Dear all,

We'd like to announce a session at the GSA Meeting this November, and invite you and your students to submit abstracts

Christoph Hilgers, Mark A. Evans, Magdalena A. Ellis, S.E. Laubach

Session T171: The role structure and diagenesis in governing fluid storage and flow in deep sedimentary basins with applications to unconventional oil and gas reservoirs

Chemical reactions and structures—primarily faults and opening-mode fractures—and their interrelationships have a profound influence on crustal fluid flow, strength, seismic response, and other attributes. The byproducts of the interaction of structural and chemical (diagenetic) processes in deep basinal settings are challenging to sample meaningfully; frequently only fragmentary data can be collected. Because chemical and mechanical interactions can influence the capacity of rocks to store and transmit fluids understanding these interactions is essential for effective extraction from low porosity (unconventional) oil and gas reservoirs and for the success of other engineering operations in rocks that are currently deeply buried or that have been deeply buried in the past. The aim of this session is to provide a broad exploration of these issues, from observations of the byproducts of processes recovered from the subsurface, inferred from outcrop, and incorporated in mechanical and geochemical models, to applications to characterization of unconventional oil and gas reservoirs and other subsurface repositories.   

Abstract deadline 12 August, 2012; GSA meeting N. Carolina, Nov 4-7

GSA is open for abstract submissions.

http://www.geosociety.org/meetings/2012/

Stephen E. Laubach

Bureau of Economic Geology, The University of Texas at Austin

University Station Box X, Austin TX 78713-8924

(512) 471-6303

http://www.beg.utexas.edu/frac/index.php