Oil and Gas

Participants will learn to:

1. Characterize siliciclastic depositional environments and sequence stratigraphic building blocks from outcrop and core, and apply this knowledge to the subsurface.
2. Construct predictive frameworks for basin fills from limited log data.
3. Integrate diverse subsurface data sets into a predictive conceptual framework for regional and local reservoir prediction.
4. Develop predictive models for sandstone reservoirs in various accommodation settings.
5. Correlate well logs within a predictive sequence stratigraphic model to identify new potential stratigraphic traps or internal reservoir heterogeneities.

This course exposes participants to continental, coastal plain, and coastal/deltaic reservoirs that were deposited in a range of different subsidence regimes, as well as uplift, producing very different, but predictable reservoir morphologies and thicknesses.  Subsurface well-log exercises will be directly linked to:

1. outcrops of the same rocks,
2. a series of 165-285 m (500-850 ft) long, continuous cores from just behind the observed outcrops, and 
3. complete log suites (including FMI) of the cored well bores.

Students also work using laptops for well-log correlation to do predictive, applied sequence stratigraphy. Each day covers a particular component of sequence stratigraphy in lecture and in the field. Following brief introductory lectures on days 2 through 4 and 6, students spend about 6 hours examining outcrops in the field. Then students return to the lecture room to examine cores and link them to FMI images and log responses. Day 5 will be spent doing applied subsurface exercises on a regional and a local scale, all within the context of the outcrop observations of facies variability and continuity.

Reservoir prediction that impacts the “bottom line” is the ultimate focus of each component of the course.

The subsurface and outcrop examples are textbook quality, but with real-world complexities common in many subsurface reservoirs.  By working with these superb data, students will learn to use a clear and pragmatic approach to predictive sequence stratigraphy.

Itinerary

Day 0     Fly into Salt Lake City, Utah

Day 1     Drive from Salt Lake City to Rock Springs, Wyoming, followed by lecture, core viewing, and a field stop to observe isolated point bars in a high accomodation coastal plain

• Safety briefing and lecture covering introductory overview
• Core examination linked to log response and reservoir quality (Almond Fm)
• Three well conceptual exercise panel for progradational highstand systems tract

Day 2   Lecture and field stops on progradational systems, followed by core and log work 

• Outcrop work on shoreface, deltaic and distributary deposits if a progradational system (Rock Springs Fm)
• Core examination
• Well correlation exercise

Day 3     Lecture and field stops on lowstand incision and valley fills

• Outcrop work on incised valley fills (Rock Springs Fm) and sheet-like deposits (Ericson Fm)
• Core examination
• Well correlation exercise

Day 4     Lecture and field stops on moderate to low accomodation systems

• Outcrop work on moderate to low accomodation system (Dakota Fm) and low accomodation system (Frontier Fm)
• Core examination
• Well correlation exercise

Day 5     Lecture, exercise on subsurface applications and correlation, core work and log correlation

• Core-to-log and reservoir quality comparison – porosity and permeability vs. lithofacies assessment, linked to log response
• Core examination
• Well logs for the Almond Fm

Day 6  Lecture, followed by outcrop work on transgressive and lowstand successions of the Almond Fm.

• Field work on Almond barrier/lagoon and coastal-plain fluvial succession
• Core examination, log comparison and linkage to reservoir quality
• Review of a transgressive sequence set correlation panel (Almond Fm. barrier/back barrier/coastal plain/fluvial, with significant lowstand events)

Day 7     Drive from Rock Springs to Salt Lake City for flights home

Geologists, geophysicists, engineers and other professionals engaged in production and/or exploration for clastic reservoir systems should attend this course. Although the course is designed for experienced participants, those with less experience would also benefit from this course.