Publications

The U.S. Geological Survey estimated volumes of potential additions to oil and gas reserves for the United States by reserve growth in discovered accumulations. These volumes were derived by using a new methodology developed by the U.S. Geological Survey and reviewed by the American Association of Petroleum Geologists Committee on Resource Evaluation. This methodology was used to assess reserve gr

Using a geology-based assessment methodology, the U.S. Geological Survey estimated mean volumes of 53 trillion cubic feet of shale gas, 172 million barrels of shale oil, and 176 million barrels of natural gas liquids in the Barnett Shale of the Bend Arch–Fort Worth Basin Province of Texas.

Coal deposits are integral to understanding the structural evolution and thermal history of sedimentary basins and correlating contemporeous estuarine and fluvial delatic strata with marine sections. While marine shales may readily lend themselves to Re–Os dating due to the dominance of hydrogenous Re and Os, the lack of a chronometer for near-shore sedimentary environments hampers basinwide corr

The newly named Upland Valley Limestone represents a carbonate complex that developed on and adjacent to a tectonically active island in east-central California during a brief interval of Early Permian (late Artinskian) time. This lithologically unique, relatively thin limestone unit lies within a thick sequence of predominantly siliciclastic rocks and is characterized by its high concentration of

The complex stratigraphy of late Paleozoic rocks in the southern Darwin Hills consists of regionally extensive Mississippian and Early to Middle Pennsylvanian rocks overlain by latest Pennsylvanian to Early Permian rocks, herein called the Darwin Hills sequence. Deposition of this latter sequence marked the beginning of the Darwin Basin. In Mississippian time, a carbonate platform prograded westwa

The Darwin Basin developed in response to episodic subsidence of the western margin of the Cordilleran continental shelf from Late Pennsylvanian (Gzhelian) to Early Permian (late Artinskian) time. Subsidence of the basin was initiated in response to continental truncation farther to the west and was later augmented by thrust emplacement of the Last Chance allochthon. This deep-water basin was fill

The U.S. Geological Survey estimated a mean of 220 million pounds of recoverable uranium oxide (U3O8 ) remaining as potential undiscovered resources in southern Texas. This estimate used a geology-based assessment method for Tertiary sandstone-hosted uranium deposits in the Texas Coastal Plain sedimentary strata (fig.1).

The Division of Geological & Geophysical Surveys (DGGS) and Division of Oil & Gas (DOG) are currently conducting a study of the hydrocarbon potential of Cook Inlet basin (LePain and others, 2011). The Tertiary stratigraphic section of the basin includes coal-bearing units that are prolific gas reservoirs, particularly the Neogene sandstones. The Paleogene sandstones are locally prolific oil reserv

Surface-based monitoring of mass transfer caused by injections and extractions in deep boreholes is crucial to maximize oil, gas and geothermal production. Inductive electromagnetic methods, such as magnetotellurics, are appealing for these applications due to their large penetration depths and sensitivity to changes in fluid conductivity and fracture connectivity. In this work, we propose a 3-D M

In the geosciences, isotopic ratios and trace element concentrations are often used along with major element concentrations to help determine sources of and processes affecting geochemical variation. Compositional Data Analysis (CoDA) is a set of tools, generally attuned to major element data, concerned with the proper statistical treatment and removal of spurious correlations from compositional d

Introduction As the source rocks from which petroleum is generated, organic-rich shales have always been considered an important component of petroleum systems. Over the last few years, it has been realized that in some mudrocks, sufficient hydrocarbons remain in place to allow for commercial development, although advanced drilling and completion technology is typically required to access hydro

Drill-core samples from a sandstone-hosted uranium (U) deposit in Wyoming were characterized to determine the abundance and distribution of uranium following in-situ recovery (ISR) mining with oxygen- and carbon dioxide-enriched water. Concentrations of uranium, collected from ten depth intervals, ranged from 5 to 1920 ppm. A composite sample contained 750 ppm uranium with an average oxidation st