The Cambro-Ordovician of Kentucky is a new frontier for petroleum exploration. Dolomite, limestone, and sandstone reservoirs, both proved and potential, provide the oil-seeker with a large number of objectives ranging in age from Early Cambrian to Middle Ordovician and are present at drilling depths of 1,000-14,000 feet.

Dolomite reservoirs associated with the pre-Chattanooga unconformity have produced more than 150 million barrels of oil in Kentucky. Present activity, directed toward the testing of the Knox Dolomite, is a logical extension of exploratory effort downward to the next major unconformity.

The pre-Chazy unconformity in Kentucky was developed on dolomite beds of the Beekmantown. Traps below the unconformity are associated with pre-Chazy structures--faulting, erosional remnants, and truncated porous zones. Vuggy, intercrystalline, and fracture porosity zones occur throughout the Knox Dolomite section, and in many instances appear to be related to specific stratigraphic zones.

The predominantly clastic Conasauga-Rome section below the Knox Dolomite includes potential, but unproved, sandstone and carbonate reservoirs of wide geographic extent. Thickness variations and structural relief in the order of several thousands of feet, coupled with facies changes and known shows of oil and gas, provide the incentive for exploration.

The best guide to exploration will be the reconstruction of Cambro-Ordovician tectonic frameworks and depositional environments. Large structural surface features must be evaluated on the bases of age and structural history.

All types of exploratory techniques, from surface geology to geophysics, are applicable to the search for Cambro-Ordovician oil in Kentucky.

End_of_Article - Last_Page 624------------