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Structure contour and overburden maps of the Niobrara interval of the Upper Cretaceous Cody Shale in the Wind River Basin, Wyoming

Thomas M. Finn
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Abstract

The Wind River Basin in central Wyoming is one of many structural and sedimentary basins that formed in the Rocky Mountain foreland during the Laramide orogeny. The basin is bounded by the Washakie, Owl Creek, and southern Bighorn uplifts on the north, the Casper arch on the east, the Granite Mountains uplift on the south, and Wind River uplift on the west. The first commercial oil well in Wyoming was drilled at Dallas dome near an oil seep along the southwestern edge of the Wind River Basin in 1884. Since then, many important conventional oil and gas fields, that produce from reservoirs ranging in age from Mississippian through Tertiary, have been discovered in this basin. In addition, an extensive unconventional (continuous) overpressured basin-centered gas accumulation has been identified in Cretaceous and Tertiary strata in the deeper parts of the basin. It has been suggested that various Upper Cretaceous marine shales, including the Cody Shale, are the principal hydrocarbon source rocks for many of these accumulations. With recent advances in horizontal drilling and multistage fracture stimulation, there has been an increase in exploration and completion of wells in equivalent marine shales in other Rocky Mountain Laramide basins that were traditionally thought of only as hydrocarbon source rocks. The maps presented in this report were constructed as part of a project carried out by the U.S. Geological Survey to characterize the geologic framework of potential undiscovered continuous (unconventional) oil and gas resources of the Niobrara interval of the Upper Cretaceous Cody Shale in the Wind River Basin in central Wyoming.

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90° N90° S · 180° W ← longitude → 180° E
Source-reported bounding extent: 42.5° to 43.75° latitude; -110° to -106.5° longitude. This indicates report coverage, not an exact sampling location. View area on OpenStreetMap.

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Thomas M. Finn. 2019-03-07. Structure contour and overburden maps of the Niobrara interval of the Upper Cretaceous Cody Shale in the Wind River Basin, Wyoming. https://doi.org/10.3133/sim3427

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