DATE April 15-19, 2024
WHERE Hilton University of Houston Hotel, Houston, Texas
COST $2850 USD/person. ALSO Discounted fee is $2350 USD/person for two or more people from the same company. Unemployed Colleagues/Students: your special discounted fee remains $800/person.
INSTRUCTOR Jeffrey J. Dravis (Consultant – Dravis Interests, Inc., Houston)
FOR Geologists, Geophysicists, Reservoir Engineers, Log Analysts and Managers.
GOAL After this seminar, each delegate will be able to describe and classify typical carbonate rocks, interpret facies relationships, delineate stratigraphic sequences and correlate facies within them, evaluate reservoir quality in limestones and dolostones, and better understand subsurface carbonate plays and reservoirs. This is an excellent refresher course. This five-day, in-house seminar introduces participants to established principles of carbonate sedimentology applied to hydrocarbon exploration and development geology. Using a highly acclaimed, hands-on and rock-based approach, each participant learns to describe typical carbonate rocks, delineate facies and sequences, evaluate reservoir quality, relate carbonates to log and seismic expression, better predict play relationships in the subsurface, and construct a time-stratigraphic facies framework essential for both accurate regional correlation of carbonate sequences and zonation of carbonate reservoirs. Lectures are reinforced with exercises and problems keyed to 10 identical sample rock sets, each containing 56 representative samples from around the world. A core problem with logs, based on a real exploration target, further reinforces principles presented in this seminar. A 750+ page notebook, with color copies of all power point slides shown in lectures, accompanies the course, as well as a reference book with color pictures of samples used in various exercises.
HISTORY OF THIS SEMINAR My flagship seminar has been presented to industry 136 times since 1987, either on a public or private basis. This course is the most popular of all the applied carbonate seminars I teach because of its rock-based and hands-on approach, including the use of a core exercise that ties together many key relationships. It is where hundreds of geoscientists, engineers and managers gained their first exposure to carbonate geology applied to oil and gas exploration and development geology. Unfortunately, in early 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic brought to a halt this type of training in a public venue. Now it is back and being presented at a popular hotel venue I have used since the 1990’s.
INSTRUCTOR’S QUALIFICATIONS Jeffrey J. Dravis (Ph D) is a technical consultant and instructor in carbonate geology with more than 40 years of worldwide industry and field experience in all aspects of applied modern and ancient carbonate geology. This experience includes 8 years with Exxon Production Research Company where he headed up Exxon’s worldwide training efforts in carbonates. Since 1987, he has taught 332 in-house and field seminars. Past consulting projects (199 in number) include reservoir studies in Texas (Paleozoic & Mesozoic, including the Ellenburger), Devonian of W. Canada and Russia, Jurassic and Cretaceous of Gulf of Mexico, and Cretaceous of Tunisia; and exploration studies in the Jurassic and Cretaceous of the U.S. Gulf Coast, including Jurassic Smackover, Haynesville and Cretaceous James Lime, Edwards, Glen Rose, Austin Chalk, Buda and Eagleford Limestones, Devonian/Mississippian of W. Canada, Permian Wolfcampian of west Texas, Permian in Thailand, Pennsylvanian of Four Corners region, and Mesozoic of western and northern Africa.
Typical classroom view showing participants with notebook and rock sets, as they work an exercise following a lecture.
Participants work in groups of two, fostering discussion and sharing experiences. The labs reinforce the formal lectures. This format is more enjoyable and enhances learning.
Lectures are reinforced with exercises that use rock samples of cores and outcrops, augmented by thin sections for each sample. Thin section photographs are organized into a 154-page rock catalog photo book. Each person uses and keeps the paper copy of the photo book of hand sample & thin section photographs (valuable reference later on!).
Slab of Rock Set Sample 42 (Jurassic)
Thin Section Photomicrograph of Sample 42 (Oolitic Grainstone With Blue Secondary Micromoldic Ø)
Demonstration samples from all over the world, ranging in age from Holocene to Cambrian, are used to illustrate typical examples of carbonate skeletal and non-skeletal grains, textures and sedimentary structures, porosity types, and evaporites.
Participants examine these samples before tackling some of the formal exercises. Samples available only for U.S. seminars.
Much of the fourth day of the seminar is devoted to a core description exercise that utilizes a suite of cores from a lower Cretaceous reefal and oolitic sequence in S. Texas. Participants discern depositional facies, cycles of sedimentation, and reservoir quality, and relate each to log response. They present their results to the group. Each group discusses the plays evident in their core and evaluates the bigger-scale controls for each.
First three lectures are presented with the assumption that most participants have little or no carbonate background.
(Introduction to unique attributes of carbonate facies and controls on their deposition)
(Non-skeletal and skeletal components of limestones; criteria for their recognition and environmental significance [exercise])
(Review of popular classification schemes; discussion of typical sedimentary textures and structures inherent to carbonates, and their significance for interpreting environmental setting [exercise])
(Basic geochemical principles governing diagenetic reactions; carbonate mineralogies and their influence on diagenesis; diagenetic environments and associated processes and products, including cementation and porosity modification in marine, fresh water and burial diagenetic environments; diagenetic fabrics -their recognition and significance; controls on carbonate diagenesis; guidelines for predicting porosity trends in the subsurface; new techniques for more effective evaluation of diagenetic history and reservoir quality [exercise])
(Review of geochemical principles governing dolomite formation; controls on dolomitization; review of standard models of dolomitization; porosity development/modification associated with dolomitization; review of new techniques to interpret facies and timing of porosity evolution in massive dolomites [exercise])
(Review of Choquette and Pray scheme for classifying carbonate pore types; evaluation of other published porosity schemes [exercise])
(Discussion of controls on facies occurrence and distribution; attributes and criteria for recognition of basinal facies, foreslope facies, platform reef systems, oolitic sand complexes, platform-interior grapestones, subtidal pelleted sands and lime muds, and carbonate tidal flats; Review of predictive end-member models: the ramp and platform with a steeply-dipping margin; use of Holocene two-dimensional models stressing comparative sedimentology, environmental relationships, geometries and preservable facies attributes; review of classical models of shallow-marine carbonate deposition from the Caribbean, Arabian Gulf and Australia; role of trade winds in carbonate deposition)
(Facies components of ancient carbonate sequences and their upward-shoaling character; recognition of depositional sequences and cyclicity in outcrops and cores; major controls on depositional cyclicity; geometries within depositional cycles; geometries between depositional cycles; effects of progradation and backstepping on carbonate facies distribution and geometry; guidelines for predicting depositional cyclicity in ramps or steep-margined platform settings; use of depositional cyclicity for local and regional time-stratigraphic correlation -implications for exploration and development geology)
(Use of wireline logs in delineating carbonate facies and depositional cyclicity; pitfalls in log pattern correlations; seismic expression of carbonate buildups and other facies; pitfalls of seismic interpretation; evaluation of existing carbonate sequence stratigraphic models)
(A suite of cores allows delegates the opportunity to interpret depositional facies, break out depositional cycles and vertical sequences, tie facies and porosity to cyclicity and log response, and assess regional depositional setting. In Texas, a suite of superb Lower Cretaceous cores are borrowed from the Bureau of Economic Geology in Austin and form the basis for the core problem. A suite of wireline logs is used with these cores. In Calgary, cores from a Devonian sequence can be easily substituted, using the facilities at the A.E.U.B. If the client has a series of cores from a basin of particular interest, these may be used as well. Or,a suite of cores from Devonian and Mississippian sequences can be shown to illustrate various play types in the western Canadian Sedimentary Basin.
(Discussion of a classification scheme relating physiographic setting to geometry of plays; review of reservoir, source, seal and trap relationships for conventional carbonate plays, including platform-margin sands, platform-margin reefs, platform-interior mounds, platform-interior subtidal muds and tidal flats, and downslope mounds; review of unconventional carbonate plays, in particular, foreslope deposits and basinal chalks; review of case studies are discussed for each play type; extensive bibliography).
Play type examples can be tailored to the interest of the client.
(Demonstrates how established principles of carbonate depositional cyclicity can be applied to more effective zonation of existing carbonate reservoirs; reviews tangible benefits which result from using this approach, including development of field extensions, wedge-edge prospects, improved well excellence and more effective recompletions)
(Exercise utilizing rock sample sets to reinforce key points discussed during the seminar. In this exercise, delegates are required to interpret facies and vertical sequences based on samples from four wells, develop a map depicting the regional physiographic setting, construct a time-stratigraphic cross section in which time-equivalent facies packages are correlated, and evaluate the merits of potential play relationships based on their cross section. This popular exercise challenges the delegates to apply all the information they have learned during the seminar [exercise])
NOTE: Discussions on evaporites and carbonate source rocks are integrated into some of the topics noted above. If desired, separate lectures on these two topics can be provided (see below):
EVAPORITES
(Controls on evaporite formation and distribution; review of environments of formation and models; depositional and diagenetic fabrics; interrelationships between evaporites and carbonate sequences)
CARBONATE SOURCE ROCKS
(Discussion of controls on preservation of organic matter in carbonate facies; review of models for predicting carbonate source rock potential; carbonate source rock case studies, including discussion of how various techniques and approaches aided a regional evaluation of hydrocarbon migration distances and pathways)
“As anyone who has taught college level courses and short courses knows, a lot of work goes into putting together even a mediocre course.Your course was absolutely superb and the amount of thought, effort, and time you put into it was apparent to even the most casual observer.
Your organization of topics was well thought out, your execution and timing of the lecture material was bang on, and the exercises were an excellent way to emphasize the topic at hand.Whether we were looking at thin section images, hand samples, cores, or well logs, everything came together just as it was intended.When we were stumped, you managed to drag the correct answer out of us with gentle prodding.It’s easy to just give the answers when you are the instructor, but it’s better to give students the mental and intellectual support they need to work through the thought process to derive the correct answer to the problem.You gave each of us, from the least skilled to the most skilled, that support.
As a bonus, the amount of take home resource material was and is amazing.Not only did we get areference book of thin section and hand sample images, but you provided each of us with atravel guide full of references, images, and presentation, plus we also have the 750-page course notebook.You have definitely set a high bar for others who teach industry related classes.….. I am able to take what I learned in your course and apply it immediately to my work.“
“This was one of the best 5-day courses I have taken -learned enough about carbonates that I could start a carbonate project and know where to look for help and what type of preparation I need, and that should help the company.”
“Instructor was very knowledgeable and though-provoking. He appeared thoroughly competent in all aspects of carbonate geology, and possessed a very likable personality and temperament. Works very well with people.”
“It (this seminar) will help me as a development geologist to interject regional concepts into my interpretation.”
“Quality of Instruction: “Excellent. Speaker was very articulate, open to questions and made an effort to walk around, ask questions and give advice during exercises.”
“The core and laboratory exercises were based on real exploration examples and were very effective.”
“This course is especially useful for the siliciclastic-background geologist who is starting out in carbonates.”
“The core and laboratory exercises were based on real exploration examples and were very effective.”
A full refund, less the nonrefundable registration fee ($300), will be given if written cancellation is received by the registration deadline of March 15, 2024. No refunds will be issued after March 15, 2024. Substitutions are allowed.
Dravis Interests and Dravis Geological Services can be contacted by email, phone, social media or mail.
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