If you have spent most of your career and plan to spend the rest of it working in Texas Railroad Commission District 3, you may know all you need to know about what you do on a daily basis, and it would be very reasonable to ask what AAPG can do for you. No matter how restricted your area of interest may be; no one works in a vacuum. If there is one certainty in this business, it is that data and information are paramount in the pursuit of hydrocarbons, and we never seem to know it all.

AAPG is first and foremost about the science of petroleum geology. For ninety three years, AAPG has provided what we hope is an unbiased forum for the dissemination of scientific information on the various facets of petroleum geology through the Bulletin, the Explorer, special publications, conferences, workshops, and short courses. AAPG does not have an exclusive on dissemination of the science. Certainly, HGS and SIPES have a long and admirable history of doing much the same thing, but if AAPG is not at the top of the list of data providers, I think we are very close to it.

We not only disseminate information, we also archive it in the form of Datapages, GIS-UDRIL, and Search and Discovery. All of AAPG’s publications are available on Datapages. A lot of this information is open to the membership and the amount of archived information open to the membership is increasing every year. The rest of it is available at a reasonable price as pay-perview. At a minimum, all issues of the Bulletin and Explorer are available to AAPG members digitally at no additional cost beyond membership dues.

The last AAPG member survey rated our publications as the most valuable service AAPG provides to its membership, and members rated networking as the second most valued benefit of membership. If you do not have all the information you need at your fingertips, it is nice to know the people who can fill the gaps.

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The competitive advantage enjoyed by an independent petroleum geologist does not lie solely in the data. It lies in an understanding of the regional geology and in the ability to combine all of the available data in such a way as to form a concise interpretation that mitigates as much risk as possible. AAPG can help with that through our publications, data archives, and our educational opportunities.

AAPG is also an advocate for the professional practice of petroleum geology. You do not need to belong to AAPG or AAPG’s Division of Professional Affairs to be a professional, but membership in AAPG and adherence to the code of ethics shows we are concerned about the professional practice of petroleum geology. As professional practitioners, why would we not support an organization that supports our livelihood?