Is Ashtabula High Risk Area???

For the life of me I could not figure out why no one has yet to drill horizontally in Ashtabula Co. when  the maps show it a good area.

Been doing a lot of reading on the internet and came across this article from March 2002 in the Geotimes.

http://www.geotimes.org/mar02/NN_quakes.html I'm just wondering if this is why there hasn't been any drilling in Ashtabula? Is Ashtabula high risk for this type of deep drilling? I hope this isn't the case but after reading this it kind of makes me wonder.

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Permalink Reply by Mark McGrail on March 15, 2014 at 4:35am

Good article. But people should understand that there are hundreds of injection wells and not all of them cause earthquakes.

Permalink Reply by elliemae82 on March 15, 2014 at 4:50am

I totally would have to agree with you Mark. I was just wondering why no interest in Ashtabula?

Could this be the reason?

Permalink Reply by elliemae82 on March 15, 2014 at 5:21am

Actually, I wasn't referring to the injection wells. The last paragraph says injection wells aren't the only culprit but also deep well drilling. Maybe since the injection well caused earthquakes in Ashtabula they're afraid the deep horizontal would do the same.

I have no idea, but I've heard every excuse under the sun why there's no interest and don't buy any of them.

Permalink Reply by elliemae82 on March 15, 2014 at 9:56am

Hoping to hear from some of the experts on this matter.

Permalink Reply by gary smith on March 15, 2014 at 12:12pm

the Utica is huge. there are other areas opening up too. mexico has opened their fields up to international companies. this would be a 50 year outlook .  they'll get here.

0i7okn54zwbdoPermalink Reply by 0i7okn54zwbdo on March 15, 2014 at 5:42pm

"For the life of me I could not figure out why no one has yet to drill horizontally in Ashtabula Co. when  the maps show it a good area."

Well the maps (I'm assuming you're referring to those o ODNR) only give you a very small piece of the picture.  There is a lot more to consider when risking capital on exploration.  Porosity, permeability, and depth (and by proxy pressure) all play a major role in whether or not any given area is economical.  Remember, shale plays are not homogenous.  The rock in eastern Noble county, though designated the same in name, is structurally different than Ashtabula county.  Natural fracture systems, faults, etc are varied throughout.  If BP and Halcon couldn't make Trumbull county work then going even further north, where the pressure seems underwhelming, is not a good use of capex at this time.

Permalink Reply by elliemae82 on March 16, 2014 at 3:22am

 All the maps I saw showed the lower townships excellent and the rest of the Co. good.

The question I had after reading the article about the discovery of the ancient unknown fault that supposedly caused earthquakes.  Would the deep well drilling be more likely to cause another earthquake in Ashtabula vs drilling in southern counties?

0i7okn54zwbdoPermalink Reply by 0i7okn54zwbdo on March 16, 2014 at 12:42pm

I'm not a geologist so I'll refer you to the thread about the Hilcorp earthquake situation.  There are some good postings on there that go into more depth (no pun intended) than I am capable of.  Look for posts by Brian Powers.  He seems very knowledgeable and explains things in lay terms.  

Permalink Reply by David Perotto on March 16, 2014 at 1:21pm

Elliemae,

I don't believe they are afraid of earthquakes. The fear is economic recovery of the oil and gas. At the shallower depths there is less pressure to force the product out of the ground. In the Eagle Ford, Enron has been drilling in their shallower wells (NE Eagle Ford) and have been getting results with their fracing methods. If you log onto the eagle ford forum, you can find posts talking about this.

 

Ashtabula county has thicker Utica, at a lower depth and at a lower total organic carbon than the middle/southern Utica. Geology.com just modified their coverage of the Utica Shale and there are several, updated maps depicting this fact on their website http://geology.com/articles/utica-shale/ . I believe that the technology will evolve and companies will eventually move to AC, but the low hanging fruit gets harvested first.

Permalink Reply by frank schell md on July 18, 2014 at 5:37pm
A different take on the earthquake situation
only high energy quakes are problems
if injection wells cause small quakes, they may actually be beneficial by letting some of the built up quake stresses be used in small quakes instead of continued build up until a nasty damaging quake occurs.

If san fran could have a small non damaging quake weekly instead of a monster masher every few decades, which would they choose?
I know which I would want--give me the small ones.
f schell
Permalink Reply by Barry D on July 18, 2014 at 7:01pm

My friends in CA tell me the same thing.

Permalink Reply by jason irvine on July 19, 2014 at 12:59am
Frank. Makes a lot of sense. To bad common sense goes out the window as soon as politicians get involved

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