May Luncheon & Annual Meeting

Please RSVP by 3:00pm on Friday, May 12, 2023.

Reservations made after the deadline will incur an additional fee of $10.

*Please note, Lowell Waite will be presenting In-Person*

Interested in Sponsoring this Luncheon? Sponsorship includes 2 Luncheon Tickets and opportunity to promote your company at the beginning of the luncheon for up to 3 minutes. Your logo will be included on [1] All Luncheon Advertisements (Social Media and Emails), [2] Full Page Advertisement on Luncheon Slides for that Month, [3] Luncheon Event Webpage, and [4] Table Signs.

Online payment by debit/credit card. In-person payment by cash, check, credit card, venmo, paypal, applepay, googlepay, and samsungpay.

LOCATION: In-Person luncheon meeting will be held at the Bush Convention Center. Virtual meeting on Zoom. 

TOPIC: Re-exploring the Eastern Shelf of the Midland Basin

ABSTRACT: The Eastern Shelf of the Midland Basin is one of several high-standing Permo-Pennsylvanian depositional shelves surrounding the deeper Delaware and Midland Basins. Dipping a modest 1.3 degrees eastward, stratigraphic units of the Eastern Shelf consist of a relatively thin succession of pre-Pennsylvanian units (Upper Cambrian sandstones and Lower Ordovician and Mississippian carbonates) unconformably overlain by a thick section of Upper Pennsylvanian to lower Permian cyclothems (alternating lowstand clastics and highstand carbonates). A century of exploration has shown the region contains a multitude of small- to medium-sized conventional oil and gas fields, most of which are housed within Pennsylvanian (Strawn, Canyon) reservoirs. These hydrocarbon reserves occur at a relatively shallow depth (-4000 to -8000 ft. MD). The complex stratigraphy of the region suggests that much oil and gas remains to be found.

Detailed analysis of producing fields from Nolan County, Texas, indicates a wide range of structural and stratigraphic traps within a total of eleven (11) individual producing zones. These include, from oldest to youngest: Cambrian sandstone; Lower Ordovician Ellenburger dolomite; Mississippian limestone; Lower Strawn Caddo and Odom limestone; Upper Strawn sandstone and limestone; Pennsylvanian (Strawn – Canyon) reef; Canyon (Lower Wolfcamp) sandstone; and Cisco (lower Wolfcamp) sandstone and limestone. Some operators have recently initiated exploration of Lower Wolfcamp shales utilizing horizontal drilling and completion techniques. The prospect of further shale exploration along western margin of the Eastern Shelf, as well as the possibilities of additional development of conventional reservoirs within and between existing fields, may provide exciting future opportunities in this region.

BIO: Lowell Waite is a Lecturer within the Department of Geosciences. He has 38 years of previous experience in the oil and gas industry, including 17 years with Mobil Oil and 21 years with Pioneer Natural Resources. While at Mobil, he worked in carbonate research, domestic exploration (Gulf of Mexico and west Texas), and international exploration and field development (Saudi Arabia, Angola, North Africa, Venezuela, and Kazakhstan) including 5 years as co-leader of Mobil’s Carbonate Seminar.  At Pioneer, his main projects included International New Ventures (Tunisia), Gulf of Mexico exploration, South Texas exploration (Edwards reef trend and Eagle Ford shale), Denver Basin exploration, and Permian Basin unconventional shales (Wolfcamp – Spraberry of the Midland Basin). At Pioneer he taught numerous in-house courses and field trips. Recently retired for the oil and gas industry, he looks forward to teaching, advising, and mentoring students in his capacity as co-director of the Permian Basin Research Lab at UT Dallas.