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A procedure to estimate the parent population of the size of oil and gas fields as revealed by a study of economic truncation

J.H. Schuenemeyer·L. J. Drew
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Abstract

An estimation technique has been derived to predict the number of small fields in a geologic play or basin. Historically, many small oil and gas fields went unreported because they were not economical. This led to an underestimation of the number of undiscovered small fields. A study of the distributions of reported oil and gas fields in well-explored areas suggests that the large fields when grouped into log base 2 size classes are geometrically distributed. Further, the number of small fields reported is a function of the cost of exploration and development. Thus, the population field-size distribution is conjectured to be log geometric in form. ?? 1983 Plenum Publishing Corporation.

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Journal of the International Association for Mathematical GeologyArticle

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J.H. Schuenemeyer, L. J. Drew. 1983. A procedure to estimate the parent population of the size of oil and gas fields as revealed by a study of economic truncation. https://doi.org/10.1007/bf01030080

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