Oil/gas folks who have worked in Appalachia are likely familiar with the legacy Trenton/Black River Play, which gave the world its first giant oil field (Lima-Indiana), and other prolific oil/gas fields. The play is driven by location-specific alteration of carbonate rocks via hydrothermal alteration. This often results in massive underground storage space, with vuggy porosity up to and including extensive subterranean cave systems. Development of the play was stunted by a lack of seismic data, until the Marcellus/Utica unconventional plays gave us new datasets and drilling results.
We now know that many of the most prolific Utica/Pt Pleasant "unconventional" wells are boosted by production of gas from these altered areas. The biggest "unconventional" gas well of all time, Scotts Run (Greene County, SW Pennsylvania) almost certainly owes a large part of its productivity to hydrothermal alteration. Only a 3300' lateral, the well has an estimated EUR of over 15 BCF/1000', whereas offset wells outside the seismically-defined area of alteration produce far less. This and many other play-wide drilling/production observations, combined with the geologic/geophysical data, define an updated version of the legacy TBR play, which I am simply calling the "UTBR", to highlight the fact that the Lower Utica is also part of this prolific conventional play.
The implications of this are substantial.
First, extensive Utica drilling integrated with 3D seismic has shown that the signature drilling events associated with UTBR hydrothermal alteration (huge gas kicks, bit drops, mud losses) occur virtually everywhere UTBR structural features are identified, ie they are pervasive throughout the play area, hence the play area is large.
Second, the Utica oil play can work in these areas. This play previously failed due to insufficient pressure to produce economic rates of oil from the tight (unaltered) Point Pleasant in Ohio. The massive vuggy or even cave porosity generated at altered sites solves this problem.
Third, if production is driven by the alteration, then we can get prolific production for far lower drilling costs, by targeting only the altered areas. Remember, the biggest well in the play was only a 3300' lateral!
Last, these learnings create an OPPORTUNITY.....amazingly, most of these UTBR sweetspots are UNDRILLED, as they often involve structuring which spooks drilling engineers, who prefer wells with little drilling difficulty. On top of that, competition is extremely limited, since only those who have the 3D seismic data have the prospects.
At Hunt Geophysical, we have identified multiple undrilled UTBR prospects in Ohio and Pennsylvania. We will drill these wells with low D&C and acreage costs, targeting only the alteration, which we can identify via our exclusive, extensive access to multi-client 3D seismic datasets in the basin. If you are an operator or investor that is tired of sinking capital into tier 2 or 3 shale wells that may never pay out, call or email us and let's talk about this exciting, proven play.
Contact info: 937-926-2494, or huntgeop@gmail.com
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