NPGS Monthly Dinner Meeting—October 2
Nevada Petroleum and Geothermal Society Monthly Dinner Meeting: Thursday, October 2, 2014
Speaker: Donna M. Herring, dmherring@voyager.net, Petroglyph Consulting, PO Box 586, Granville OH 43023
Topic: Structural re-interpretation of the Confusion Range “synclinoria” in western Utah leads to multiple new exploration targets in the Western Utah Thrust Belt
Where: Ramada Reno Hotel, 1000 East 6th Street, Reno, NV 89512
When: Cocktail Reception 6:30 PM, Skyline Bar, 14th Floor; Dinner Served at 7:00 PM
Cost: NPGS Members $20; Non-Members $23; Students $10
Abstract: The newly-recognized Western Utah Fold Belt provides significant opportunity for conventional petroleum exploration at moderate depths in an under-drilled frontier area. The northern Confusion Range, Snake Valley to the west, and Tule Valley to the east, in Millard County, Utah are expected to contain hydrocarbons in several trap configurations. Production targets analogous to both the existing Basin and Range fields of Nevada and to Utah Hingeline fields discovered only in the last decade are likely. Previous drilling targets over more than 50 years of exploration included surface anticlines and buried horsts, and about half of the seven wells drilled in the area had oil and/or gas shows. Conventional targets include classic Basin and Range horst accumulations trapped beneath valley fill, sub-thrust and roll-over traps beneath mountainous exposures, and subthrust/rollover traps beneath valley fill. The Mississippian and Devonian source rocks are well-studied in the literature, >1,000 m thick, average 2-3% TOC (up to 13%), and are not spent or over mature. The most promising reservoir rocks are massive Devonian carbonates in thrust/subthrust positions in the Confusion Range, and these carbonates plus Tertiary volcanics are potential targets below valley fill. Published basin burial modeling indicates oil generation from the Mississippian-Devonian source rocks prior to and contemporaneous with development of the folds and thrusts, as well as during Basin and Range structural development. Chemical remnant magnetization studies of prior workers show migration of hydrocarbons through the area both in the early stages of folding and post-folding/thrust emplacement. In short, preserved thrust structures could have been filled post-folding, pre-Basin and Range, and could also be filling now from the hydrocarbon kitchen in Snake Valley.
Please RSVP by Tuesday, September 30 with the following link:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/16L9wSj-pJ5fh-B1xHkWeIZWc6ez5tNYXdxospU3_O6A/viewform
Keep in mind that NPGS is charged for every meal that is reserved. If you cannot keep your reservation, please cancel prior to the meeting.