ABSTRACT

The Chatham oil field is located in Chatham, Harrisville, and Litchfield townships, Medina County, Ohio, and was discovered in 1899. Since its discovery, at least 3,279 Berea wells have been drilled in this field.

Water flooding commenced in June of 1939, and the Chatham field has been the most successful secondary recovery operation in Ohio. It is estimated that over 12,000,000 barrels of oil has been produced from this field. Approximately 77 percent of this oil was recovered by water flooding. Production began to decline in the 1960's and by the mid- 1970s most water-flooding projects had either been plugged or were idle.

Changes in regulations in 1983 made it more difficult to continue water flooding operations in the Chatham field. Only three new projects have been authorized since that time. Oil production for the field as of 1992 was 57 barrels per day.

Despite the success water flooding brought to the Chatham oil field, a significant amount of oil remains in place. Additional secondary or tertiary recovery methods would most likely be successful in this field, but due to the numerous historical problems with the field, extensive corrective action and expense would be required.