McCutcheon, Steve

English

University of New Brunswick: Centre for Digital Scholarship Journals

GEOSCIENCE CANADA Volume 36  Number 2 June 2009 95REVIEWSCores and Core Logging forGeoscientists, 2nd editionBy Graham A. BlackbournWhittles Publishing, 2009distributed by CRC PressISBN-10: 978-1904445395ISBN-13: 978-1439801161US $79.95, hardcover, 152 p.Reviewed by Steve McCutcheonNB Geological SurveysP.O. Box 50, Stn. Main Bathurst, NB, E2A 3Z1E-mail: steve.mccutcheon@gnb.caThis book is an expanded and updatedversion of  Cores and Core Logging forGeologists (ISBN-13: 978-1870325257),which was originally published in 1999as a 120 page paperback (US $39.95).The author is a sedimentologist and hisScotland-based company, BlackbournGeoconsulting, caters to the petroleumindustry; consequently, the emphasis ison cores and core logging practicesfrom oil and gas wells. Upon learningthis, my first reaction was that thisbook will be of  little use to me as ahardrock geologist who looks at miner-al industry drill cores. To my surprise, Iwas wrong, as my wife delights intelling me at every opportunity.The book is laid out in sevenchapters and three appendices, includ-ing chapters on drilling and coringmethods (2), core handling (3), corelogging (4), core analysis and testing(5), interpretation and preparation offinal logs (6), and core preservationand storage (7). Each of  these chapterscontains nuggets of  useful informationand a few practical tips for any geolo-gist who works with drill cores ordrilling projects. This book should bemandatory reading for geology stu-dents, although North Americans needto keep in mind that a ‘conductor pipe’is called a drill casing and a ‘torch’ is aflashlight on this continent.Overall, it is well written andwell illustrated apart from the odd edi-torial oversight, e.g. ‘But although’ and‘one-off  studies’, and the handling ofthe colour figures. These figures are allplaced in the centre of  the book, obvi-ously to reduce printing costs, and areassigned chapter-specific figure num-bers, which are referred to in the text.When reading along in the text, how-ever, it is not obvious where to findeach missing colour figure, especially ifone misses the ‘Key to colour section’at the beginning of  the book. It wouldhave been less confusing for this read-er if  these colour images were labelledwith plate numbers, rather than chap-ter-specific figure numbers. What is most surprising is thatthere is no comparable book with aminerals-industry perspective on coresand core logging, given the increasedemphasis in recent years on reportingstandards by regulatory agencies, e.g.Canadian National Instrument 43-101.The book, Geoscience Reporting Guidelines(ISBN-10: 0-968769314), by BrianGrant has seven pages (out of  a totalof  346) devoted to the preparation of‘Drillcore Logs’, which is more thancan be found in the ‘Exploration BestPractice Guidelines’, to which NI 43-101 refers. In my opinion, there is areal need for a ‘best practices’ book oncore logging for minerals industrygeologists, in order to ensure consis-tent reporting. However, until such abook is published, I am going to keepa copy of  Graham Blackbourn’s sec-ond edition on my shelf  for handy ref-erence.

Cores and Core Logging for Geoscientists, 2nd edition

https://journals.lib.unb.ca/index.php/GC/article/download/12584/13457

Cores and Core Logging for Geoscientists, 2nd edition

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University of New Brunswick: Centre for Digital Scholarship Journals