Have you ever felt as though your life consisted of a lot of carefully balanced spinning plates?  You have family plates, work plates, volunteer plates and just when everything seems in balance, you get hit with a bad virus.  You try to catch the plates before they fall but some inevitably get by you.  One that got by me was our first social this year at Rose City Draft House.  I was sorry to miss it, but reports are that it was a good time with plenty of food.  Thanks, Hunter Carr, for organizing; I am looking forward to the next one.

Sequence stratigraphy month is here!  We are so lucky to have two amazing experts coming our way to teach us more about this powerful tool.  The first is Dr. John Suter, who will be our luncheon speaker this month.  He has more than 30 years of domestic and international experience.  Currently a consulting geologist in Houston, Dr. Suter has worked for Exxon Production Research and ConocoPhillips.  He has published numerous papers, and taught a variety of courses and workshops.  He has received multiple awards and is an AAPG distinguished lecturer.  He will present “Variations on a Theme—Latitudinal Impacts on Sequence Stratigraphy”.  Check out our website for more details. Be sure to note that our luncheon has been moved to Wednesday, Feb. 8th, same time and place, 11:30 at the Cascades Country Club, because of NAPE.

Happy New Year!  Well, the Christmas decorations are back in the boxes, and the resolution to get back to the gym to work off those extra holiday pounds has been made (planning to implement any day now).  However, I do count my blessings for family and friends and hope you all had a joyous holiday as well.

We are looking forward to an exciting 2017.  With the hope of an upward trajectory of oil and gas prices, or at least stability, optimism is in the air.

The East Texas Geological society has some upcoming fun and educational events to put on your calendar.  The first is our luncheon this month: Wednesday, January 18th, 11:30 at the Cascades Country Club.  Our speaker will be Dr. Peter R. Rose, presenting “Cognitive Bias, The Elephant in the Living Room of Science and Professionalism”.  This is part of AAPG’s distinguished lecture series.  Dr. Rose authored a book in 2001, Risk Analysis and Management of Petroleum Exploration Ventures, and authored or co-authored more than 80 published articles and over 300 presented papers.  He has received numerous prestigious awards.  An additional benefit to attending this lecture is that our society will offer the required ethics credit for anyone renewing or obtaining a Texas Professional Geoscience License.  Don’t forget to RSVP!

I hope this finds you all enjoying this season of celebration.  As this difficult year for the oil industry draws to a close, there are some reasons to celebrate.  Natural gas exports from Texas to Mexico have expanded rapidly.  Currently pipeline capacity from the US to Mexico stands at 7.3 BCF/D. In the next three years this capacity is projected to double (source eia.gov, Dec 1, 2016). LNG exports from Louisiana began this year, with four more terminals planned in the next five years.  OPEC just reached a provisional agreement to cut output; who knows if it will stick with all the drama and confusion, but there is cautious optimism.  With oil starting at below $30/B at the beginning of the year, now topping $50/B and with natural gas prices at a two-year high, things are headed in the right direction.

As our industry slowly picks up, this is a good time to hone our skills and spark new ideas. Many of us must take financial responsibility for our own continuing education to stay up on the latest technology and innovations.  What better, low-cost place to do that than ETGS. I hope you will join us for our luncheon this month, 11:30, December 14th, at the Cascades Country Club, to hear Bill Chandler’s presentation, “Rethinking Drill Cuttings: A new productive identification tool that finds the 'sweet spots'".  He will show us a low-tech methodology using drill cuttings that creates a reliable resistivity curve and tracks density porosity while drilling.  In wells without wireline logs, this could be a very useful tool in analyzing zones of interest.  Don’t forget to RSVP on our website.