An integrated interpretation of well and seismic reflection data from Italy’s Po Valley shows the range’s undulations are controlled by the slope and composition of two major gliding horizons.
oil & gas
Drones Hunt for Impacts of Oil Exploration on Wetland Emissions
Seismic lines, constructed for petroleum resource exploration, disturb Canadian peatlands, but how can we detect their impact on greenhouse gas budgets?
Fluid Injection Wells Can Have a Wide Seismic Reach
High-volume fluid injection can cumulatively increase underground pore pressure and induce earthquakes in regions unexpectedly far from injection wells, recent Kansas studies show.
Oil Spill Response Knowledge Grows, but New Risks Emerge
Oil spill expert Nancy Kinner discusses lessons learned from Deepwater Horizon, dangers of aging infrastructure and atomized dispersants, and a Russian plan that imperils Arctic waters.
Spills, Sediment, and Shoreline Contamination
A recent paper in Reviews of Geophysics describes the formation and behavior of oil-sediment residues in marine and coastal environments following an oil spill.
How to Trigger a Massive Earthquake
Humans may be to blame for California’s second-largest 20th century earthquake, and a team of seismologists has now proposed how that could have happened.
Where and How Can We Find New Sources of Oil and Gas?
The editors of a new book on oil and gas exploration describe developments in methods for identifying oil and gas fields, and for making accurate predictions about their extractive potential.
It’s Not Just Fracking: New Database of Human-Induced Quakes
In the largest compilation of anthropogenically induced earthquakes, causes range from building water reservoirs to mining.
Largest Ever U.S. Shale Oil Deposit Identified in Texas
The Wolfcamp shale, which underlies a large swath of Texas roughly centered on the city of Midland, contains 20 billion barrels of oil that could be recovered with current technology.
What Happens to Methane That Leaks from Abandoned Wells?
Three-dimensional simulations suggest that some aquifers may be more vulnerable to contamination from leaky oil wells than others.
