Explorer Article

Super basins around the world offer plentiful opportunities for exploration and development, even with the temporarily reduced financial outlook of the oil industry. Ask explorationists to pick a favorite in today’s environment and the popular choice is almost a cheat. The Gulf of Mexico isn’t just a super basin. It’s a huge expanse of prospects and possibilities, of proven resources and potential reserves. An onshore, near-shore, offshore and deepwater exploration province that is really a vast collection of basins and geological features.

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American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Article

Helium rose back into the news recently, in part because of drilling exploration programs planned for an area along the Alberta-Saskatchewan border in southern Canada. North American Helium Inc. of Calgary announced it had arranged additional equity financing of about $29 million to purchase and construct its second helium purification plant at the Battle Creek field in southwest Saskatchewan and to fund an active drilling program. A number of other companies are reportedly involved in North American helium exploration projects, including Desert Mountain Energy Corp. and Royal Helium Ltd. of Vancouver, Weil Group Resources LLC in Richmond, Va., and Australian explorer Blue Star Energy.

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American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Emphasis Article

Can predictive data analytics, a cutting-edge tool for exploration, lead to a future boom in new field discoveries and reserve additions? If it does, predictive analytics predicted it.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Director’s Corner

Many of us as petroleum geoscientists, whether recent graduates or experienced professionals, are confronting significant disruption in our chosen profession. The oil and gas business today is, once again, in transition. How do we each individually adapt this to this new reality? It’s by exploring breadth – range – not just the depths of specialization.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Historical Highlights

History is repeating itself today as low oil prices force collaboration between OPEC and non-OPEC producers. An historical analysis of the real global price of oil shows that OPEC will push up prices when the value of oil drops, as in 1995, or work with non-OPEC countries to defend a value floor, as in 1999 and in 2016 until the present. This value floor is defined by times when OPEC advocated abandoning the U.S. dollar as a basis for pricing oil, or when OPEC and non-OPEC countries collaborated.

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American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Emphasis Article

In a world that has seen rock-bottom oil prices, a sharp decline in energy demand, constrained funding for oil and gas and a worldwide COVID-19 pandemic, the future for unconventional resources looks – Challenging. Although, not too bad. That might seem counter-intuitive, but many analysts say the outlook for unconventionals remains positive even as the oil industry goes through a period of struggle and woe.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Emphasis Article

They might have to invent a new designation for the Anadarko Basin: “super-super basin.” An extraordinarily deep basin, it towers far above the standard definition of a Super Basin – a basin containing multiple reservoirs and source rocks with cumulative production of at least 5 billion barrels of oil equivalent, and future production potential of more than 5 billion boe. The Anadarko has all that and more.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Article

In July 2019, when the current AAPG Executive Committee took office, they inherited one piece of outstanding business: review the AAPG Climate Statement that had been approved by the previous EC, but also tabled for approval by the incoming EC. Over the last seven months, and long before the two black swan events that are wreaking havoc on our industry and our Association, the EC engaged many of the Association’s stakeholders, including the divisions, the Advisory Council, the Corporate Advisory Board and, by way of a survey, our members.

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American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer ProTracks

At a time when the geoscience job market is suffering from low demand and fewer jobs, the Middle East is hungry for petroleum geoscientists.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer President’s Column

We have been through a month of lockdown due to the coronavirus, and in that time, we have seen oil prices go into negative numbers. This is paper barrels! The commodity market has a place in our business and it’s helpful to understand the history and how the commodity market has changed our industry.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)

Hot Items

Explorer Article

Carbon capture and sequestration reduces emissions, but it cannot work past cost barriers without the revenue opportunities provided by utilization and storage. 

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Director’s Corner

Perhaps you did a double take pulling the April issue of EXPLORER from the mailbox. What is this? If you joined AAPG in the last 40 years, you’ve only known EXPLORER in its long-standing tabloid format. It worked well for many years as our advertisers – particularly seismic companies – loved the large format and the ability to display their data on a sweeping canvas. For readers, it was a little more awkward.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Historical Highlights

The Paris Basin offers times of both discoveries and failures, from its first well drilled near Normandy in the 1920s to today. 

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Article

Nihal Darraj, carbon capture and storage researcher at Imperial College, London shares barriers to CCUS commercialization, including costs, technology, permitting and more. 

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)

Headquarters Contacts

Susan Nash
Susan Nash Director, Innovation and Emerging Science and Technology, AAPG +1 405 314 7730