Reports

The Cretaceous-Tertiary Composite Total Petroleum System coincident Taranaki Basin Assessment Unit was recently assessed for undiscovered technically recoverable oil, natural gas, and natural gas liquids resources as part of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) World Energy Resources Project, World Oil and Gas Assessment. Using a geology-based assessment methodology, the USGS estimated mean...

Using a geology-based assessment methodology, the U.S. Geological Survey estimated mean undiscovered volumes of 7.4 billion barrels of oil, 6.7 trillion cubic feet of associated/dissolved natural gas, and 0.53 billion barrels of natural gas liquids in the Bakken and Three Forks Formations in the Williston Basin Province of Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota.

Using a geology-based assessment methodology, the U.S. Geological Survey estimated means of 19 million barrels of undiscovered, technically recoverable oil and 244 billion cubic feet of undiscovered natural gas in the Puerto Rico–U.S. Virgin Islands Exclusive Economic Zone.

ong Lake National Wildlife Refuge, located in south-central North Dakota, is an important habitat for numerous migratory birds and waterfowl, including several threatened or endangered species. The refuge is distinguished by Long Lake, which is approximately 65 square kilometers and consists of four primary water management units. Water levels in the Long Lake units are maintained by low...

Midway Atoll in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands supports the largest breeding colony of Laysan albatross (Phoebastria immutabilis) in the world and is a proposed site for the translocation of endangered Northwestern Hawaiian Island passerine birds such as the Nihoa finch (Telespiza ultima), Nihoa millerbird (Acrocephalus familiaris kingi), or Laysan finch (Telespiza cantans). On the...

In 2010 and 2011, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), in cooperation with the Northeast Texas Municipal Water District and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, did a baseline assessment of physical characteristics and aquatic biota (fish and mussels) collected at the mesohabitat scale for reaches of Big Cypress, Black Cypress, and Little Cypress Bayous in the Big Cypress Basin...

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), in cooperation with the Northeast Texas Municipal Water District and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, did a baseline assessment in 2010-11 of physical characteristics and selected aquatic biota (fish and mussels) collected at the mesohabitat scale for three stream reaches in the Big Cypress Basin in northeastern Texas for which...

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) conducts baseline and storm response photography missions to document and understand the changes in vulnerability of the Nation's coasts to extreme storms (Morgan, 2009). On February 7, 2012, the USGS conducted an oblique aerial photographic survey from Pensacola, Fla., to Breton Islands, La., aboard a Piper Navajo Chieftain at an altitude of 500 feet...

Understanding the time frame in which ecosystem services (that is, water quality maintenance, shoreline protection, habitat provision) are expected to be provided is important when restoration projects are being designed and implemented. Restoration of three-dimensional shell habitats in coastal Louisiana and elsewhere presents a valuable and potentially self-sustaining approach to...

Water samples were collected from 20 domestic wells during August and September 2012 and analyzed for 47 constituents and properties, including nutrients, major ions, metals and trace elements, radioactivity, and dissolved gases, including methane and radon-222. This study, done in cooperation with the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, Bureau of Topographic...

Years of sediment accumulation and abnormally dry conditions in the Midwest in 1999 and 2000 led to the water level decline of many water-supply lakes in Missouri, and caused renewed interest in modernizing outdated area/volume tables for these lakes. The U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the Missouri Department of Natural Resources and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers...

In 2009, the Kootenai Tribe of Idaho released and implemented the Kootenai River Habitat Restoration Master Plan. This plan aimed to restore, enhance, and maintain the Kootenai River habitat and landscape to support and sustain habitat conditions for aquatic species and animal populations. In support of these restoration efforts, the U.S. Geological Survey, in cooperation with the...