Since January of 1989, the U.S Geological Survey Energy Resources Program Geochemistry Laboratory Database (EGDB) has grown to contain the analytical data for over 200,000 samples worldwide. The EGDB contains chemical analysis data for crude oil, natural gas, coal, water, and rock samples analyzed by the USGS Energy Resources Science Center’s Geochemistry Laboratory, or by contracted-service laboratories. Data was also obtained from the literature and unpublished public domain sources. The sample types included are primarily rock, coal, oil, and gas. This information is used by the USGS for worldwide energy resource assessments and is periodically released to the public. Analytical data within the EGDB includes rock-eval pyrolysis, organic mass spectrometry, vitrinite reflectance, gas chromatography, stable carbon isotopes, inductively coupled plasma, inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry, mercury analysis and a number of other related geochemistry analyses that, in some instances, predate the EGDB. Throughout the years the Energy Program scientists have utilized these data to not only develop an understanding of the physical and geochemical processes responsible for hydrocarbon formation, but also as a tool to assess the oil and gas potential for sedimentary basins in both national and international settings.
The public release of the EGDB is in a Microsoft Access (.mdb) format. The downloaded .mdb can be accessed in any version of Microsoft Access 2000 or later. Because of the large size of the data file, a high-speed connection is highly recommended for the download of these files.
In many instances, latitude and longitude site location information for wells is derived from a USGS one-quarter mile grid system. Please note that because of the significant number of data sources, laboratory techniques, and reporting units included in this release, it is impossible for USGS to guarantee the precision or accuracy of any individual data point.
In the public release of the Energy Geochemistry Database (EGDB), an attempt to place reasonable accuracy in reporting all site location (latitude and longitude) was undertaken in the generation of pseudo coordinates for sample locations originally derived from proprietary information. In instances where the information is proprietary in nature the site location information is derived from cell maps designed by the USGS as a part of the resource assessment effort. Each cell represents a quarter-mile square of the land surface and the cells are coded to represent whether the wells included within the cell are predominantly oil producing, gas producing, both oil and gas producing, or dry or unknown. Some well information was initially retrieved from the IHS Energy Group, PI/Dwights PLUS Well Data on CD-ROM, which is a proprietary commercial database containing information for most oil and gas wells in the United States. However, no proprietary data are displayed or included in the cell maps and the latitudes and longitudes of the center-cell points are published with permission (click here for a copy of this letter) and are used in this Database. The accuracy of the cells, as created by the Arc Macro Language (AML) program of Laura R.H. Biewick , Susan Weiler, and Christopher Skinner, depends upon the accuracy of the oil and gas well information in the 2014 version of the IHS Energy data. For the National Assessment of Oil and Gas Project, the assumption was made that the data were of sufficient accuracy for a national-scale analysis. The remaining data locations are either unknown or supplied by the sample submitter.
The Samples table contains records of samples and information pertaining to the location where the samples were collected and geologic information about the samples. The Analysis table contains records of analysis results from the analysis performed on the samples.
Similar analysis types have been grouped together to assist with basic database queries. A separate query has been configured for each anaylsis group to give the user a starting point for querying the tables for specific data. These queries are named according to the analysis group for which it has been configured. Several queries have also been configured to query on Matrix (Sample) Type. These queries are named as by "MatrixType."
Disclaimer for a Provisional Database:
"The data you have secured from this USGS Database are provisional and subject to revision. The data are released on the condition that neither the USGS nor the United States Government may be held liable for any damages resulting from its authorized or unauthorized use."
Distribution Liability:
"Although the data has been processed on the computer system at the U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Department of the Interior, no warranty, expressed or implied, is made by the Geological Survey regarding the utility of the data on any other system, nor shall the act of distribution constitute any such warranty. No responsibility is assumed by the U.S. Geological Survey in the use of these data."
