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The AAPG/Datapages Combined Publications Database

AAPG Special Volumes

Abstract

J. W. Robinson and K. W. Shanley, 2004, Jonah Field: Case Study of a Tight-Previous HitGasNext Hit Fluvial Reservoir: AAPG Studies in Geology 52 and Rocky Mountain Association of Geologists 2004 Guidebook.

Copyright copy2004. The American Association of Petroleum Geologists. All rights reserved.

Previous HitBasinNext Hit-Previous HitcenteredNext Hit Previous HitGasNext Hit Systems and the Jonah Field

B. E. Law,1 C. W. Spencer2

1Pangea Hydrocarbon Previous HitExplorationNext Hit, LLC, Lakewood, Colorado
2U.S. Geological Survey, Lakewood, Colorado, Retired

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This chapter draws on the publications of many workers and organizations. We were employed by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) in 1977 when the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) requested that the USGS design a program to study the then poorly known characteristics and resources in tight-Previous HitgasNext Hit sands. We thank the DOE for supporting the subsequent USGS program. Without this support, the USGS research would probably have been done on a very small scale. DOE managers assisting the research include Keith Westhusing, Karl Frohne, and William Gwilliam.

Many USGS researchers contributed to the program, including R. C. Johnson, T. M. Finn, D. D. Rice, T. D. Fouch, V. F. Nuccio, C. W. Keighin, J. Pittman, R. M. Pollastro, J. L Ridgley, C. J. Wandrey, and R. T. Ryder. Special thanks are extended to W. J. Barrett, F. J. Barrett, Terry Barrett, C. A. Brown, W. B. Hanson, Greg Anderson, D. P. Battin, J. W. Robinson, and Ira Pasternak for their help in obtaining subsurface data and useful discussions.

Reviews by Barry C. McBride, Mark A. Kirschbaum, and an anonymous reviewer provided many helpful suggestions and corrections.

ABSTRACT

The giant Jonah Previous HitgasNext Hit field, located in western Wyoming, is a Previous HitgasNext Hit chimney rooted in a regionally pervasive, direct-type, Previous HitbasinNext Hit-Previous HitcenteredNext Hit Previous HitgasNext Hit accumulation (BCGA). The field is an excellent example of a structural sweet spot in a BCGA. Previous HitBasinNext Hit-Previous HitcenteredNext Hit Previous HitgasNext Hit systems (BCGSs), of which BCGAs are products, are potentially one of the more economically important, unconventional Previous HitgasNext Hit systems in the world; in the United States, they contribute as much as 17% of the total annual Previous HitgasNext Hit production. These regionally pervasive Previous HitgasNext Hit accumulations are different from conventional accumulations in several respects. The BCGAs associated with BCGSs are typically characterized by regionally pervasive reservoirs that are Previous HitgasNext Hit saturated, abnormally (high or low) pressured, commonly lack a downdip water contact, and have low-permeability reservoirs. The accumulations range from single, isolated reservoirs a few feet thick to multiple, stacked reservoirs several thousand feet thick.

Two types of BCGSs are recognized: a direct type, characterized by having Previous HitgasNext Hit-prone source rocks, and an indirect type, characterized by having liquid-prone source rocks. During the burial and thermal histories of these systems, the source rock differences between the two types of BCGSs result in strikingly different characteristics. Based on these criteria, Previous HitgasNext Hit in the Jonah field is interpreted to have been sourced from Previous HitgasTop-prone, type III kerogen and is therefore a direct type of BCGA.

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