Much technological advancement to the science of drilling and completing oil wells has occurred since Colonel Drake brought in the first commercial well in
By studying this graph known as an electric log, geologists and engineers are able to precisely determine the depth of a formation from the surface, how thick it is and whether or not it is likely to contain recoverable quantities of oil and gas. This study is called log analysis because, with all the advancements that have taken place since electric logs were first implemented, they still only hint at what a company will find when they actually perforate a possible oil and gas producing zone. To this day, the most important tool is the geologist’s knowledge of the area and his visual examination of the sample cuttings as they come out of the borehole of a drilling well.
There is no tool that informs a company without reservation that a formation will be productive. As a result, zones that would be productive are often overlooked and go untested. In the real world, this is the rule rather than the exception. I am often asked, why re-enter an old plugged hole? Didn’t the company that drilled it know there was oil there? Well, sometimes, apparently not.
One such mistake occurred in
J.A. Roberson, et al re-entered the Daniels #1 in 1949. The company perforated zones known as the Basal McLish and the Oil Creek and completed them for 203 BOPD and 2 MMCFGD. This became the discovery well for the East Oconee Field that has since produced more than 4 million barrels of oil.
Two companies had arrived at very different conclusions after careful analysis of the exact same data. The company that committed the multi-million barrel mistake was none other than Conoco, not some fly-by-night mom and pop organization. It was, in fact, a mom and pop oil company that made the correct interpretation of the data and brought in the discovery well.
Big oil may rule, but it is the little independents that keep the bulk of the oil flowing in the heart of