New oil and gas fields in Kansas show brisk pace of exploration

by Phyllis Jacobs Griekspoor

Deception Creek, Woodchuck, Meercat, Driftwood and Air Park. These are among the 19 new oil and gas fields discovered in Kansas. They got their names when the Kansas Corporation Commission and the Kansas Geological Survey got together with the Kansas Geological Society's Nomenclature Committee.
The committee has been busy this year with wildcat discoveries in Kansas nearly doubling from a year ago. There have been 39 new fields recognized since Jan. 1, compared to 20 last year. Discoveries of all types, including new infield discoveries, totalled 44, up 33 % from a year ago.

Ed Cross, executive director of the Kansas Independent Oil and Gas Association, said the new discoveries are indicative of an ever-increasing pace of exploration.
"It's just really, really busy out there," he said. "We've seen people finding oil in new places, increasing production in existing fields and going back into abandoned fields." The latest round of newly named fields comes in14 counties in western and central Kansas.

And the names come from a range of guidelines and the imagination of members of the nomenclature committee, which includes John Morrison, publisher of the Independent Oil and Gas Service Red Top Weekly News. Morrison has been chairman of the naming committee for more than 25 years.
"If an operator wants a name that means something to him, we understand that it may be the only big discovery of his life, and we try not to deny him that opportunity," Morrison said. "Sometimes we use a landowner name, the name of the field lease or something that comes from the geography or the topography of the region."

If a new discovery is close to an existing field and an annexation appears likely in the future, the field will often be named for its direction from the existing field. Examples of that are Amerson North and Nibla South from the most recently named fields.
"Sometimes, we just draw a blank," Morrison said. "I remember one time we were trying to come up withsomething from this discovery in nowhere Butler County and the well site geologist was on the committee. He said what he remembered about that well was how bad the flies were. So we named it 'Flies Field.' "

He said Woodchuck in the most recent list came from the fact that it was close to an old field that had been named Prairie Dog. Fields around it had names such as Gopher and Chipmunk.
"So we stuck with the theme and called the new fields Woodchuck and Meercat," he said. "We try to keep it fun."