Show OIL PROBLEMS IN THE UINTAH BASIN XIII earl the last article in this series showed in a general way the main characters of the formations which are oil bearing in the area under consideration it has been found that certain of mesozoic and tertiary age contain petroleum and petroleum residue and they are evidently original petroleum many of the sandstones which are associated associated with these also contain oil residue both in in the pores of the sands and in the fissures caused by disturbance tur bance of the strata and it is evident that these have derived their hydrocarbons from the adjacent we have been investigating structure the structure of the rocks depending on their origin it was intended in succeeding articles to study the structure arising from disturbance tur bance the writer expects to go into the field soon and further investigate certain phases of the problem which are of peculiar interest it has been decided therefore to defer the consideration of this phase ph ase of the matter until more complete data are available for this reason it has been decided to present some general theoretical phases which it was intended to discuss later as it is not certain that this is not the best place for their consideration A little retrospection repetition in a series of articles like this seems necessary for the purpose of making the facts plain and keeping in view the plan which is being followed it is desired at this point of the discussion to again call attention to the foundation principles on which they have been written these were quoted from cunningham craig in the second article of the series and they will be re quoted here in heavy type they are from the first edition of oil finding it has become increasingly evident not only to the scientific but also to the commercial world that it is to the geologist rather than to the engineer that one must look in the first instance if successful results are to be achieved before asking himself if there is oil to be found in any district or locality the geologist must consider why there should or should not be oil how it could have reached such an environment and whether it can be relied upon to be present if drilled for since the article containing these quotations quotation was written the territory has been examined more or less carefully and many times from an engineering standpoint and some drilling has been done but so far without the desired results either in the production of oil or encouragement for future work this result was feared by the present writer writ erand and his apprehension of the outcome expressed in the first article of the series which was published in this magazine in november 1921 it is quoted here granting that there is oil here in paying paving quantities I 1 can see that millions may be spent the oil not lot be found in ill paying quantities and the development of the field be set back for years it was feared that the basin would be prospected almost solely for structures like those in certain other fields which have as yet been only partly developed but which have made good beginnings in oil production it was seen that such methods could hardly be expected to produce gratifying results here as the structure was decidedly not of the right type whatever the case in other fields it was plain that here it was a geological problem and not one which would be likely to find solution if approached pro Oro ached from a prejudiced or one sided point of view the area is large and the factors are exhibited on a large scale but the principles involved are not difficult to understand they seem plain and oi of a common sense nature when the conditions are graphically presented this the writer will endeavor to do and will spare no pains to make his position clear and definite so that it will be convincing or give fair ground for controversy he has conversed with many on oil the subject and there has often been a congenial companionship to a certain place where the ways part but when he has given his opinion as to the direction which the object of search must have taken there has been no controversy but a sudden silence an evident misunderstanding disbelief or distrust and it was evident that the companionship ended here it is very probable that in the present discussions many have been with the writer to this point but we are now approaching the seemingly more or less hazy and debatable ground where we may have to separate but let us go along a little farther and the way may clear up to present the matter in plain language we are coming in to the problems of odthe the migration and accumulation of oil we are corning coming to where we must decide between a theory much in vogue and the geological facts if it is found that they do not agree it seems tobe to be a very generally accepted 1 l idea that a dome or an anticline and an oil ture are the same thing indeed so prevalent is this idea that if oil were found in a pot hole filled with blown sand I 1 it would popularly be known as a dome it seems regrettable and the reason will appear in the sequel that in in the literature of petroleum these terms have almost become synonymous we will present a brief review of the theory and try to ascertain whether or not it merits the dominant i place it now holds at least in some localities the writer ariter does not intend that the question shall rest on his representation of facts or on his theories the evidence cannot be discounted because the writer is not a petroleum geologist he is is going to present the findings of those who are considered 1 and are authorities on the subject the anti clina l theory of the accumulation of oil will be presented mainly on the testimony of those who are oil geologists 11 1 the theory professor W H emmons in his geology of petroleum h has a s given a brief sketch of the history of the theory in the following summary taken principally from this work the exact words of emmons are in quotations portions of quotations are in heavy faced type to call attention to parts which it is desired to emphasize see page and onward the theory of gravitational arrangement ac according cordina b io t density is generally referred to as the theo theory ry or the structural theor theory y this theory was formulated as a resu result it of work in the appalachian field of 0 the united states state and in in the ontario field sands sand in this field where the are dry the oil is found far down on the flanks of the anticlines anti clines and in synclines syn clines at some places especially ln ill tl the le well known fields in pennsylvania near pittsburgh pittsburg these sands are very productive and it was natural that th the theory should have met a lack of enthusiasm where pronounced ex j captions to it were prominently displayed the first to publish the water fact that gas and oil and separate by gravity were andrews who had studied the burning springs vo volcano acano anticline in west virginia and an hunt who studied the petro petrolia ia and oil springs domes 1 ontario in these localities the segregation of oil and its f accumulation at the tops of domes is very marked 5 alexander winchell and J S newberry gave g ave the theory a more definite form winchell based his conclusions chiefly on the relations he had observed in ontario and newberry on the areas in western pennsylvania west virginia and eastern ohio in the years immediately following these discussions the theory made little progress the fields of pennsylvania were then being developed and in these fields many of the accumulations are in sy synclines syn nc clines lines lesley and his associates of the pennsylvania geological zal survey opposed the theory theor the theory was discredited in many quarters because so many exceptions to it had been found 1 I C white revived it worked out many many problems nearly related to it and was probably the first ii investigator vesti gator to use it in a practical way later orton published a monograph on the lima indiana fields in this paper he amplified his former discoveries co and presented a map which is probably the first contour map drawn for the purpose of showing structure in an oil field this report 1889 marks a decided advance in geologic methods applied to mapping the structure of oil fields it was followed by a series of brilliant papers be men engaged in the survey of the appalachian oil region by the united states and pennsylvania geological surveys under the direction of campbell these reports and the structural contour map accompanying them have shown that oil and gas occur at the tops of structural uplifts in saturated rocks and lower in unsaturated rocks woolsey in 1906 noted that the oil was found high in anticlines anti clines where the beds contain water and in the hollows of synclines syn clines where they do not F G clapp of stone and clapp investigated further the occurrence and relations of oil gas and water in unsaturated synclines syn clines criswold and munn in 1907 made a detailed report on a large area in southwestern pennsylvania in which the oil in the saturated rocks tie ane big injun sands and beds above it was found in higher parts of anti clines and that in the unsaturated rocks the squaw and those below it on the flanks of the anticlines anti clines and synclines syn clines in all or nearly all handbooks of oil geology t one finds statements to the effect that if the reservoir ro rock ck does not j contain water the oil if any will be found in the syn synclines clines if there is some water the oil will be higher on the flanks of the anticline the position depending b on the amount of water for example ziegler in his popular r oil ceolo geology says if the sand be completely saturated or filled witia water the oil will rise to the highest part of the reservoir which is j F the very top or crest of the anticline if the sands ar are e only partly saturated the oil will mccun accumulate eulate on top of the water 1 level leve along the sides of the folds if the sands are dry the oil of necessity will be found in the bottoms of the troughs 5 or orto to use the geologic term in the syncline t the theory in practice in his article moving underground waters as a primary cause of the migration and accumulation of oil 6 and gas john L rich economic geology september october 1921 says il 1 it appears that the theory in so far as it aphes that buoyancy is a prime factor of the movement of k oil 1 1 trough through rocks is founded on a false premise t since nce anticlines anti clines are the simplest and most common traps 1 the success of the theory in practice seems to have blinded most geologists to the fundamental fallacy on which i it is is based t in the first part of this article rich explains one of these fundamental fallacies as follows the theory that oil moves up thedia the dip of the rocks into the anticlines anti clines mainly on account of its buoyancy as compared with water still seems to have many adherents in spite of the fact that it has repeatedly been shown that the component of gravity tending to cause a globule of oil to move up the dip of the rocks for the dips prevailing in a large number of the oil fields is much less than the static friction opposed to its movement recent experiments also by various investigators have shown that no movement takes place even vertically upward through the sands unless the liquids are agitated in some way or moving gas is present page none of us doubt the fact that if oil and water are mixed and left in a vessel the oil on account of its lightness or greater buoyancy will rise to the top of the water we know too at least those who lived in the country that cream will rise on good milk on account of the buoyancy of the b globules glo lobules bules of cream but will this occur if the water and oil or the milk are in sands such as the reservoir sands of most oil fields rich in this same article page tells of an experiment which he tried and anyone who wishes to confirm it can try the same take a straight glass tube 12 inch or more in diameter close the lower end with a tightly fitting cork place in the bottom 6 inches or more of water soaked sand with a diameter of 1 14 to 1 12 millimeters above this place a layer of oil soaked sand and above that another layer of water sand set aside to let buoyancy to do its work in the writers experiments there was no movement in the tube even after several months and in repeated exper experiments experiment imen ts of course very light oil might rise through coarse sands but this would not explain the occurrence of oil in the anti clines of most of the oil fields it should not be forgotten that the areas from which a very large part of the oil has been obtained especially in the united states though classed as anticlines anti clines have a very low dip only a few feletto feet to the mile as in ohio indiana and kansas for example these are quite different from the comparatively small and sharp uplifts in wyoming and california though the theory has vastly predominated in the search for oil it has been found either by design or accident in many other structures below is a list of the different kinds of structures it is taken from emmons geology of petroleum pages paes and classification of oil and gas reservoirs 1 anticlines Anti clines and domes monoclines Mono clines sealed by 2 overlying and underlying joining above reservoirs reservoirs 3 faul faulting ting 4 toca local I 1 cementing of reservoir rock 5 asphalt 6 unconformities 7 igneous intrusions flat lying beds 8 including oil sands 9 flat lying lenses 10 terraces 11 synclines Syn clines and basins fissures 12 in 13 in sch isis 14 in igneous rocks when oil has been found in so many structures and i the number is constantly increasing one naturally wonders bonde rs why a new field should be condemned condemned by the standard of the theory when this has never been more than half a truth whether it is from lack of understanding of writer it not prepared to say he is at present concerned principally with the geological i side of the problem if buoyancy does not a account for the fot formation mation of oil in reservoirs not even in most anticlines anti clines what factor or factors do explain it in other words is there some generalization iza tion which has been discovered by field and laboratory practice that agrees with all known facts and if followed will lead more surely and economically to the discovery of petroleum reservoirs we will consider this question later |