The Kern Front Oil Field is a large oil and gas field in the lower Sierra Nevada hills in Kern County, California. Found in 1912, and with cumulative production of about 210 million barrels (33,000,000 m 3 ) of oil, it ranks 29th in the state, and is believed to retain about ten percent of its original oil (about 22 million barrel (3.500.000 m 3 )), according to official estimates from California's Department of Oil, Gas and Geothermal Resources (DOGGR). It is adjacent to the much larger Kern River Kern Field, which lies to the southeast, and Poso Oil Field in the north.
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Kern Home Square is approximately 5 miles (8.0 km) north of Oildale town, and 10 miles (16 km) north of Bakersfield, on small hills above the San Joaquin Valley floor. It is about 6 miles (9.7 km) long by 2.5 miles (4.0 km), with a long axis in the north-south direction, comprising a productive surface area of ​​5,495 acres (22.24 km 2 ). The altitude varies from about 500 to 1,000 feet (150 to 300 m) above sea level. The land is scattered, especially compared to the very dense construction of the adjacent Kern River Oil Field, which has one of the most densely populated oil developments in the United States, with more than 9,000 oil wells accumulated within just a few square miles. The Kern Front Field is bordered on the west by California State Route 65, to the southwest by James Road, and to the southeast by Bakersfield-Glennville Road. Oilfields Road stretches south to north through the field.
Being in the sub-ecology of California Central Valley known as Hardpan Terraces, at an altitude of less than 1,000 feet (300 m), the dominant native vegetation is grass. The climate is hot and dry, with summer temperatures routinely exceeding 100 ° F (38 ° C); the average freeze-free period lasts from about 250 to 300 days. The average annual rainfall is about 10 inches (250 mm), almost all of it as rain and almost all in winter; Summer is characteristically painless.
Maps Kern Front Oil Field
Geology
The Front Front Kern contains two main production units, the Etchegoin Formation and Chanac, both sediments, but are not aligned overlapped. Etchegoin is Pliocene sea sand, and Chanac is a non-marine sand Pliocene. Each is interspersed with mud and clay, and the sand has a high porosity, ranging from 25 to 33 percent, making it particularly suitable as an oil reservoir. Above it the Etchegoin and Chanac formations are the highly productive Kosen Formation of the Pleosen River Kern in the adjacent Kern River Oil Field. These units all have northwest attack and a small southwest dip. The large north-trending faults on the east side of the field provide a structural seal on the side; on the northeast side, the upper side of the field, the sand layer into the mud and relatively water-resistant clay, providing a seal in that direction. Many small mistakes move southwest across the field. California DOGGR recognizes only one production pool - Etchegoin-Chanac - and integrates production data.
Many sediment units underlie these petroleum-containing sands, but they also have not yet produced much oil or have not been fully explored. Basement rock - a granite complex representing a large Sierra Nevada batholith, and possibly from the late Jurassic age - occurs at a depth of about 7,000 feet (2,100 m). The deepest well at Kern Front Field, Atlantic Richfield Company "Kramer No. 1", reaches a depth of 7,738 feet (2,359 m) before crashing into a basement compound.
Oil from the field is heavy crude oil, with an average API weight of 14, and a sulfur content of 0.9 weight percent. Because the oil is heavy, it thickens and flows easily only when assisted by steam injection or other enhanced recovery techniques.
The average depth of the oil bearing unit is about 2,300 feet (700 m), and the oil carrier thickness ranges from 100 to 700 feet (30 to 213 m). Due to relatively shallow oil depths, relatively low temperatures, only 100 ° F (38 ° C) (many deeper zones in the Central Valley oil field produce oils over 200 ° F (93 ° C). greater safety hazards for workers). In 1983, the date of compilation of DOGGR data, the water table in the field was at 2,500 feet (760 m) below ground level.
History, production, and operations
Standard Oil Company of California invented the field in 1912 with No Drilling No. 1, into the Etchegoin pool, to a depth of 2836 feet (864 m). Wells are still there, like Chevron Corp. No. No. 1. The peak production for the field was in 1929, where 4,535,029 barrels (721,012,0 m 3 ) of the oil were pumped from the ground.
Production continued to decline from that peak until the discovery of the steam injection method in the 1960s. Cyclic steam injection ("huff and puff method" began in 1964, and production rebounded, due to heavy oil flowing more freely to pump wells.In 1978, former Chevron Corp. operator started a steam flood in the south of the field, and Century Oil Management doing the same thing in the north, Petro-Lewis Corporation tested the steam foam and steam foam solutions packed in polymer gel to see if steamflood performance could be improved.
Gas production in the field peaked in 1980.
One of the current operators, Tearlach Resources, has claimed that the field may actually contain a potential reserve of 500 million barrels (79,000,000 m 3 ). This estimate is based on work performed by field operators in 1990, Mobil, ARCO and Occidental, and involves the recovery of previously uneconomic deposits, and exploring deeper, previously unexplored zones believed by some geologists to be oil - bearing.
In early 2009, there were 838 producing oil wells in the field. If some current proposals for further exploration and development are enforced, as Tearlach does, this figure can increase significantly.
Current operators include Bellaire, Vintage, E & amp; Natural Resources Management B, West American Energy Corp., and several others. Field operators send some wastewater from oil production to the Valley Waste Disposal, with some of the waste water filtered and softened to make the feed water for the boiler. Wastewater skims the remaining oil and fat from water, and water is delivered to the Cawelo Water District, where it is reused for irrigation.
References
- California Oil and Gas Field, Volumes I, II and III . Vol. I (1998), Vol. II (1992), Vol. III (1982). California Conservation Department, Oil, Gas and Geothermal Resources Division (DOGGR). 1.472 pp. Oil Field Information McKittrick p. 268-272. PDF files are available on CD from www.consrv.ca.gov.
- California Conservation Department, Oil and Gas Statistics, Annual Report, December 31, 2006.
- The Bellaire Oil Company: a description of geology, production, and operations in the Kern Front
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Source of the article : Wikipedia
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