New Perspectives on Airborne Radiometric Reconnaisance: Analyses of NURE (National Uranium Resource Evaluation) Data Over Four Producing Oilfields
ZINKE, ROBERT, and JEROME G. MORSE
Processing and mapping of radiometric data acquired in the period 1977 to
1982 from airborne platforms by the DOE in the comprehensive search for uranium
provides a viable tool for hydrocarbon exploration. Studies were made of the
geology with the DOE data over four producing oilfields in the Rocky Mountain
area: the Wilson Creek field, Rio Blanco, Colorado; Belle Creek field, Powder
River County, Montana; Bridger Lake field, Summit County, Utah; and the Eland,
Dickinson, Duck Creek, Versippi fields complex, Stark County, North Dakota. Each
was mapped using gamma ray data recorded in the spectrometer's total count
window (0.3 - 3 MeV). The low gamma flux values clearly show good correspondence
with the oilfields, although at times slightly offset. These findings add to the
geochemical viewpoint - i.e. - the causative geochemical factors of microseepage
induced redox (reduction/oxidation) reactions - by proposing roles played by the
underlying nuclear physics
and geology of the three primordial radioelements,
potassium, thorium, and uranium.