Chemostratigraphy and XRF – Buzzwords at NAPE and AAPG

Layered rock on high steep sea bank

NAPE (The North American Prospect Expo) lived up to its promise of being the world’s largest Exploration and Production (upstream) expo. Almost 900 exhibitors and 16,500 attendees filled 12 acres of the George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston at 2014 Winter NAPE. There were plenty of #TheNAPE_2014 tweets proclaiming “Houston is booming, but the rest of the U.S. economy is sluggish” after Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan forecasted the oil boom’s effect on the US economy. There was also plenty of foot traffic at our booth. Compared to last year, we found many more people were looking for us and specifically for ways to get geochemical data. Owners, vice presidents, investors… everyone wanted to know how much mineralogy can be inferred from, and what kind of data can be provided about, elemental composition with portable x-ray fluorescence (XRF) analyzers. The oil and gas exploration and production (E&P) market is quickly adopting field-portable XRF analyzers to rapidly analyze a variety of samples in the field including drill cuttings, core samples, outcrops, and piston cored sediments. While these handheld XRF analyzers are not used to directly analyze hydrocarbon fluids, they can analyze major and trace elements of host rocks. These assay data are very important in interpretation of the hydrocarbon potential of the strata and can be used for:

Inferring Mineralogy
Inferring Lithology (Mud Logging)
Chemostratigraphy
Reservoir Characterization
Oil and Gas Productivity

In fact, chemostratigraphy, the study of the variation of chemistry within sedimentary sequences, was brought up in several booth discussions. Many visitors were impressed that XRF analysis can detect uranium, thorium, magnesium, aluminum, silica, and calcium. Their interest was piqued when they realized that if they can detect those elements as well as some others, they can figure the ratios of aluminum/silica and aluminum/calcium and be able to tell if they are in a shale formation … or if they see iron sulphur, they know there is iron pyrite in the vicinity. And if the calcium number drops down, they should see the silica ratio go up to sandstone, which will help in their decision about fracking in the area, since fracking is of no use in sandstone. We also got many inquiries about automatic data input into their proprietary mudlogging systems. Having the gamma logs from the down hole drills correlate to the elemental composition and Total Organic Carbon (TOC), will help let them know where oil plays. All in all, most executives agreed that immediate, onsite, XRF analysis can be a great help in decision making. Another observation is the increased number of posters that were presented by the universities that included elemental data. There seems to be a growing acceptance of portable XRF by academics who are embracing the idea that elemental composition from xrf analysis is accurate and reliable in E&P. I’m looking forward to finding out if we will hear the same buzz in April when we return to the George Brown Center in Houston for the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, (AAPG) Annual Convention. Is chemostratigraphy important to you? Let us know below… or ask us in person at AAPG. AAPG Annual Convention and Exhibition Booth #1222 6–9 April, 2014 Houston, TX USA