Volatile
global conditions continue to be a factor, but not a deterrent,
for AAPG's Distinguished Lecture
program, which this year will again sponsor 14 speakers on tours
to both domestic and international groups.
This year's
topics will be as specific as "Making Sense of Turbidite Reservoirs,"
to as big as "Global Energy — the Next Decade and Beyond," to as
relevant as a look at Ghawar, the world's largest oil field, to
as offbeat as "Feathered Dinosaurs and the Origin of Birds."
The DL
program, funded in part by the AAPG
Foundation, will offer nine domestic and five international
speakers this season.
Last season's
slate of eight domestic and five international speakers made 153
visits to a total audience of nearly 9,000.
AAPG's
Distinguished Lecture program was developed to expose students,
young geologists, college faculty members and members of geological
societies to current information, research and thinking.
Remaining
on track this year is the continuation of the intersociety lecturer
effort — a cooperative program that presents an opportunity for
cross-discipline lectures.
The
AAPG-SEG Joint Distinguished Lecture speaker — fifth in the series
— will be given by Heloise Lynn,
an AAPG member with Lynn Inc., in Houston, who will talk on "The
Winds of Change: Anisotropic Rocks — Their Preferred Direction
of Fluid Flow and Their Associated Seismic Signatures."
In keeping
with the alternating logistical responsibilities for the intersociety
lecturer, Lynn's tour will be coordinated by SEG.
And also
as in past years, support for several tours comes directly from
the AAPG Foundation's Distinguished Lecture Fund. They are:
- The
Allan P. Bennison Distinguished Lecture — An international lecturer
who makes a U.S. tour, funded by contributions from longtime Tulsa
geologist Allan Bennison, who died this past year at his home
in California.
This year's Bennison
lecturer will be Rob Gawthorpe,
a professor of sedimentology and tectonics at the University of
Manchester (UK). His topics are:
-
The J. Ben Carsey Distinguished Lecture — A domestic tour, provided
by contributions from J. Ben Carsey Jr., of Houston, to establish
a named lecturer in memory of his father, who served as president
of AAPG in 1967-68.
This year's J. Ben
Carsey lecturer is Arthur R. Green,
retired chief geoscientist with ExxonMobil, Houston. His topics
will be:
- The
Haas-Pratt Distinguished Lecture — A domestic tour, provided
by contributions from the late Merrill W. Haas, in honor of famed
geologist (and Haas' mentor) Wallace Pratt. The funding is granted
for emphasis on a specific case history application of geology
in a discovery.
The Haas-Pratt lecture
will be presented by Jack C. Pashin,
manager of the energy and minerals unit for the Geological Survey
of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, Ala. His lecture is "Geologic Heterogeneity
in Coalbed Methane Reservoirs of the Black Warrior Basin: Implications
for Gas Production and CO2
Sequestration."
- The
Roy M. Huffington Distinguished Lecture — An international tour,
provided by contributions from the Huffington family in honor
of the oilman-geologist.
The Huffington speaker
will be Robert S. "Bo" Tye,
senior geological adviser for PetroTel Inc., Plano, Texas. His
tour, scheduled to begin Sept. 20 and go through Oct. 15, will
have stops in China, Southeast Asia, Indonesia and Australia.
His talks are:
- The
Dean A. McGee International Distinguished Lecture — Provided
by contributions from Kerr-McGee, which annually supports international
speaking tours.
This year's McGee
lecturer is Carlo Doglioni,
professor at the University of Roma La Sapeinza (Italy). He
is scheduled to tour central Europe in November or December.
His topic is "Global Tectonic Asymmetries and Applications to
Europe."
This year's list of domestic
Distinguished Lecturers also includes:
- Philip
J. Currie, curator of dinosaurs at the Royal Tyrrell
Museum of Paleontology, Drumheller, Canada. His topics are:
- David
C. Jennette, research project manager, Bureau of Economic
Geology, Austin, Texas. His topics are:
- Tony
Reynolds, development geologist for BP, Chirag Field,
Azerbaijan. His topics are:
- Ron
Steel, professor and Davis Chair, University of Texas,
Austin, Texas. His topics are:
- Lori
L. Summa, senior research geologist, ExxonMobil Upstream
Research, Houston. Her topic is "Issues and Approaches for Integrated
Hydrocarbon Systems Analysis in Tertiary Deltas — What We Have
Learned: Examples from Deep Water Nigeria."
- A
special lecture tour of North America will be presented by Abdulkader
M. Afifi, senior geological consultant-upstream ventures
department, Saudi Aramco, Dhahran, Saudi Arabia. He will tour
in the early fall this year, and his tour will be subsidized by
Saudi Aramco and ExxonMobil. His topics are:
- "Ghawar: Anatomy
of the "World's Largest Oil Field."
- "Paleozoic Hydrocarbon
Habitat in the Arabian Plate."
This year's
other international Distinguished Lecturers are:
-
John
Castagna, school of geology and geophysics, University
of Oklahoma, Norman, Okla. He will tour Latin America, on dates
to be determined. His talk is titled "Using Spectral Decomposition
to Increase Confidence in Direct Hydrocarbon Indicators."
-
Richard
Swarbrick, professor at the University of Durham,
UK. He will tour western Europe during the winter of 2005, and
his talk is titled "Overpressure as a Primary Control on Fluid
Flow in Sedimentary Basins."