dennis Moberg, professor at Santa Clara University (Calif.), that "a significant number of unethical acts in business are likely the result of foibles and failings ... rather than selfishness and greed.

"Our moral lapses are usually not because of what one does, but for what we fail to bother to do," she said. "Scripts (cognitive shortcuts that take the place of careful thinking), distractions and our natural tendency to exclude those unfamiliar to us cloud our best thinking and interfere with the expression of our best ethics."

Gries spoke of ethics from two perspectives: As professionals needing to do their best, and as victims of those who do not.

"We each must be guided by high standards of business ethics, personal honor and professional conduct," Gries said.

"If you have been in this business very long and have not been the victim of someone's dishonest behavior, then you are likely the exception and not the rule," she said. "And it is much worse when the perpetrator is a member, bound by the same code of ethics that we all are."

Gries, in giving an example of how a business associate treated her in an unethical manner, questioned her own choice at that time in not demanding action against the perpetrator.

"Because I didn't, and others did not cause him to be accountable for his poor ethics, he was allowed to continue in this misbehavior," Gries said, "and who knows how many other good companies and geologists were burned?

"He was also allowed to set poor standards for his employees, and many of them adopted these unethical standards," she added, "many that are AAPG members today."

Gries said AAPG members already have a standard in place: the Code of Ethics, which applies to a geologist's dealing with clients, the association and with each other -- and gives a format for holding members up to the standard.

"Now, let's look at our history on this issue," she said. "AAPG has not brought any ethical charges against a member in the last 10 years. We have had about five or six charges filed in 10 years, which represents about .0002 percent of our membership.

"Either we are an exceptionally ethical group," she said, "or we are just not bothering with initiating a grievance."

Even in recognizing the huge cost of time and money in pursuing legal actions that enforcement of the Code brings, Gries said the situation begs a question: Will we enforce our thoughtful and deliberate Code of Ethics, or not?

"If not, then let's remove the Code from our bylaws," she said, "recognizing that we are not, as individuals or as an organization, going to spend the time, money and emotional energy policing ethics -- recognizing that perhaps we are just being prudent in a very litigious world.

"Or, if we decide to keep it, then let's practice it, let's teach it, let's enforce it.

"Are we ethical wimps," she closed, "or are we prudent? Let's decide."