PORES AREN’T THE ONLY GAPS: EXAMINING THE GORDON SANDSTONE IN THE JACKSONBURG-STRINGTOWN FIELD, WEST VIRGINIA USING NEW PERMEABILITY AND XRF DATA

The Midwest Regional Carbon Initiative (MRCI) is evaluating opportunities for utilization of CO₂, including enhanced oil recovery (EOR), in legacy oil fields across the Appalachian and Illinois basins. Although legacy oil fields have previously been characterized under various regional studies, many datasets for the wells have limited availability and are underrepresented in the region. Estimates of permeability, necessary for the construction of CO₂ injection models, are especially underrepresented; publicly-accessible permeability measurements are available for approximately 5% of the fields included in the MRCI oil and gas fields’ database. Detailed mineralogical data, which can help to identify subtle lithologic changes and characterize preferential flow pathways, are even more uncommon. To help increase data density in the legacy oil fields of West Virginia, newly acquired continuous cores from the Devonian Gordon sandstone in the Jacksonburg-Stringtown oil field are being analyzed using X-ray Fluorescence (XRF) and a permeameter to obtain closely-spaced composition measurements and permeability. Resulting work will improve characterization of heterogeneous reservoirs and allow stakeholders of various backgrounds to evaluate future opportunities in the Jacksonburg-Stringtown oil field.