Autopsy of an Oil Field

Intense litigation over an oil field straddling the Utah-Wyoming border yielded a gusher of data that’s enabling a pair of Utah State University geologists to thoroughly examine properties of sandstone tracts rich in black gold.

Geology professor Jim Evans and graduate student Dustin Keele recently received one of five 2007 Utah Geological Survey grant awards to fund their research project, “Analysis of Reservoir Properties of Faulted and Fractured Aeolian Thrust-belt Reservoirs.”

 

“Due to an ownership dispute, an unusually large amount of data and core sampling was collected on this particular field,” says Evans.

 

Core sampling, which involves drilling into the earth with a hollow steel tube and extracting a cylindrical sample, is relatively expensive and time-consuming, he says. “Typically, you’d collect no more than 100 feet of core at a sampling site.”

 

Evans was intrigued when he heard that, back in the 1970s, an oil company had collected more than 30,000 feet of core from the embattled oil patch, which lies along Interstate-80 near Evanston. “That’s unheard of,” he says.

 

He began trying to track down the core samples and accompanying field data about four years ago, which proved a challenging treasure hunt.

 

“Much of the written data wound up in the attic of a retired oil company geologist in Houston, and the core samples are housed with the Oklahoma Geological Survey,” he says.

 

Securing the written data was a small chore but trying to bring the core samples back to Utah was another story.

 

“Dustin (Keele)’s father owns a trucking company and offered to help with the transport,” says Evans. “But given the size and weight of the samples, we calculated it would require at least four semi-trucks to move them back to Utah. Storage was a whole other matter. It was simply cost-prohibitive.”

 

So if you can’t move the mountain to Mohammed? 

 

“Dustin is now in Oklahoma where he’ll spend about a month analyzing the core samples,” says Evans.

 

As part of the project, which forms the basis of Keele’s master’s thesis, Evans and Keele will compare their findings from the Evanston field with characteristics of a potential oil field in Salina, Utah.

 

“From initial analysis, the Salina tract has a similar sandstone type and geological setting,” says Evans. “We want to find out if more of its properties match the productive oil field.”

 

Evans says Keele, a Vernal native and veteran oil field roughneck, brings valued expertise to the project.

 

“He’s an ideal student and a self-starter. From his years of drilling experience, he’s able to offer unique insights.”

 

Just two years old, the Utah Geological Survey’s Characterization of Utah’s Hydrocarbon Reservoirs and Potential New Reserves grant program is designed to promote research on Utah’s natural gas and oil resource potential. Funded by oil and gas revenue generated from state and federally owned reserves, the program’s aim is to sustain development through diversification of the state’s energy supplies and mitigate the impacts of boom-bust cycles.

 

 

Contact: Jim Evans [jpevans@cc.usu.edu], 435-797-1267