Up from the ground came a bubblin'crude

The good news is that most of Vernon County rests on top of a large pocket of oil. The bad news is that it is heavy, shallow and hard to pump. However, Dr. Shari Dunn-Norman, from the University of Missouri Petroleum Engineering Department, conducted some experiments near Eve last Saturday, in an effort to devise a way to make shallow heavy oil extraction more economical. Saturday's experiments consisted of two steps. First, two of the wells went through a process called hydraulic fracturing, which pumps, under pressure, 58,000 gallons of potable water and two truckloads of very fine sand down the wells. This causes cracks to open up in the subsoil that will allow the oil to flow faster. Dunn-Norman said that, in effect, they are creating a superhighway for the oil. After the site has gone through the hydraulic fracturing process, Dunn-Norman plans on injecting a microbial treatment into the wells. The microbes will change the viscosity of the oil to increase flow and generate gas that will push the oil along. "We are hoping the microbes will increase flow capability," she said. The oil still has to be pumped out of the ground. Dunn-Norman reports that with 80 psi or less oil won't flow to the surface. The speed and direction of the flowing oil will be recorded and tracked with ERT, an electric restivity tomography machine. The ERT will process electrical images that track changes in resitivity. However, interpreting all the data collected by Saturday's experiments will be a time consuming project. Dunn-Norman estimates it will take six months to a year before she will know how well the project worked. Dunn-Norman is very excited about the project because it is unique in several ways. Firstly, this sort of project has never been done before. In the past, steam has been used to extract heavy oil but this method is very expensive and to be cost effective the price of crude has to be very high. "We are trying to develop an inexpensive way to extract it," said Dunn-Norman. Secondly, Vernon County is a very unique site because nowhere else in the world does oil exist at this depth of 160 feet. Finding an inexpensive way to extract oil will not only be a benefit to Vernon County, but also the whole of Missouri. Dunn-Norman estimates that there is two billion barrels under this state. "It's just hard to get out," said Dunn-Norman. She is looking at establishing a system that will be cost effective with 2-3 barrels-a-day production. "We don't have to have a flood," said Dunn-Norman. "We are wildcatting some new technology," said Jim Long, project coordinator.. In oil-business terminology, a wildcatter is someone who will drill wells in an untested location.