Methods for locating oil or gas deposits employing earth surface temperatures

摘要

A method for predicting the likelihood of encountering oil or gas deposits below a location and determining the areal extent and magnitude (economic value) of such deposit. The earth's surface temperature at selected points within a location is compared to the earth's surface temperature at a plurality of points in the surrounding geographic area to determine locations having anomalously low surface temperatures which are indicative of the presence of oil or gas deposits. Representative earth surface temperatures for all locations under consideration and reference temperatures in the geographic area are obtained, under similar ambient conditions, at points having similar topography, vegetative cover and surface features for minimizing extraneous factors which affect earth surface temperature, such that the earth surface temperatures may all be compared with each other to determine locations which have low earth surface temperatures, and therefore are more likely to have oil or gas deposits beneath them. The magnitude of the temperature difference between a location having low temperatures and the representative temperature for the geographic area as a whole is indicative of the thickness and area of an oil or gas deposit below the location.