Oil and Gas – Black Gold!

NASA

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Moscow_traffic_congestion.JPG http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ce/Oil_well.jpg
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Ceratium_hirundinella.jpg en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Oil_platform.jpg
 Origin (1): Chemistry
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Petroleum.JPG en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Octane_molecule_3D_model.png

Hydrocarbon
• Oil and gas are made of a mixture of
different hydrocarbons.
• As the name suggests these are large
molecules made up of hydrogen atoms
Crude Oil attached to a backbone of carbon.
 OIL AND GAS PRODUCTION
1) What are "fossil fuels" and why are they called that?

The most common fossil fuels are coal, oil and natural gas.

Some other fuels, like oil shale and peat (a very young form of coal), also are fossil fuels.

Formed millions of years ago from plants and animals that died and decomposed beneath tons of soil and rock

2) Why did some decaying material become coal while other ancient material became oil and natural gas?

Coal was formed from plant debris while natural gas and oil were formed from tiny organisms that settled to
the bottom of ancient seas and rivers.

Temperatures and pressures, along with the amount of time the organisms decayed underground, typically
determined whether oil or natural gas was formed.

Higher temperature or the pressures form natural gas.

Finally concluded that organic source material is probably converted to droplets of crude thro’ thermo
chemical reaction (pyrolisis)

Other possible variations in the type of organic source such as Type I,II &III
Type I- Algal,
Type II- combination algal and zooplankton and phytoplankton
Type III- generally from woody (land) plants
 Origin (2): Plankton
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Plant plankton Animal plankton

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Ceratium_hirundinella.jpg en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Copepod.

• Most oil and gas starts life as microscopic plants and animals
that live in the ocean.
 Origin (3): Blooms
serc.carleton.edu/images/microbelife/topics/red_tide_genera.v3.jpg

• Today, most plankton can be

found where deep ocean
currents rise to the surface

• This upwelling water is rich in

nutrients and causes the
plankton to bloom

• Blooms of certain plankton

called dinoflagellates may
© Miriam Godfrey give the water a red tinge
Dinoflagellate bloom
 Origin (4): On the sea bed
upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/04/Plankton.jpg

When the plankton dies it rains

down on sea bed to form an
organic mush
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Nerr0328.jpg

If there are any animals on the

Sea bed sea bed these will feed on the
organic particles
 Origin (5): Black Shale
upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/0/04/Plankton.jpg
• However, if there is little or no
oxygen in the water then animals
can’t survive and the organic
mush accumulates

• Where sediment contains

more than 5% organic matter,
it eventually forms a rock
known as a Black Shale

© Earth Science World Image Bank

 Origin (6): Cooking
As Black Shale is buried, it is heated.

Organic matter is first changed by the

Kerogen increase in temperature into kerogen,
which is a solid form of hydrocarbon
Around 90°C, it is changed into a liquid
Oil state, which we call oil

Gas
Around 150°C, it is changed into a gas

www.oilandgasgeology.com/oil_gas_window.jpg A rock that has produced oil and gas in

this way is known as a Source Rock
OIL
You wouldn't see a big underground lake, as a lot of people think.
Oil doesn't exist in deep, black pools. In fact, an underground oil formation - called an "oil reservoir" - looks very
much like any other rock formation.

When reservoir rock is magnified, the tiny pores that contain trapped oil droplets can be seen.

Geological Surveys
Begins with geologists examining the surface structure of the earth

Areas are most likely to contain a petroleum or natural gas reservoir.

Information attained from the rock cuttings and samples obtained from the digging of irrigation ditches, water wells,
and other oil and gas wells.

This information is all combined to allow the geologist to make inferences as to the fluid content, porosity,
permeability, age, and formation sequence of the rocks underneath the surface of a particular area.
Seismic Exploration
Seismology refers to the study of how energy, in the form of seismic waves,
moves through the Earth's crust and interacts differently with various types
of underground formations.

Placing Geophones
Seismic waves, emitted from a source, will travel through the earth, but also
be reflected back towards the source by the different underground layers.

It is this reflection that allows for the use of seismology in discovering the
properties of underground geology.

Create vibrations on the surface and record how these vibrations are
reflected back to the surface. – rubber ball

Placing Geophones
Onshore Seismology
Artificially creating seismic waves, the reflection of which are then picked
up by sensitive pieces of equipment called 'geophones', imbedded in the
ground.

A Seismic Vibrator Truck

Due to environmental concerns and improved technology, it is often no
Seismology in Practice
longer necessary to use explosive charges to generate the needed seismic
waves.

Instead, most seismic crews use non-explosive seismic technology.

Thumper

A Seismic Vibrator Truck

Offshore Seismology
Instead of using dynamite or impacts on the seabed floor, the seismic
ship uses a large air gun, which releases bursts of compressed air under
the water, creating seismic waves that can travel through the Earth's
crust and generate the seismic reflections that are necessary.

Offshore Seismic Exploration

Magnetometers
Magnetic properties of underground formations can be measured to generate geological and geophysical data.

Magnetometers are devices that can measure the small differences in the Earth's magnetic field.

Satellite, called Magsat, allows for the study of underground rock formations and the Earth's mantle on a larger
scale, and provides clues as to tectonic plate movement and the location of deposits of petroleum, natural gas, and
other valuable minerals.

3D visualization
 Trap Rock Reservoir Rock

Reservoir Rock Classification

• Clastic Rocks (broken pieces of older rock)

– Sand / sand stone
• Carbonate rocks
– Lime Stone/ Dolomite
• Reef Rocks (a ridge of jagged rock)
– This is fractured basement rock;
– Porous and permeable rock that contains the pool of petroleum
Porosity
• Porosity or pore space or void space is expressed in percentage as the ratio of total volume of pore space
to total volume of rock.
• The ratio of interconnected pore space to the total bulk volume of rock is termed effective porosity.
• The porosity of most reservoirs range from 5-30% most commonly 10-30%.
• 15-20% of porosity - Good;
• 20-25% of porosity - very good
• >25% of porosity - excellent

Permeability
• Another important factor to be considered in a reservoir rock. It is the property that permit the passage
of any fluid thro’ the interconnected pores of a rock with out damage to the frame work of the rock.
• The ability, or measurement of a rock's ability, to transmit fluids, typically measured in darcies or milli
darcies.
• A rough appraisal of reservoir permeabilities is
– 1.0 to 10 md- Fair;
– 10 to 100 md – Good;
– 100 to 1000 md- Very good.
 Origin (7): Migration
www.diveco.co.nz/img/gallery/2006/diver_bubbles.jpg
• Hot oil and gas is less dense than
the source rock in which it occurs

• Oil and gas migrate upwards up

through the rock in much the same
way that the air bubbles of an
underwater diver rise to the surface

Rising oil

• The rising oil and gas eventually gets

trapped in pockets in the rock called
reservoirs
 Traps
• Beneath the earth's surface, oil will ooze through rocks if there is enough space between them, but
this oil will not accumulate into large quantities unless something traps it in a particular place.
There are a variety of geologic traps, which themselves can be broken into categories:

• Structural trap types: anticline, fault trap, salt dome

• Stratigraphic trap types: unconformity, lens, pinch-out
• Combination traps

Structural Trap
 Anticline Trap

An anticline is an example of rocks which were previously

flat, but have been bent into an arch. Oil that finds its way
into a reservoir rock that has been bent into an arch will flow
to the crest of the arch, and get stuck (provided, of course, that
there is a trap rock above the arch to seal the oil in place).
A cross section of the Earth showing typical Anticline Traps.
Reservoir rock that isn't completely filled with oil also
contains large amounts of salt water.

Normal fault.
Normal Fault
•The main varieties of faults are normal or gravity faults,
reverse or thrust faults and strike-slip faults.
•The hanging wall moves down relative to the footwall of a
normal fault.
•These faults are formed the trap for many gas or oil pools.
•Pools trapped by normal faulting are almost always on the
upper side of the fault.
•Trap associated with thrust or reverse faulting may form
either above or below the fault plane.
Schematic Diagram of Growth Fault

A cross section of rock showing a fault trap - in this

case, an example of gouge. This is because the
reservoir rock on both sides of the fault would be
connected, if not for the fault separating the two. In
this example, it is the fault itself that is trapping the
oil.
Fault traps are formed by movement of rock along a
fault line. In some cases, the reservoir rock has
moved opposite a layer of impermeable rock. The
impermeable rock thus prevents the oil from
escaping. In other cases, the fault itself can be a very
effective trap. Clays within the fault zone are
smeared as the layers of rock slip past one another.
This is known as fault gouge.
 Salt Dome Trap
Here we see salt that has moved up through the Earth,
punching through and bending rock along the way. Oil can
come to rest right up against the salt, which makes salt an
effective trap rock.
However, many times, the salt chemically changes the
rocks next to it in such a way that oil will no longer seep
into them. In a sense, it destroys the porosity of a
reservoir rock.

Photograph of fractures in Jebel Hafit (UAE)

Fracture. A fracture is a surface of breakage

in rock, but differs from a fault in that there
is no movement of the rocks on either side
of the fracture.
Stratigraphic Trap
 Origin (9): Source of North Sea Oil
© Ian and Tonya West

Black Shale

Ancient Earth

The Kimmeridge Clay is a Black Shale with up to 50% organic

matter. It is the main source rock for the North Sea Oil & Gas
Province
 Exploration and Production (3):
Seismic Surveys
Drill here!

Earth Science World Image Bank Image #h5inor Earth Science World Image Bank Image #h5inpj

• Seismic surveys are used to locate likely rock structures

underground in which oil and gas might be found
• Shock waves are fired into the ground. These bounce off layers
of rock and reveal any structural domes that might contain oil
Exploration and Production (5):
Enhanced Recovery
• Although oil and gas are less
dense than water and naturally
rise up a well to the surface,
in reality only 40-50% of the
total will do so.

• To enhance recovery, a hole

is drilled adjacent to the well
and steam is pumped down. The
hot water helps to push the oil out
of the rock and up into the well.
© California Department of Conservation
Exploration and Production (6):
Transport
Trans-Alaskan Pipeline • Once extracted oil and
gas must be sent to a
refinery for processing

• Pipelines transport
most of the world’s oil
from well to refinery

• Massive Oil Tankers

also play an important
role in distribution
United States Geological Survey
 Exploration and Production (8):
Early History
• The modern era of oil
Abraham Gesner usage began in 1846 when
(1797-1864) Gesner perfected the art
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Abraham_Gesner.gif of paraffin distillation.

• This triggered a massive

worldwide boom in oil
production.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Oilfields_California.jpg • California was centre of

Californian oil gusher activity in the early 1900s,
famous for its gushers.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Lucas_gusher.jpg