Using geostatistical-hydrogeological approach to develop groundwater monitoring system in South Western Karoo, South Africa

Magister Scientiae - MSc (Environ & Water Science)Groundwater in the South Western Karoo plays a vital role in the overall water supply in the region. However, this resource is vulnerable to impacts from anthropogenic and natural activities. Mitigating the impacts on groundwater quality and quantity depends on the information provided by groundwater monitoring networks. The information provided by groundwater monitoring networks allow for timely and effective intervention to take place before widespread degradation occurs. In recent times, there has been interest in exploiting potentially vast natural resources of shale gas in the South Western Karoo. However, studies have highlighted links between shale gas development and groundwater contamination. There are concerns that these issues of groundwater contamination and overexploitation can occur in the South Western Karoo during shale gas development. One of the key features that need addressing is the lack of a statistically sound baseline that can inform on the natural conditions of the groundwater system, before development of shale gas exploitation

The Relationship between Crude Oil Price, Exploration, Production, and Uncertainty

NO ABSTRAC

Caprock integrity and public perception studies of carbon storage in depleted hydrocarbon reservoirs

Capture and subsurface storage of CO2 is widely viewed as being a necessary component of any strategy to minimise and control the continued increase in average global temperatures. Existing oil and gas reservoirs can be re-used for carbon storage, providing a substantial fraction of the vast amounts of subsurface storage space that will be required for the implementation of carbon storage at an industrial scale. Carbon capture and storage (CCS) in depleted reservoirs aims to ensure subsurface containment, both to satisfy safety considerations, and to provide confidence that the containment will continue over the necessary timescales. Other technical issues that need to be addressed include the risk of unintended subsurface events, such as induced seismicity. Minimisation of these risks is key to building confidence in CCS technology, both in relation to financing/liability, and the development and maintenance of public acceptance. These factors may be of particular importance with regard to CCS projects involving depleted hydrocarbon reservoirs, where the mechanical effects of production activities must also be considered. Given the importance of caprock behaviour in this context, several previously published geomechanical caprock studies of depleted hydrocarbon reservoirs are identified and reviewed, comprising experimental and numerical studies of fourteen CCS pilot sites in depleted hydrocarbon reservoirs, in seven countries (Algeria, Australia, Finland, France, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, UK). Particular emphasis is placed on the amount and types of data collected, the mathematical methods and codes used to conduct geomechanical analysis, and the relationship between geomechanical aspects and public perception. Sound geomechanical assessment, acting to help minimise operational and financial/liability risks, and the careful recognition of the impact of public perception are two key factors that can contribute to the development of a successful CCS project in a depleted hydrocarbon reservoir

From creekology to geology: Finding and conserving oil on the Southern Plains, 1859--1930.

This dissertation tells the story of the oil industry's westward migration from Pennsylvania to the Southern Plains states of Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas and how different environments in these regions influenced prospectors' methods for finding oil. Petroleum engineers, geologists, and businessmen take center stage throughout the narrative, and I emphasize how their biases, values, and interests influenced the kind of knowledge produced. At the heart of this story lay a contest between professional, university-trained engineers and geologists and so-called practical oil men, or "wildcatters, " who received their training less formally from surveying the landscape. Although both groups performed field work in their search for oil, I explore how each learned very different information from that activity. Wildcatters met with so much success that the oil industry failed to take geologists seriously for approximately fifty years after 1860 when the Pennsylvania oil boom started, and I argue that the environment played an important role in this contest for authority between oil prospectors who learned their trade through hands-on experience and those who learned it primarily in the classroom. I continue this theme by showing how the environment actively influenced the growing acceptance of geologists as the oil industry migrated west and companies with interests in Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas began hiring geologists and establishing their own geological research departments. A pioneer in the use of geology, Henry L. Doherty, controlled Cities Service holding company and dispatched an army of geologists who discovered significant oil strikes in these states. Doherty's embrace of university-trained experts led him to advocate conservation of oil on the basis of geological and engineering principles. Practical men in Oklahoma, however, recognized the need for conservation even earlier and succeeded in lobbying their state legislature for laws which proved effective long before geologists and engineers entered the industry en masse. I show how the political battle over conservation between practical men and petroleum engineers and geologists underscores the complex and decades-long relationship between the oil industry and the natural world