PITTSBURGH—The deadlines, the money, the pressure, the geology, the data.

The task of tackling so much information may lead to finding a pulse-quickening deal. Or it may lead to dead weight on a portfolio.

Diana Duran, a geological adviser at Occidental Petroleum Corp. (NYSE: OXY), walked an audience through the key points on finding those data room ingots at Hart Energy’s DUG East conference on June 21. Duran, who works with Oxy’s worldwide exploration - North American team, gave a primer on the Marcellus shale play.

In terms of a data room experience, “not everything that shines is gold,” Duran said.

More than anything, Duran’s emphasis seemed to be on asking questions—a lot of questions.

The start point is whether the data available to buyers point to shale acreage that is truly prospective for the Marcellus?

“One thing that we have to be careful about is whether we are being biased by our previous work and our previous knowledge,” cautioned Duran. Could the data be “telling me something different,” Duran asked? And, ultimately, the question arises: “Is this really an opportunity to pursue or to pass?”

Features that are important differ between a conventional play and an unconventional resource play. For a shale play like the Marcellus, noted Duran, key items may include:

  • Basin position;
  • Source rock type, quality and distribution, including thickness and total organic carbon (TOC);
  • Transformation ratio;
  • Expulsion efficiency; and
  • Repeatability.

One possibility is to use third-party vendors’ data to build a production map “to start looking for trends or where you may have a sweet spot.

“And you also have to think of attributes. What production attribute is likely to be more reliable?” she asked, adding that it may be useful to normalize data depending on the number of frack stages in a lateral.

Another consideration: the legitimacy of the data. Often missing, for example, is information on the type of drilling fluid used when the information was acquired. Even mud tells different stories: was the well drilled using oil-based or water-based mud? Are samples related to core, cuttings or sidewall cores? In terms of TOC in a resource play, while 9% TOC may be found in the sweet spots, said Duran, anything that is less than 2% is “kind of marginal.”

In terms of integrating data, Duran showed a chart summarizing a number of key parameters as follows:

  • Thickness;
  • Organic content;
  • Mineralogy;
  • Maturity;
  • Generation potential;
  • Location in basin;
  • Repeatability; and
  • Correlation to production.

In addition, Duran pointed to assessing the land position “in relation to coal mines or anything that would make the acreage not attractive for repeatable drilling.”

Chris Sheehan can be reached at csheehan@hartenergy.com.