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Abstract

DOI:10.1306/13321475M973494

Lithology of the Barnett Shale (Mississippian), Southern Fort Worth Basin, Texas

Philip J. Bunting,1 John A. Breyer2

1School of Geology, Energy and the Environment, Texas Christian University, Fort Worth, Texas, U.S.A.; Present address: BP America, Houston, Texas, U.S.A.
2School of Geology, Energy and the Environment, Texas Christian University, Fort Worth, Texas, U.S.A.; Present address: Upstream Technology, Marathon Oil Company, Houston, Texas, U.S.A.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We thank EOG Resources, Inc., and particularly David Trice for allowing us to study core and well logs from the Two-O-Five 2H well. The Fort Worth Geological Society and the Gulf Coast Association of Geological Societies provided generous financial support for this research. Daniel M. Jarvie, Worldwide Geochemistry, provided geochemical analyses of 225 samples. Robert Loucks and Stephen Ruppel of the Bureau of Economic Geology, University of Texas-Austin, provided insightful reviews that enabled us to improve the final version of the manuscript.

ABSTRACT

Five lithologies are present in the Barnett Shale (Mississippian) in a core taken in Johnson County, Texas, in the southern part of the Fort Worth Basin. Dark claystone to mudstone makes up 86% of the cored interval. Sponge spicules are the most common silt-size grain in this lithology. The clay-size material comprising the matrix is a mixture of cryptocrystalline quartz, probably derived from radiolarian tests, and clay minerals. The rock is highly siliceous, hard, dense, and brittle. Three calcareous lithologies are present in the core: limy layers, shell layers, and concretions. Together, these lithologies make up only 7% of the cored interval. The limy layers and concretions consist almost entirely of micrite. The shell layers contain gravel-size fragments of brachiopods, pelecypods, and cephalopods. The calcareous lithologies are found as thin interbeds in the dark claystone to mudstone throughout the core. A laminated siltstone to mudstone containing abundant sponge spicules is found only at the top of the cored interval. Glauconite and phosphatic material are conspicuous components of this lithology. The phosphatic material includes phosphate-coated grains of glauconite, quartz, and fossil fragments. The lithologies in the core resemble those described in the core from the northern part of the basin. However, the relative abundance of the various lithologies changes greatly from the northern part to the southern part of the basin. Understanding lithologic variation within the Barnett Shale is key to locating sweet spots within the play and then selecting intervals within the reservoir in which to land horizontals wells.

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