By OGJ editors
WASHINGTON, DC, Mar. 24 -- The US Geological Survey Wednesday said the public now can access a new government database that includes chemical analysis of crude oil, natural gas, and rock samples from thousands of locations worldwide.
USGS officials said they expect the database, which contains 65,000 records, to help government officials, academics, and the public assess domestic and world energy resources.
The agency predicted their information "will be a useful reference for federal, state, and local agencies involved in land and resource planning, oil and gas production, oil and gas assessments, public safety, and environmental concerns.
"The database will also be a valuable tool for academic research into the processes responsible for the formation and accumulation of petroleum," USGS said.
Information within the database includes rock pyrolysis data, organic mass spectrometry, vitrinite reflectance, gas chromatography, column chromatography, stable carbon isotopes, and a number of other related petroleum geochemical analyses.
The sample types included are primarily rock, oil, and gas samples collected from outcrops or from exploratory or production wells.
USGS scientists use the data to develop their own understanding of the physical and geochemical processes responsible for hydrocarbon formation, maturation, generation, migration and accumulation, and as a tool to assess the oil and gas potential for petroleum systems in both national and international settings.
