Explorer Article

In the first part of this series, we showed the energy transition will follow an “all of the above” trajectory, irrespective of aspirational messages. Our conclusions are based on the inherent limitations of wind and solar low-density energy machines for generating base-load power: low-density energy machines would cover hundreds of millions of acres. Also in part 1, we discussed Princeton University’s Net Zero America report, an outstanding, 18-author study of five models to de-carbonize the United States by 2050. The report does not mention environmental impact of LDEMs.

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American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Article

While it is evident that the world will rely on oil and gas for years to come, some industry geoscientists are paving a path toward a future in alternative energy and other geoscience-related careers. Geoscientists are needed for research and development in areas of geothermal science, minerals and mining, and carbon and energy storage. They also are needed for projects that require knowledge of geology, subsurface imaging, reservoir development, satellite mapping, geotraining, multiphysics and smart data solutions.

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American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Article

These days, more uncertain than the price of gas, especially with the announcement last month from the administration to ban the import of Russian oil and gas, combined with the European Union’s decision to cut imports by 80 percent, is the question of whether the world will get the energy it needs – and who will provide it. To that end, it’s worth considering what conventional oil and gas reservoirs here in America can be drilled and placed online quickly to help fill that need.

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American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Article

Geoscientists and industry leaders throughout the world are preparing for the International Conference and Exhibition Cartagena 2022, AAPG’s flagship international event taking place in Cartagena, Colombia, April 19-22. Held for the last time in Buenos Aires in August 2019, ICE returns to Latin America after a three-year break imposed in part by the COVID-19 pandemic.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Geophysical Corner

Phase decomposition is a novel technique that decomposes a composite seismic signal into different phase components, which can improve reservoir characterization. The technique is particularly useful in those areas where thin-bed interference causes the phase of the input seismic response to differ from the phase of the embedded wavelet in the data.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Article

When the International Petroleum Technology Conference comes to Saudi Arabia in February, the technical program will include a significant look at both unconventional oil and gas and conventional tight oil in the Middle East. Those are two different concepts in the region and the distinctions are important. The Middle East holds a large conventional tight oil resource, now emerging as a serious focus for development. With so much recent attention devoted to unconventional resources, conventional tight oil could be considered an overlooked sibling.

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American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Article

Thanks to continuing advances in reservoir characterization, technology and innovative thinking, many oil fields around the globe have “grown larger” in recent decades. John Sneider, president of Sneider Exploration Inc., documented examples of mature field growth 20 years ago and recently revisited the topic to focus on mature giant fields. This updated analysis is detailed in chapter 4 of the new AAPG Memoir 125: “Giant Fields of the Decade: 2010 – 2020.”

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American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Historical Highlights

Before unconventional resources became prevalent in the global petroleum supply, deepwater exploration and development was a significant focus for many larger companies. For deepwater activities to succeed, the petroleum industry was forced to merge its above-ground concerns with the below-ground geoscience and engineering disciplines.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Regions and Sections

What is “unconventional wisdom?” It’s the wisdom obtained from half a century of important conferences organized by the AAPG Eastern Section, founded in 1971, which recently celebrated at its 50th annual conference in Pittsburgh. The Pittsburgh Geological Society, founded in 1945, co-hosted the conference with the Pittsburgh Association of Petroleum Geologists, created in 1984. “The theme ‘Unconventional Wisdom’ is intended to reflect not only the unconventional resources and reservoirs that have brought life to the Appalachian basin, but also to appreciate the broad heritage of our science and vocation,” said conference General Chair John Corbett.

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American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Explorer Historical Highlights

Natural gas was first commercially discovered in the San Juan Basin of New Mexico in 1921, making this year the Basin’s centennial. The first San Juan Basin natural gas strike occurred one mile south of Aztec, N.M., when the Aztec Oil Syndicate completed their No. 1 State. Production was found at a depth of about 1,000 feet. The gas discovered south of Aztec was piped into town and used domestically throughout most of the 1920s. This was the first commercial use of natural gas in New Mexico or the San Juan Basin. Located in northwest New Mexico and southwest Colorado, the San Juan is one of the largest gas basins in the United States, along with the Marcellus in the Appalachian Basin and the greater Hugoton Field of Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas.

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American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Workshop
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Monday, 2 October Tuesday, 3 October 2023, 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.

AAPG and EAGE have teamed up to deliver the upcoming New Discoveries in Mature Basins workshop to be held from 2-3 October 2023 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Save the date! Registration to open soon.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Workshop
Khobar, Saudi Arabia
Monday, 9 October Wednesday, 11 October 2023, 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.

The fifth annual AAPG Siliciclastic Reservoirs of the Middle East Workshop will take place in Al Khobar in Saudi Arabia from 9 – 11 October 2023. This workshop will bring together professionals from the region to share their knowledge and experience related to siliciclastic reservoirs and showcase the best success stories in the industry on understanding and utilizing oil and gas siliciclastic reservoirs in the region.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Workshop
Khobar, Saudi Arabia
Monday, 4 March Wednesday, 6 March 2024, 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.

Join us for the 4th Edition of: "Stratigraphic Traps of the Middle East" workshop. The workshop will be hosted by AAPG in Al Khobar, Saudi Arabia 4-6 March 2024.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Workshop
Paramaribo, Suriname
Wednesday, 17 January Thursday, 18 January 2024, 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.

Plan now to attend an interactive in-person workshop with industry leaders, government representatives and technical experts working in the Guyana-Suriname Basin.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Field Seminar
Lisbon, Portugal
Tuesday, 20 June 2023, 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.

Come along on this 1-day field seminar and tour outcrops in the Serra de Montejunto, just north of Lisbon and on the coast from Porto Novo to Paimogo. Instructors: Ricardo Pereira, GeoBioTec - Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia, Universidade Nova de Lisboa. Gil Machado, ChronSurveys Lda & Instituto Dom Luiz Fees: €190 - Local VAT applicable Limit: 20 Participants Includes: Ground Transportation Snacks and Refreshments Lunch and Dinner Guidebook Departure Time/Location 20 June 2023 8:30am Hotel Dom Pedro Note:Transportation to start point is not included in the costs of this trip. Please bring clothing for hot day time temperatures (sun hat/ sun glasses/ sun cream etc.). Participants must wear suitable and comfortable light trekking shoes. Aims To gain or increase an understanding of the tectono-sedimentary processes of continental extension and rifting supported by outcrop observations, with focus on deep-depositional marine systems. Discuss implications for prospective petroleum systems. Promote debate and nourish new insights between attendants. About the Field Trip The Lusitanian Basin records the proximal events of syn- to post rift evolution of the hyper-extended West Iberian Margin, showing some outstanding examples of the combined tectono-stratigraphic depositional systems. Here, the Late Jurassic reveals diverse aspects of mixed marine depositional systems including not only submarine fans and turbidites, but also the build-up of carbonate reefs and shoreface to fluvial clastic sequences. Throughout the field trip the different depositional aspects can be observed in detail to demonstrate how such depositional systems can vary in time and space. Observation of these outcrops allows a better understanding on how deep-water depositional systems can change within a sub-basin and help improving the understanding of reservoir properties.

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American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Workshop
Lisbon, Portugal
Wednesday, 21 June Thursday, 22 June 2023, 8:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m.

This 3-day conference brings together diverse experts working on modern and ancient turbidite, MTDs, contourite and hybrid/mixed systems in order to improve the present-day knowledge, models and predictive power.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Online e-Symposium
Thursday, 22 July 2010, 12:00 a.m.–12:00 a.m.

Upon successful completion of this course, you will be able to describe geomechanics in shale reservoirs and discuss differences between plays.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Online e-Symposium
Tuesday, 25 January 2011, 12:00 a.m.–12:00 a.m.

This esymposium takes a close look at workflows associated with resource plays, and analyzes where integration must occur between disciplines, data, and workflows at all phases of the process.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Online e-Symposium
Tuesday, 10 September 2013, 12:00 a.m.–12:00 a.m.

The goal of this e-symposium is to review an important dimension in the ways geologist can build and update geological models using information from performance data.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Webinar
Virtual Webinar
Thursday, 22 October 2020, 3:00 p.m.–4:00 p.m.

Join us to hear Jean-Jaques Biteau talk about key parameters controlling pressure regimes, trap sealing at the level of both the basin and the prospect, as well as areas of uncertainty. Webinar will be presented on Thursday 22 October at 15:00 SGT (UTC+8) Singapore time zone.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Online Certificate Course
Tuesday, 1 January 2013, 12:00 a.m.–1:00 a.m.

This course introduces the learner to the fundamentals of shale gas, including current theories that explain its origin, and how to determine which reservoirs are commercially viable.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Online Certificate Course
Tuesday, 1 January 2013, 12:00 a.m.–1:00 a.m.

There are approximately 1,000 oil and gas fields in the world that have been classified as 'giant,' containing more than 500 million barrels of recoverable oil and /or 3 trillion cubic feet of gas.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Webinar
Virtual Webinar
Thursday, 25 June 2020, 8:00 a.m.–9:00 a.m.

Panelists will discuss current unconventional resource activities in North America, including key plays that remain competitive and potential for future growth. They also will address the key challenges for unconventional resources to stay competitive in the global market: maintaining cashflow, reducing expenditures, improving capital and production efficiencies and managing resources. Virtual Forum to be presented via Zoom.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Online e-Symposium
Thursday, 10 November 2011, 12:00 a.m.–12:00 a.m.

This work investigates how heterogeneity can be defined and how we can quantify this term by describing a range of statistical heterogeneity (e.g. coefficient of variation and the Lorenz coefficient).

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Online e-Symposium
Thursday, 7 June 2012, 12:00 a.m.–12:00 a.m.

Unger Field, discovered in1955, has produced 8.6 million barrels of oil from a thinly (several ft) bedded, locally cherty dolomite containing vuggy and intercrystalline porosity.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
Online e-Symposium
Thursday, 8 December 2011, 12:00 a.m.–12:00 a.m.

This e-symposium focuses on methods for predicting connectivity within clastic fluvial systems.

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
DL Abstract

Around 170 million years ago, the Gulf of Mexico basin flooded catastrophically, and the pre-existing landscape, which had been a very rugged, arid, semi-desert world, was drowned beneath an inland sea of salt water. The drowned landscape was then buried under kilometers of salt, perfectly preserving the older topography. Now, with high-quality 3D seismic data, the salt appears as a transparent layer, and the details of the drowned world can be seen in exquisite detail, providing a unique snapshot of the world on the eve of the flooding event. We can map out hills and valleys, and a system of river gullies and a large, meandering river system. These rivers in turn fed into a deep central lake, whose surface was about 750m below global sea level. This new knowledge also reveals how the Louann Salt was deposited. In contrast to published models, the salt was deposited in a deep water, hypersaline sea. We can estimate the rate of deposition, and it was very fast; we believe that the entire thickness of several kilometers of salt was laid down in a few tens of thousands of years, making it possibly the fastest sustained deposition seen so far in the geological record.

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Request a visit from Frank Peel!

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
DL Abstract

Local sea-level changes are not simply a function of global ocean volumes but also the interactions between the solid Earth, the Earth’s gravitational field and the loading and unloading of ice sheets. Contrasting behaviors between Antarctica and Scotland highlight how important the geologic structure beneath the former ice sheets is in determining the interactions between ice sheets and relative sea levels.

Request a visit from Alex Simms!

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
VG Abstract

In comparison with the known boundary conditions that promote salt deformation and flow in sedimentary basins, the processes involved with the mobilization of clay-rich detrital sediments are far less well established. This talk will use seismic examples in different tectonic settings to document the variety of shale geometries that can be formed under brittle and ductile deformations.

Request a visit from Juan I. Soto!

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
DL Abstract

Three-dimensional (3D) seismic-reflection surveys provide one of the most important data types for understanding subsurface depositional systems. Quantitative analysis is commonly restricted to geophysical interpretation of elastic properties of rocks in the subsurface. Wide availability of 3D seismic-reflection data and integration provide opportunities for quantitative analysis of subsurface stratigraphic sequences. Here, we integrate traditional seismic-stratigraphic interpretation with quantitative geomorphologic analysis and numerical modeling to explore new insights into submarine-channel evolution.

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Request a visit from Jacob Covault!

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
DL Abstract

President Biden has laid out a bold and ambitious goal of achieving net-zero carbon emissions in the United States by 2050.  The pathway to that target includes cutting total greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030 and eliminating them entirely from the nation’s electricity sector by 2035. The Office of Fossil Energy and Carbon Management will play an important role in the transition to net-zero carbon emissions by reducing the environmental impacts of fossil energy production and use – and helping decarbonize other hard-to abate sectors.

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Request a visit from Jennifer Wilcox!

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
VG Abstract

Production from unconventional petroleum reservoirs includes petroleum from shale, coal, tight-sand and oil-sand. These reservoirs contain enormous quantities of oil and natural gas but pose a technology challenge to both geoscientists and engineers to produce economically on a commercial scale. These reservoirs store large volumes and are widely distributed at different stratigraphic levels and basin types, offering long-term potential for energy supply. Most of these reservoirs are low permeability and porosity that need enhancement with hydraulic fracture stimulation to maximize fluid drainage. Production from these reservoirs is increasing with continued advancement in geological characterization techniques and technology for well drilling, logging, and completion with drainage enhancement. Currently, Australia, Argentina, Canada, Egypt, USA, and Venezuela are producing natural gas from low permeability reservoirs: tight-sand, shale, and coal (CBM). Canada, Russia, USA, and Venezuela are producing heavy oil from oilsand. USA is leading the development of techniques for exploring, and technology for exploiting unconventional gas resources, which can help to develop potential gas-bearing shales of Thailand. The main focus is on source-reservoir-seal shale petroleum plays. In these tight rocks petroleum resides in the micro-pores as well as adsorbed on and in the organics. Shale has very low matrix permeability (nano-darcies) and has highly layered formations with differences in vertical and horizontal properties, vertically non-homogeneous and horizontally anisotropic with complicate natural fractures. Understanding the rocks is critical in selecting fluid drainage enhancement mechanisms; rock properties such as where shale is clay or silica rich, clay types and maturation , kerogen type and maturation, permeability, porosity, and saturation. Most of these plays require horizontal development with large numbers of wells that require an understanding of formation structure, setting and reservoir character and its lateral extension. The quality of shale-gas resources depend on thickness of net pay (>100 m), adequate porosity (>2%), high reservoir pressure (ideally overpressure), high thermal maturity (>1.5% Ro), high organic richness (>2% TOC), low in clay (<50%), high in brittle minerals (quartz, carbonates, feldspars), and favourable in-situ stress. During the past decade, unconventional shale and tight-sand gas plays have become an important supply of natural gas in the US, and now in shale oil as well. As a consequence, interest to assess and explore these plays is rapidly spreading worldwide. The high production potential of shale petroleum resources has contributed to a comparably favourable outlook for increased future petroleum supplies globally. Application of 2D and 3D seismic for defining reservoirs and micro seismic for monitoring fracturing, measuring rock properties downhole (borehole imaging) and in laboratory (mineralogy, porosity, permeability), horizontal drilling (downhole GPS), and hydraulic fracture stimulation (cross-linked gel, slick-water, nitrogen or nitrogen foam) is key in improving production from these huge resources with low productivity factors.

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Request a visit from Ameed Ghori!

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
VG Abstract

The Betic hinterland, in the westernmost Mediterranean, constitutes a unique example of a stack of metamorphic units. Using a three-dimensional model for the crustal structure of the Betics-Rif area this talk will address the role of crustal flow simultaneously to upper-crustal low-angle faulting in the origin and evolution of the topography.

Request a visit from Juan I. Soto!

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
VG Abstract

The carbonate sequences that were deposited in the now exhumed Tethyan Ocean influence many aspects of our lives today, either by supplying the energy that warms our homes and the fuel that powers our cars or providing the stunning landscapes for both winter and summer vacations. They also represent some of the most intensely studied rock formations in the world and have provided geoscientists with a fascinating insight into the turbulent nature of 250 Million years of Earth’s history. By combining studies from the full range of geoscience disciplines this presentation will trace the development of these carbonate sequences from their initial formation on the margins of large ancient continental masses to their present day locations in and around the Greater Mediterranean and Near East region. The first order control on growth patterns and carbonate platform development by the regional plate-tectonic setting, underlying basin architecture and fluctuations in sea level will be illustrated. The organisms that contribute to sequence development will be revealed to be treasure troves of forensic information. Finally, these rock sequences will be shown to contain all the ingredients necessary to form and retain hydrocarbons and the manner in which major post-depositional tectonic events led to the formation of some of the largest hydrocarbon accumulations in the world will be demonstrated.

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Request a visit from Keith Gerdes!

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)
DL Abstract

As oil and gas exploration and production occur in deeper basins and more complex geologic settings, accurate characterization and modeling of reservoirs to improve estimated ultimate recovery (EUR) prediction, optimize well placement and maximize recovery become paramount. Existing technologies for reservoir characterization and modeling have proven inadequate for delivering detailed 3D predictions of reservoir architecture, connectivity and rock quality at scales that impact subsurface flow patterns and reservoir performance. Because of the gap between the geophysical and geologic data available (seismic, well logs, cores) and the data needed to model rock heterogeneities at the reservoir scale, constraints from external analog systems are needed. Existing stratigraphic concepts and deposition models are mostly empirical and seldom provide quantitative constraints on fine-scale reservoir heterogeneity. Current reservoir modeling tools are challenged to accurately replicate complex, nonstationary, rock heterogeneity patterns that control connectivity, such as shale layers that serve as flow baffles and barriers.

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Request a visit from Tao Sun!

American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG)

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