Images

This is a graphic from the USGS National Oil and Gas Assessment Explorer application, which allows user to drill into 70 oil and gas assessment provinces throughout the United States.

USGS personnel on the deck of the R/V Hugh R.

One charge of the U.S. Geological Survey’s Energy Resources Science Center is performing description
and analysis of hydrocarbon source rocks as input to USGS oil and gas assessments. This 2018 image
shows a coring and geophysical well-logging operation adjacent to U.S. Route 90, Kinney County, Texas.

One charge of the U.S. Geological Survey’s Energy Resources Science Center is conducting field work to
better understand the distribution of hydrocarbon source rocks as input to USGS oil and gas
assessments. This 2015 image is a view to the south-southeast of rocks exposed along an unnamed

USGS Denver Federal Center Building 25 Entrance

USGS researchers drill a research well located on the south side of U.S. 90, 7.1 miles east of Brackettville, Texas. This core was drilled by USGS during field work for an oil and gas assessment for the Eagle Ford of the Gulf Coast Basins. Cores like these provide information on the various rock layers, such as their make-up, their age, etc.

Gas hydrate from offshore Korea courtesy of the Korean Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources.   Learn more about gas hydrates at https://woodshole.er.usgs.gov/project-pages/hydrates/

 Seth Haines, USGS research geophysicist, on a Korean Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources laboratory tour, which included stops at their gas hydrate and sediment pressure chamber - it's a whopping 320 gallons, dwarfing even Seth, a 6-footer.  The chamber is the silvery ring and the black cylinder beneath it.  It's so big and heavy

Core storage facility at the the Korean Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources in Daejeon, South Korea

USGS scientists, Bill Waite, Tim Collett, and Seth Haines in front of a archway in Daejeon, South Korea

Tim Collett, research geologist in gas hydrates, is chief for the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Energy Resources Program gas hydrate research efforts offering a presentation on unconventional oil and gas resources at KIGAM, the Korean Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources in Daejeon, South Korea

Tim Collett, USGS research geologist, presenting at the Korean Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources' (KIGAM)  international program for geoscience resources.

Permafrost forms a grid-like pattern in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, a 22.8 million acre region managed by the Bureau of Land Management on Alaska's North Slope. USGS has periodically assessed oil and gas resource potential there. These assessments can be found here.

Coal is loaded into trucks at the Trapper Mine in northwest Colorado.

Cannel coal is a type of bituminous coal, which is the second-highest rank of coal (just behind anthracite). This particular sample has a high carbon content with high pollen and spore content as well. Unlike most bituminous coal, Cannel coal can be carved into ornaments. This sample came from the Eastern Interior Coalfield in Kentucky.

USGS scientist Sarah Hawkins, lead scientist for the Mancos Shale assessment, examining a core drilled by the USGS Core Research Center. This core provided valuable data for the assessment. Image credit: Joshua Hicks, USGS.

The USGS Core Research Center collaborated with the USGS Energy Resources Program to drill a core from the Mancos Shale to aid in the oil and gas assessment. Image Credit: Joshua Hicks, USGS.

Coal project personnel visiting Trapper Mine in northwest Colorado in June, 2016.

from usgs files

Scientists aboard the D/S Chikyu prepare to collect a research core drilled from marine sediments in the Indian Ocean. This research is part of the 2015 Indian National Gas Hydrate Program Expedition 02 (NGHP-02), which is a follow-up to the 2006 NGHP-01. 

A scanning electron microscope image of the newly discovered mineral finchite. The Denver Microbeam Lab provided this scan of finchite in order to help describe and identify the mineral as a new one. Finchite is a uranium mineral first observed in Martin County, Texas.