Orcutt Oil Field
Encyclopedia
The Orcutt Oil Field is a large oil field
in the Solomon Hills
south of Orcutt
, in Santa Barbara County
, California
. Discovered in 1901 by William Warren Orcutt, it was the first giant field (over 100 Moilbbl in ultimate recovery) to be found in Santa Barbara County, and its development engendered the boom town of Orcutt, now the major unincorporated southern suburb of Santa Maria
. With a cumulative production in 2008 of 870000 barrels (138,318.9 m³) of oil, it is the largest onshore producing field in Santa Barbara County.
The Orcutt field was called the "Santa Maria Field" until the discovery of the larger Santa Maria Valley Oil Field on the plain to the north, an area which is now largely covered with the urban and suburban development. Several oil companies, including Breitburn Energy and Phoenix Energy, LLC are still actively producing from the Orcutt field. p. 94 The field also contains the remains of the ghost town of Bicknell, a company town built for oil workers in the early years of the 20th century, but abandoned in the mid-1930s.
on the east and State Route 135
on the west. Its total productive area is 4220 acres (17.1 km²), almost 7 mi2. Most of the active oilfield operations are invisible from the populated parts of the Santa Maria Valley, as the wells, tanks, and other facilities are behind the Graciosa Ridge, which rises to 1346 feet (410.3 m) elevation at Mount Solomon, and the most active part of the field in 2009 was on the south slope of the range. There are no public roads entering the field.
Terrain is rolling and occasionally steep, with wellpads cut into hillsides or occupying flat areas. Native vegetation is a mix of chaparral
and oak woodland
s (California montane chaparral and woodlands
), with some stands of Bishop pine
(Pinus muricata) on north-facing slopes.
The region has a Mediterranean climate
, with cool and rainy winters, and dry summers during which the heat is greatly diminished by fog and northwesterly winds from the cold waters of the Pacific Ocean
, which is about 15 miles (24.1 km) west of the field. Prevailing winds year-round are from the west-northwest. Approximately 14 inches (35.6 cm) of rain falls in a typical winter, with the rainy season lasting from around November to April. Drainage on the south side of the hills is down Harris Canyon, Long Canyon, and Careaga Canyon, to San Antonio Creek
, which exits to the ocean through Vandenberg Air Force Base
. Drainage to the north is to Orcutt Creek, which passes Old Town Orcutt on the north on its way to its juncture with the Santa Maria River and the Pacific Ocean near Guadalupe
.
being the surface expression of this anticline
. In the Orcutt field, oil has pooled in a dome-like structure bounded on the north by the Orcutt Fault and on the southwest by the Casmalia Fault, at a minimum depth of 900 feet (274.3 m) in a diatomite formation. The deepest oil-producing horizon was not discovered until 1981, and yields oil from about 9300 feet (2,834.6 m) below ground surface.
The capping geologic units are the Sisquoc
, Careaga, and Foxen formations. The Careaga and Foxen are of Pliocene
age, while the thicker, diatomaceous Sisquoc is both Pliocene and Upper Miocene
. Beneath these, separated by an unconformity
, is the fractured shale of the Monterey Formation
which has been richly productive for over 100 years. This is the same producing formation as in many other California oil fields, including the Lompoc Oil Field
in the similarly anticlinal ridge of the Purisima Hills to the south, and the Zaca field
to the southeast.
Oil from the field is heavy in the main Monterey producing horizon, with API gravity
of 14-17. The Point Sal formation, discovered in 1905 at a depth of 2700 feet (823 m), has lighter oil, with gravity 22-24. Some of the more recently discovered deep horizons, such as the Lospe in the Careaga Area, or the Deep Monterey in the field's Main Area, are lighter yet. These two pools were discovered in 1985 and 1981, respectively.
. Following his suggestion, the company leased around 70000 acres (283.3 km²) in the valley and vicinity, including the hills, and began drilling. In October 1901, their third well on the Careaga lease came in at 150 oilbbl/d, beginning the field's long history.
The most productive well of all, and one of the most productive in the history of the industry, was the result of an accident. In 1904 a drilling crew was transporting their equipment to a pre-determined location, but a road accident on the way upended the boiler they had been carrying. Rather than putting the rig back together and continuing, they decided to make their work easier and drill on the spot. It turned out to be a good idea. "Old Maud", as the well became known, came in as a spectacular gusher, producing 12000 oilbbl/d and flooding a canyon with oil as crews struggled to contain tens of thousands of barrels of black goo running downhill by hurriedly constructing earthen dams. This well was the largest oil producer on the continent up until this time, with Spindletop
in Texas being a close second. It produced over 2 Moilbbl in its long history, not being plugged and abandoned until 1988. The origin of the name "Old Maud" has not been definitively determined; some sources attribute it to the name of a mule, others to a favored town prostitute.
Peak oil production from the Orcutt field – or the Santa Maria field as it was known then – occurred early, in 1908, at 8.7 Moilbbl in that year. By this year the boom town of Orcutt, built to house the oilfield workers, already had approximately 1,000 residents, along with saloons, hotels, and restaurants. Production from the field began to slow after the peak, and in the late 1920s Union Oil, which by then owned the majority of the field, cut production in half. During the boom period, Union Oil built a small company town on the field itself. Bicknell, which still appears on USGS topographic maps, was abandoned in the 1930s, with some of the houses themselves being moved down the hill to Orcutt. At its peak it included a post office, grocery store, and school house
, in addition to residences; the school house is the solitary remaining building, and is currently in use by Breitburn Energy, who operates much of the field.
In 1947 the name of the field was changed officially from "Santa Maria" to "Orcutt", to differentiate it from the Santa Maria Valley field to the north, discovered in 1934.
Several enhanced recovery operations have been used on the field, beginning with waterflooding in 1951 (a technique of filling a depleting reservoir with wastewater, both to dispose of produced water and to increase reservoir pressure, allowing more oil to be pumped out). Both gas injection and alkaline flood operations have been used in the Point Sal horizon in the Main Area.
Unocal sold the field in the 1990s along with other assets in California. Other owners have included Nuevo Energy, who sold the field in 2003 to Energy Reserves Group LLC. This company operated the field for one year before selling to Breitburn Energy in 2004 for $46.7 million. Breitburn remains the largest operator on the field. Another operator active as of 2010 is Pacific Resources, LLC, a division of Santa Maria Pacific.
Oil field
An oil field is a region with an abundance of oil wells extracting petroleum from below ground. Because the oil reservoirs typically extend over a large area, possibly several hundred kilometres across, full exploitation entails multiple wells scattered across the area...
in the Solomon Hills
Solomon Hills
The Solomon Hills are a low mountain range in the western Transverse Ranges, in northern Santa Barbara County, California.The Hills separate the Santa Maria Valley and Santa Maria to the north, from the Los Alamos Valley and Orcutt to the south.-History:...
south of Orcutt
Orcutt, California
Orcutt is an unincorporated township located in the Santa Maria Valley of California, and a census-designated place; it is in Santa Barbara County, California, United States. Orcutt is named for William W. Orcutt, the manager of the Geological, Land and Engineering Departments of the Union Oil...
, in Santa Barbara County
Santa Barbara County, California
Santa Barbara County is a county located in the southern portion of the U.S. state of California, on the Pacific coast. As of 2010 the county had a population of 423,895. The county seat is Santa Barbara and the largest city is Santa Maria.-History:...
, California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
. Discovered in 1901 by William Warren Orcutt, it was the first giant field (over 100 Moilbbl in ultimate recovery) to be found in Santa Barbara County, and its development engendered the boom town of Orcutt, now the major unincorporated southern suburb of Santa Maria
Santa Maria, California
Santa Maria is a city in Santa Barbara County, on the Central Coast of California. The 2010 census population was 100,062, putting it ahead of Santa Barbara for the first time and making it the largest city in the county...
. With a cumulative production in 2008 of 870000 barrels (138,318.9 m³) of oil, it is the largest onshore producing field in Santa Barbara County.
The Orcutt field was called the "Santa Maria Field" until the discovery of the larger Santa Maria Valley Oil Field on the plain to the north, an area which is now largely covered with the urban and suburban development. Several oil companies, including Breitburn Energy and Phoenix Energy, LLC are still actively producing from the Orcutt field. p. 94 The field also contains the remains of the ghost town of Bicknell, a company town built for oil workers in the early years of the 20th century, but abandoned in the mid-1930s.
Setting
The Orcutt field occupies a large portion of the Solomon Hills south of Orcutt, including most of the otherwise undeveloped land between Highway 101U.S. Route 101
U.S. Route 101, or U.S. Highway 101, is an important north–south U.S. highway that runs through the states of California, Oregon, and Washington, on the West Coast of the United States...
on the east and State Route 135
California State Route 135
State Route 135 is a state highway in the U.S. state of California, entirely within Santa Barbara County, and is basically a bypass of U.S. Route 101 in northern Santa Barbara County between the town of Los Alamos and the city of Santa Maria....
on the west. Its total productive area is 4220 acres (17.1 km²), almost 7 mi2. Most of the active oilfield operations are invisible from the populated parts of the Santa Maria Valley, as the wells, tanks, and other facilities are behind the Graciosa Ridge, which rises to 1346 feet (410.3 m) elevation at Mount Solomon, and the most active part of the field in 2009 was on the south slope of the range. There are no public roads entering the field.
Terrain is rolling and occasionally steep, with wellpads cut into hillsides or occupying flat areas. Native vegetation is a mix of chaparral
California chaparral and woodlands
The California chaparral and woodlands is a terrestrial ecoregion of lower northern, central, and southern California and northwestern Baja California , located on the west coast of North America...
and oak woodland
California oak woodland
California oak woodland is a plant community found throughout the California chaparral and woodlands ecoregion of California in the United States and northwestern Baja California in Mexico...
s (California montane chaparral and woodlands
California montane chaparral and woodlands
The California montane chaparral and woodlands ecoregion covers , including the mountains of the Transverse, Peninsular, and Santa Lucia Ranges of California. It is part of the Mediterranean forests, woodlands, and scrub biome, with cool, wet winters and hot, dry summers...
), with some stands of Bishop pine
Bishop Pine
The Bishop Pine, Pinus muricata, is a pine with a very restricted range: mostly in the U.S. state of California, including several offshore Channel Islands, and a few locations in Baja California, Mexico...
(Pinus muricata) on north-facing slopes.
The region has a Mediterranean climate
Mediterranean climate
A Mediterranean climate is the climate typical of most of the lands in the Mediterranean Basin, and is a particular variety of subtropical climate...
, with cool and rainy winters, and dry summers during which the heat is greatly diminished by fog and northwesterly winds from the cold waters of the Pacific Ocean
Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south, bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, and the Americas in the east.At 165.2 million square kilometres in area, this largest division of the World...
, which is about 15 miles (24.1 km) west of the field. Prevailing winds year-round are from the west-northwest. Approximately 14 inches (35.6 cm) of rain falls in a typical winter, with the rainy season lasting from around November to April. Drainage on the south side of the hills is down Harris Canyon, Long Canyon, and Careaga Canyon, to San Antonio Creek
San Antonio Creek (Vandenburg Air Force Base)
San Antonio Creek is a stream that flows westerly from the Solomon Hills through the Los Alamos Valley, the Barka Slough and the San Antonio Valley on its way to the Pacific Ocean, north of Purisima Point...
, which exits to the ocean through Vandenberg Air Force Base
Vandenberg Air Force Base
Vandenberg Air Force Base is a United States Air Force Base, located approximately northwest of Lompoc, California. It is under the jurisdiction of the 30th Space Wing, Air Force Space Command ....
. Drainage to the north is to Orcutt Creek, which passes Old Town Orcutt on the north on its way to its juncture with the Santa Maria River and the Pacific Ocean near Guadalupe
Guadalupe, California
Guadalupe is a small city located in Santa Barbara County, California. According to the U.S. Census of 2010, the city has a population of 7,080. It was incorporated as a city on May 19, 1946...
.
Geology
The Orcutt field is one of several along the Casmalia-Orcutt Anticline, one of several anticlinal structures in the region along which oil fields are found, with the Solomon HillsSolomon Hills
The Solomon Hills are a low mountain range in the western Transverse Ranges, in northern Santa Barbara County, California.The Hills separate the Santa Maria Valley and Santa Maria to the north, from the Los Alamos Valley and Orcutt to the south.-History:...
being the surface expression of this anticline
Anticline
In structural geology, an anticline is a fold that is convex up and has its oldest beds at its core. The term is not to be confused with antiform, which is a purely descriptive term for any fold that is convex up. Therefore if age relationships In structural geology, an anticline is a fold that is...
. In the Orcutt field, oil has pooled in a dome-like structure bounded on the north by the Orcutt Fault and on the southwest by the Casmalia Fault, at a minimum depth of 900 feet (274.3 m) in a diatomite formation. The deepest oil-producing horizon was not discovered until 1981, and yields oil from about 9300 feet (2,834.6 m) below ground surface.
The capping geologic units are the Sisquoc
Sisquoc Formation
The Sisquoc Formation is a sedimentary geologic unit widespread in Southern California, both on the coast and in mountains near the coast. Overlying the Monterey Formation, it is of upper Miocene and lower Pliocene age...
, Careaga, and Foxen formations. The Careaga and Foxen are of Pliocene
Pliocene
The Pliocene Epoch is the period in the geologic timescale that extends from 5.332 million to 2.588 million years before present. It is the second and youngest epoch of the Neogene Period in the Cenozoic Era. The Pliocene follows the Miocene Epoch and is followed by the Pleistocene Epoch...
age, while the thicker, diatomaceous Sisquoc is both Pliocene and Upper Miocene
Miocene
The Miocene is a geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about . The Miocene was named by Sir Charles Lyell. Its name comes from the Greek words and and means "less recent" because it has 18% fewer modern sea invertebrates than the Pliocene. The Miocene follows the Oligocene...
. Beneath these, separated by an unconformity
Unconformity
An unconformity is a buried erosion surface separating two rock masses or strata of different ages, indicating that sediment deposition was not continuous. In general, the older layer was exposed to erosion for an interval of time before deposition of the younger, but the term is used to describe...
, is the fractured shale of the Monterey Formation
Monterey Formation
The Monterey Formation is an extensive Miocene oil-rich geological sedimentary formation in California, with massive outcroppings of the formation in areas of the California Coast Ranges, Peninsular Ranges, and on some of California's off-shore islands...
which has been richly productive for over 100 years. This is the same producing formation as in many other California oil fields, including the Lompoc Oil Field
Lompoc Oil Field
The Lompoc Oil Field is a large oil field in the Purisima Hills north of Lompoc, California, in Santa Barbara County. Discovered in 1903, two years after the discovery of the Orcutt Oil Field in the Solomon Hills, it is one of the oldest oil fields in northern Santa Barbara County, and one of the...
in the similarly anticlinal ridge of the Purisima Hills to the south, and the Zaca field
Zaca Oil Field
The Zaca Oil Field is an oil field in central Santa Barbara County, California, about 20 miles southeast of Santa Maria. One of several oil fields in the county which produce low-grade heavy oil from the Monterey Formation, the field is within a region of rolling hills containing horse ranches and...
to the southeast.
Oil from the field is heavy in the main Monterey producing horizon, with API gravity
API gravity
The American Petroleum Institute gravity, or API gravity, is a measure of how heavy or light a petroleum liquid is compared to water. If its API gravity is greater than 10, it is lighter and floats on water; if less than 10, it is heavier and sinks...
of 14-17. The Point Sal formation, discovered in 1905 at a depth of 2700 feet (823 m), has lighter oil, with gravity 22-24. Some of the more recently discovered deep horizons, such as the Lospe in the Careaga Area, or the Deep Monterey in the field's Main Area, are lighter yet. These two pools were discovered in 1985 and 1981, respectively.
History, operations, and production
Prospectors long suspected the presence of oil in the Santa Maria Valley and surrounding hills, but the late 19th-century attempts to find it were either shallow or misplaced. Union Oil Co. geologist William Warren Orcutt, for whom the town is named, began exploring the area in 1901, and suggested drilling in the Solomon Hills south of the then small town of Santa MariaSanta Maria, California
Santa Maria is a city in Santa Barbara County, on the Central Coast of California. The 2010 census population was 100,062, putting it ahead of Santa Barbara for the first time and making it the largest city in the county...
. Following his suggestion, the company leased around 70000 acres (283.3 km²) in the valley and vicinity, including the hills, and began drilling. In October 1901, their third well on the Careaga lease came in at 150 oilbbl/d, beginning the field's long history.
The most productive well of all, and one of the most productive in the history of the industry, was the result of an accident. In 1904 a drilling crew was transporting their equipment to a pre-determined location, but a road accident on the way upended the boiler they had been carrying. Rather than putting the rig back together and continuing, they decided to make their work easier and drill on the spot. It turned out to be a good idea. "Old Maud", as the well became known, came in as a spectacular gusher, producing 12000 oilbbl/d and flooding a canyon with oil as crews struggled to contain tens of thousands of barrels of black goo running downhill by hurriedly constructing earthen dams. This well was the largest oil producer on the continent up until this time, with Spindletop
Spindletop
Spindletop is a salt dome oil field located in the southern portion of Beaumont, Texas in the United States. The Spindletop dome was derived from the Louann Salt evaporite layer of the Jurassic geologic period. On January 10, 1901, a well at Spindletop struck oil . The new oil field soon produced...
in Texas being a close second. It produced over 2 Moilbbl in its long history, not being plugged and abandoned until 1988. The origin of the name "Old Maud" has not been definitively determined; some sources attribute it to the name of a mule, others to a favored town prostitute.
Peak oil production from the Orcutt field – or the Santa Maria field as it was known then – occurred early, in 1908, at 8.7 Moilbbl in that year. By this year the boom town of Orcutt, built to house the oilfield workers, already had approximately 1,000 residents, along with saloons, hotels, and restaurants. Production from the field began to slow after the peak, and in the late 1920s Union Oil, which by then owned the majority of the field, cut production in half. During the boom period, Union Oil built a small company town on the field itself. Bicknell, which still appears on USGS topographic maps, was abandoned in the 1930s, with some of the houses themselves being moved down the hill to Orcutt. At its peak it included a post office, grocery store, and school house
One-room school
One-room schools were commonplace throughout rural portions of various countries including the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, United Kingdom, Ireland and Spain in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. In most rural and small town schools, all of the students met in a single room...
, in addition to residences; the school house is the solitary remaining building, and is currently in use by Breitburn Energy, who operates much of the field.
In 1947 the name of the field was changed officially from "Santa Maria" to "Orcutt", to differentiate it from the Santa Maria Valley field to the north, discovered in 1934.
Several enhanced recovery operations have been used on the field, beginning with waterflooding in 1951 (a technique of filling a depleting reservoir with wastewater, both to dispose of produced water and to increase reservoir pressure, allowing more oil to be pumped out). Both gas injection and alkaline flood operations have been used in the Point Sal horizon in the Main Area.
Unocal sold the field in the 1990s along with other assets in California. Other owners have included Nuevo Energy, who sold the field in 2003 to Energy Reserves Group LLC. This company operated the field for one year before selling to Breitburn Energy in 2004 for $46.7 million. Breitburn remains the largest operator on the field. Another operator active as of 2010 is Pacific Resources, LLC, a division of Santa Maria Pacific.
See also
- Lompoc Oil FieldLompoc Oil FieldThe Lompoc Oil Field is a large oil field in the Purisima Hills north of Lompoc, California, in Santa Barbara County. Discovered in 1903, two years after the discovery of the Orcutt Oil Field in the Solomon Hills, it is one of the oldest oil fields in northern Santa Barbara County, and one of the...
- Orcutt Ranch Horticulture CenterOrcutt Ranch Horticulture CenterThe Orcutt Ranch Horticulture Center, formally known as Rancho Sombra del Roble, is a Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument located in the West Hills section of Los Angeles, California, USA.-William Orcutt's vacation home:...