Articles
Highlights of Petroleum and Crustal Framework of the Beaufort-Mackenzie Basin: Key Results from BeaufortSPAN East Phases I and II Surveys
Menno Dinkelman, Naresh Kumar, James Helwig, Pete Emmet and James Granath
The Beaufort-Mackenzie basin in Arctic Canada is a petroliferous province still in the early stages of exploration. Almost three decades of exploration in the Mackenzie Delta onshore and shallower water offshore have resulted in 48 conventional oil and gas discoveries. Although no significant production exists as yet, mean undiscovered resources…
CHORUS Heavy Oil Research Project Sings The Happy New Technology Tunes
Joan Embleton and the CHORUS team
As the world oil situation becomes a larger economic focus for billions of global consumers, the CHORUS University of Calgary research project has expanded its integrated science international industry research team and heavy oil international sponsor focus to address these needs. Global energy consumption is on the rise; however, conventional…
Geoscience of Climate Change: Understanding the Climate System, and the Consequences of Climate Change for the Exploitation and Management of Natural Resources
Andrew Miall
The modern world is faced with two significant and interrelated problems: a climate system that appears to be undergoing rapid change, and a growing economy that will soon have to deal with the rapid depletion of its most important energy source: readily available and inexpensive oil and gas. A survey…
Seismic Modeling of Reservoir-Scale Heterogeneities—an Application to the Mallik Gas Hydrates, Northwest Territories
Jun-Wei Huang, Gilles Bellefleur and Bernd Milkereit
An algorithm was developed to construct heterogeneous petrophysical reservoir models based on well logs showing power law features and Gaussian or Non-Gaussian probability density distribution. The algorithm honoured the statistical features of well logs such as the horizontal and vertical characteristic scales and the correlation among rock properties. Multi-dimensional and…
The impact of oil viscosity heterogeneity on production from heavy oil and bitumen reservoirs: Geotailoring recovery processes to compositionally graded reservoirs
Ian Gates, Jennifer Adams and Steve Larter
The majority of the world’s petroleum resources are contained in heavy oil and oil sand reservoirs. Average recoveries from heavy oil and oil sand reservoirs are typically low ranging from 5 to 15 percent for cold heavy oil production and from 30 to 85 percent for steam-based in situ processes.
... Exhibits Make 2008 ‘Kids in Science Program’ a Huge Success
Pratt Barndollar
If you were on the exhibit floor Tuesday morning during this year’s Joint Convention, you may have seen a younger than expected crowd!
... Yukon Minerals, Oil and Gas Overview 2007
Mike Burke and Bernie Adilman
Mineral exploration in Yukon in 2007 continued its dramatic rise from the past few years, with an estimated $130 million spent on the search for base and precious metals, and uranium. Exploration for gold held the largest share of exploration expenditures (29%), followed by zinc and copper (23% each), silver…
Quantitative Interpretation of 4D Seismic data for Thermal EOR Applications
Keith Hirsche
The earliest 4D seismic field studies were designed to monitor thermal recovery operations in heavy oil reservoirs in the USA, Canada and Indonesia. Thermal recovery operations were chosen to demonstrate the viability of 4D seismic because of the large contrasts in the seismic velocity of the heavy crude as it…
Geomechanics Effects in Thermal Processes for Heavy Oil Exploitation
Maurice B. Dusseault and Patrick M. Collins
There is a great need for high-quality monitoring data from thermal enhanced oil recovery processes applied to heavy oil reservoirs. We need to understand the physical mechanisms, to improve our attempts at mathematical simulation of these processes, and to provide information for “real-time” project optimization.
... Mackenzie Plain/Great Bear Plain, NWT
Canadian Discovery Ltd.
This past winter no new drilling or workover efforts were licensed in this area of the Central Mackenzie Valley. Operators are still waiting to see what happens with the long delayed and still uncertain Mackenzie Gas Pipeline Project (MGP). This spring, it was announced that the cost estimate for the…
The road less traveled – an eclectic career path in geophysics
John Peirce
So how does a kid from Cape Cod end up spending his career in the oil patch in Calgary? I spent summers in high school canoeing on long trips in the North Woods of Maine and decided that forestry would be a good career that would allow me to be…
Personal memories of the first seismic survey for oil exploration in the Canadian Arctic Islands
Pierre Marechal
Sometime during the rainy season of 1963, we had a visit by the Chief Geologist from the Paris head office. One evening, as we were sipping some cool Scotch and Soda drinks, he mentioned that Petropar, one of the subsidiaries of the group, had acquired some exploration permits in the…
20th Annual CSPG-CSEG 10km5km Roadrace and Fun Run
Recorder Committee
Once again, the CSPG-CSEG will be running its annual Roadrace and Fun Run in September. With some new and exciting changes, the event promises to be better than ever!
... Canada Celebrates the International Year of Planet Earth
Godfrey Nowlan
The International Year of Planet Earth (IYPE, www.yearofplanetearth.org) 2007-2009 provides an unprecedented opportunity for citizens of the Earth to learn more about how our planet functions and to celebrate the contributions made by earth sciences to our society. About 70 nations are ready to celebrate the year under the tag…
Centres for Research in Youth, Science Teaching and Learning – the NSERC CRYSTAL Pilot Program
Eileen Van der Flier-Keller
The NSERC CRYSTAL program is a five year (2005-2010), university based, pilot program to conduct research on the teaching and learning of science and mathematics (K-12), and to increase our understanding of the best ways to enrich the preparation of young Canadians in these foundation subjects. Increased understanding of the…
The State of Earth Science Outreach in Canada and an Action Plan for the Future: Results of a Session and Workshop Held in Yellowknife, N.W.T., May 24-27, 2007
Godfrey S. Nowlan and Donna Schreiner
The largest session in the technical program at the Annual Meeting of the Geological Association of Canada and the Mineralogical Association of Canada in Yellowknife in May 2007 was a session on earth science outreach entitled: Geoscience Skills for Canadian Communities. A total of twenty-six presentations were made at this…
EdGEO Earth Science Teacher Workshop Program
Eileen Van der Flier-Keller
EdGEO, is a national program which supports local workshops on Earth science for Canadian teachers. Grants of up to $3000 are provided per workshop. EdGEO is coordinated by the Canadian Geoscience Education Network (CGEN) of the Canadian Federation of Earth Sciences (CFES) and is funded primarily by the CSPG (Canadian…
A Quick Look in the Mirror – Results of the 2007 Membership Survey
Doug Bogstie, François Aubin and Jim Racette
Along with the 2008 Membership renewal the CSEG Executive sent out a short membership survey in December. We needed to update the demographics and activities of our society. In total we received about 650 replies which equates to about a 33% participation rate. While most respondents answered all the questions…
Azimuthal Processing for Fracture Prediction and Image Improvement
Galen Treadgold, Charles Sicking, Victoria Sublette, and Gary Hoover
Oil and gas production from tight, fractured reservoirs (sandstones, carbonates, shales) has increased considerably as commodity prices have risen over the past 5 years. A common aspect of these hard rock targets is an oriented stress field and open fractures. P-wave seismic processing that can identify these variations in the…
Careers in Earth Sciences Website
Jenn Sabean, John Clague, and Fran Heidl
In response to the increase in students dropping out of key math and science courses and to pressures faced by today’s students to make important career decisions earlier in their schooling, the Canadian Geoscience Education Network (CGEN)/Réseau Canadien d’éducation géoscientifique (RCEG) has undertaken an initiative to develop a website to…
