Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Petroleum systems and geologic assessment of oil and gas in the Bighorn Basin Province, Wyoming and Montana

June 30, 2010

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) recently completed an assessment of the undiscovered oil and gas potential of the Bighorn Basin Province, which encompasses about 6.7 million acres in north-central Wyoming and southern Montana. The assessment is based on the geologic elements of each total petroleum system defined in the province, including petroleum source rocks (source-rock maturation, petroleum generation, and migration), reservoir rocks (sequence stratigraphy and petrophysical properties), and traps (trap formation and timing). Using this geologic framework, the USGS defined two total petroleum systems: (1) Phosphoria, and (2) Cretaceous-Tertiary Composite. Within these two systems, eight assessment units (AU) were defined, and undiscovered oil and gas resources were quantitatively estimated within each AU.

Publication Year 2010
Title Petroleum systems and geologic assessment of oil and gas in the Bighorn Basin Province, Wyoming and Montana
DOI 10.3133/ds69V
Authors
Publication Type Report
Publication Subtype USGS Numbered Series
Series Title Data Series
Series Number 69
Index ID ds69V
Record Source USGS Publications Warehouse