OHIO OPERATORS PRESS 3D WORK

Operators are committing to larger 3D seismic surveys along the state's substantial Cambro-Ordovician Knox gas and oil producing trend. Aspect Management Corp., Denver, NGO Development, Newark, Ohio, and Butcher Energy, Columbus, Ohio, plan an 8 1/2 sq mile survey over 33 well Bakersville gas field in Coshocton and Tuscarawas counties (see map, OGJ, Jan. 23, p. 61).

March 20, 1995

2 min read

Operators are committing to larger 3D seismic surveys along the state's substantial Cambro-Ordovician Knox gas and oil producing trend.

Aspect Management Corp., Denver, NGO Development, Newark, Ohio, and Butcher Energy, Columbus, Ohio, plan an 8 1/2 sq mile survey over 33 well Bakersville gas field in Coshocton and Tuscarawas counties (see map, OGJ, Jan. 23, p. 61).

The survey, to start in late March or early April, will test 3D's cost effectiveness in identifying infill and extension locations in Cambro-Ordovician Knox group formations. The field produces from Ordovician Beekmantown dolomite.

Butcher Energy has also assembled a block of more than 200,000 acres in Pike County, Ohio, and adjacent counties of southern Ohio in an attempt to extend the Cambro-Ordovician Rose Run/Beekmantown trend toward Kentucky. The Knox formations are less than 3,000 ft deep in southern Ohio, said Paul Gerome, Butcher exploration manager.

A 5 sq mile exploratory 3D survey in Coshocton County east of the producing trend is to start in second quarter 1995. Operator is Newstar Energy Inc., Calgary, with participation by PetroVentures Exploration Co., Detroit, an affiliate of Michigan Consolidated Gas Co.

Newstar, with an office in Monroe, Mich., said PetroVentures purchased a 25% working interest 18,750 net acres on which Newstar holds all or deep rights in Coshocton, Muskingum, and Tuscarawas counties. Objectives are Rose Run and Beekmantown reservoirs at about 6,000 ft.

Newstar plans to drill as many as 30 wells on these and other Ohio lands during 1995. It drilled six Ohio wells and participated in six others in late 1994.

Newstar previously, shot 3D seismic in search of gas in Silurian Guelph pinnacle reefs in the southwestern Ontario portion of the Michigan basin.

MB Operating, Canton, Ohio, acquired a 1 sq mile 3D survey in Ohio last year and drilled one dry hole on the acreage.

Independent operators are sharply increasing use of onshore 3D seismic surveys as costs and duration compress and data quality improves (OGJ, Jan. 2, p. 16).