The evaluation and assessment of geological energy resources in Georgia

THE EVALUATION AND ASSESSMENT OF GEOLOGICAL ENERGY RESOURCES IN GEORGIA
by Dr. Serge Gonzales

THE EVALUATION AND ASSESSMENT OF GEOLOGICAL ENERGY RESOURCES IN GEORGIA
Prepared by Dr. Serge Gonzales Institute of Community and Area Development The University of Georgia Athens, Georgia 30602
December, 1975
For The State of Georgia Energy Office
Atlanta, G~orgia 30334

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Topic/Subject

INTRODUCTION

Background

1

Acknowledgments

2

USE PATTERN OF GEOLOGICAL ENERGY RESOURCES

National

5

Georgia

9

GEOLOGICAL SETTING OF GEORGIA

Physiographic-Geologic Provinces

14

Energy Resource Potential of Georgia's

21

Physiographic-Geologic Provinces

ASSESSMENT OF GEOLOGICAL ENERGY RESOURCES

Introduction

32

Coal Resources

34

Hydropower Resources

Hydroelectric

40

Geothermal Steam

46

Petroleum Resources

Coastal Plain Province

56

Outer Continental Shelf

69

Northwest Georgia Provinces

76

Unconventional Petroleum Sources

80

Nuclear-Fuel Resources

Uranium

87

Thorium

93

SUBSURFACE GEOLOGICAL SPACE IN ENERGY MANAGEMENT

98

RECOHMENDATIONS

108

REFERENCES CITED

113

i

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Figure 1. Physiographic-geologic divisions within

15

Georgia.

Figure 2. Distribution of coal-bearing Pennsylvanian-age

36

strata on Sand and Lookout Mountains, Dade

and Walker Counties, Georgia.

Figure 3. Existing and potential hydrologic sites in

42

Georgia.

Figure 4. Exploratory petroleum tests in Georgia as of September, 1975.

Rear Pocket

Figure 5. Southeast Atlantic offshore Continental Shelf

leasing area, offshore South Carolina, Georgia

and Florida.

74

ii

LIST OF TABLES

Table 1. Contribution of Energy Resources Within the United States for 1973
Table 2. Comparison of Energy-Resource Use Between Georgia and the United States for 1973
Table 3. Contribution of Energy Resources to Production of Electricity in Georgia as of February, 1975
Table 4. Cumulative Production of Coal by Decades in Georgia
Table 5. Large-Capacity Developed and Undeveloped Hydroelectric Sites in Georgia
Table 6. Developed Hydroelectric Facilities in Georgia Having Less Than 50,000 KW Capacity
Table 7. Petroleum Exploratory Wells Drilled in Georgia

6 10 12 38 41 43 57-62

iii

INTRODUCTION
BACKGROUND This report, entitled The Evaluation and Assessment of Geological Energy
Resources in Georgia, has been prepared for The State of Georgia Energy Office under a funded contract in the amount of $14,737 as negotiated between the Board of Regents of The University System of Georgia and the aforementioned state agency. Responsibility for the execution of this project has been with The Institute of Community and Area Development within the Office of the VicePresident for Services at The University of Georgia.
The project was directed by Dr. Serge Gonzales, S~aff Geologist for The Institute of Community and Area Development. Preparation of this final project report and all the views expressed within it are solely his responsibility.
As an outgrowth of the expanding problems which have evolved in the field of energy supplies within the United States, especially since 1970, the administrators of the State of Georgia Energy Office felt that an assessment of this state's indigenous energy resources should be undertaken. Those areas which involved consideration of more engineering-oriented subject material became the responsibility of The Engineering Experiment Station of the Georgia Institute of Technology under separate contract funding from The State of Georgia Energy Office. Specific topical areas addressed in that phase included (1) bibliographic inventory on energy usage, supply and demand, and energy-related technologies; (2) assessment of solar and wind energy technologies; (3) evaluation of technologic approaches to recover energy values potentially obtainable from solid-waste conversions; and, (4) reco~~ended technologic and operat~onal procedures to increase energy conservation within industry. Results of these studies are contained in a separate report submitted to the State cf G~orgia Energy Office.
1

2
The principal thrust of this report, then, is the study and evaluation of those known and potential, but as yet undiscovered or non-productive, geological energy resources contained within the State. Included in this category are petroleum (both crude oil and natural gas), coal, hydropower sites, uranium and thorium, geothermal steam and unconventional petroleum sources such as oil shale and tar sands. Also investigated and discussed are the potential energy-related uses of subsurface, geological space.
A basic premise behind both these projects was the need to have at hand the knowledge of what energy resources of all types are or may be available within Georgia for the future. This information, in turn, can prove most valuable to state leaders at the agency, legislative and administrative levels in more properly charting future energy policy and the support of appropriately related research and development efforts. Along these lines, this report concludes by making certain recomntendations about ongoing or future studies, including observations toward trying to develop a greater geologicalenergy resource base.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The writer wishes to thank both Messrs. Lamar Cobb and Chart Bonham for
having the initial confidence in him to undertake and finalize this project. Their continued support and assistance throughout the duration of this study is thus gratefully acknowledged.
So, too, is the considerable work, both in the data gathering, contacting of industry and agency personnel, typing and other manuscript preparation, demonstrated by Ms. Sara Kahan, who has diligently served as research associate on the project. Without her many hours of fine assistance, this report would not have been poss1nle.

3
Appreciation is also extended to Drs. Ernest E. Melvin and Albert F.
Ike of The Institute of Community and Area Development for their administra-
tive assistance over the past six months. Special thanks go also to Mr.
Robert Rowan, Adn1inistrative Assistant to The Vice-President for Services,
for his enduring patience and advice on various administrative and financial
matters.
The assistance of Mr. James Ingram of The Cartographic Laboratories at
The University of Georgia is also acknowledged, namely for his preparation
and supervision of the various illustrations contained in this final report.
Discussion with and the furnishing of useful technical information by
the following persons is similarly appreciatively acknowledged here.
Mr. Ray Ashe Mr. James Davis Mr. Cary Evans Mr. Robert Humphries Georgia Power Company
Mr. James Cooper U. S. Bureau of Mines U. S. Department of the Interior
Mr. Sanford Derby Land Reclamation Section Environmental Protection Division State of Georgia Department of Natural Resources
Mr. William Dillon U. S. Geological Survey U. S. Department of the Interior
Mr. Jan Fortune Southeast Power Administration U. S. Department of the Interior
Dr. Norman Herz Department of Geology The University of Georgia
Dr. Kenneth S. Johnson Oklahoma Geological Survey

4
Mr. Creg Smith Petroleum Council of Georgia
Mr. Walter Starke Southern Natural Gas Company
Mr. David Swanson Division of Earth and Water State of Georgia Department of Natural Resources
Mr. Charles Ussery, Jr. Ussery Mining Company
Mr. Roger Wood Gregisco Mining Company
Although information was secured from all of the above, opinions and
evaluative views based on these data are solely those of the writer.

USE PATTERN OF GEOLOGICAL ENERGY RESOURCES
National During the 200 years of our national existence, the United States has
become the most energy-consumptive nation in the world. Blessed by discoveries of significant deposits of coal and petroleum and other natural resources, we have developed our technologic and industrialized status on the dual philosophy that energy resources were almost limitless and prices for energy must remain low to provide the impetus for more economic growth. With only about 6 percent of the world's population, the United States consumes more than one-third of all the inanimate energy generated throughout the world. Our per capita consumption of energy is the highest in the world. Twice during the last three decades, our rate of growth in energy use has required a doubling in our energy-producing capacity. The consumption of electricity over the same span of time has required a triple doubling. Electricity now represents more than 26 percent of all the energy used in this nation.
Energy-resource use in the United States has gone through three significant transitions. First, from 1850 to 1890, wood accounted for an average of more than 50 percent of the energy produced domestically. By 1900, coal, which had been increasing in importance during the preceding half century, assumed the role as our principal energy resource. In fact, coal accounted for between 60 and 70 percent of this nation's energy production during the early 1900's. Thus, the first major change was a shift to our nation's most abundant geological energy resource--coal.
Coal's dominance was relatively short-lived. As the second significant change, petroleum bec::c,c the l22ding source of .::rwrgy in the country. r- 1s,
5

6 by 1940, petroleum, in the form of both crude oil and natural gas, was furnishing more than 50 percent of our domestic energy. In the three and onehalf decades since, petroleum has increased steadily in importance and now accounts for more than three-fourths of all the energy produced (Table 1). The second transition, therefore, involved a move away from one important geological energy resource toward another. Of interest here as well is that each resource during its rise in importance substantially aided industrial development. Coal was of course vital to the railroads and heavy industry; petroleum to the enlarging transportation and chemical industries as well as to urbanization in general.

Table 1
Crude Oil Natural Gas Coal Hydroelectric Nuclear

Contribution of Energy Resources Within the United States for 1973

Total Electrical

Total Energy

Generation Capacity

(values in percent)

46

18(l)

31

21

18

41

4

15

1

5

100

100

(1) - refers to fuel oils derived from crude oil by refining

(data from the Federal Energy Administration, 1974)

7
The .third transition is proving to be the most trying of all. As our dependence upon petroleum has grown, our domestic ability to produce crude oil has been diminishing for several years. In fact, with one exception, each year since 1960 has seen an increase in the amount of crude oil imported over the preceding year. Not only are we as a nation becoming aware that geological energy resources are finite and thus depletable at some future date, but we also have come to realize how great is our vulnerability with regard to obtaining crude oil from foreign sources. Dominant control over the world price of crude oil, a significant reserves position and the ability to impose restrictive embargoes have taught the United States just how effective the oil cartel, or the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), is at present.
Although the last two years have seen a decline in this country's demand for crude oil in response to conservation, higher prices and a downturned economy, our national dependence on foreign sources has worsened. Data compiled by the Chase Manhattan Bank of New York show that at the start of 1973, the United States imported 29 percent of its crude-oil needs, with the Middle East sector of OPEC accounting for only 10 percent. Two years later, this nation now imports 39 percent of its crude oil needs and 22 percent is from the Middle East faction in OPEC.
The past three years have seen countless conferences and seminars on energy and energy resources, considerable political and agency rhetoric on our domestic energy crisis, ongoing squabbles between the legislative and administrative branches of the federal government and many differences of opinion in regard to energy policy and energy-resource price control plus diplomatic efforts to reduce our undesirable petroleum-import position. To

8
a-large degree, this nation is still floundering in efforts to effectively
address various domestic energy problems at a time of economic recession.
Of those problems not yet solved, many involve supply and demand diffi-
culties with geological energy resources. Some of the more pressing are:
1. Since 1970, our domestic production of crude oil has shown an average decline from the peak output of that year. Annual consumption since then has exceeded 5 billion barrels with the last three years each exceeding 6 billion barrels. Reserves at the end of 1974 were only 34 billion barrels.
2. Since 1969, the domestic annual consumption of natural gas has exceeded 20 trillion cubic feet, and in each of the last 6 years, it has exceeded 21 trillion cubic feet. Due to unreasonably low prices for interstate sales as imposed by federal government fiat, exploration activity for this resource has declined. As a result, additions to reserves since 1968 have for each year fallen well below production levels. Year-end reserves for 1974 totaled only 237 trillion cubic feet, or only an 11-year supply if one assumes no change in consumption and no additional reserve additions.
3. Mine production of bituminous and lignitic coals has, since 1960, exceeded annual consumption, thus allowing American firms to annually export more than 35 million tons over that decade and a half. The coal so exported has been high quality, metallurgical coking coal. Demands to substantially increase coal production to offset use of petroleum are being seriously confronted with environmental problems from the mining and combustion of coal, heavy-equipment supply limitations and mine-safety regulations. The price of coal since 1970 has averaged more than $6 per short ton f.o.b. the mine; in 1974 the average price rose to nearly $16 a ton.
4. As more nuclear-electric power plants have come on stream, dt,mand has mounted for both increased production from uranium mines and more enriched separative units from federal-government facilities. Reserves of uranium are calculated on certain price per pound categories; it is clear that identified reserves at $8 per pound will urove inadequate for projected growth rates in nuclear energy. This means that lower-grade deposits will require mining and the price per pound will rise to stimulate production, if we assume no mixed-oxide fuels (plutonium recycling) or no major contribution by breeder reactors.

9
5. Calls for development of synthetic fuels based on either crude oil from oil shale and liquid or gaseous hydrocarbons from coal have produced no commercialization to date. Restrictions involve a myriad of problems such as greatly escalated construction costs for the first processing plants, indefiniteness of land-leasing policies, environmental pollution, unavailability of risk capital and lack of a price-competitive position under changing federal price controls. The best estimate is that syncrude from oil shale and synthetic pipeline gas from coal will barely be coming on stream by 1985, with no appreciable impact on the total energy market before 1990. Tar-sand development is similarly viewed with the same reservation.
6. Geothermal steam is greatly underdeveloped, and offers some promise, especially in the West, to contribute to a reduction in demand on conventional electrical-generating facilities. Despite significant recent increases in exploration efforts, development is also beset with environmental, leasing and some technologic limitations. The reserve base, as dictated by economics and technology, shows significant variations between different estimators.
The above areas by no means embrace the total, complicated scope of our
national energy dilemma. It is apparent, however, that, even though geo-
logical energy resources are depletable, they now provide most of this
nation's energy and will continue to do so for several decades. If the
United States is to arrest its current energy-related difficulties, sustain
a viable economic posture and respond favorably to environmental considera.-
tions, decisions resolving these major geological-energy-resource problems
must be made prudently and not in the too-distant future. A unified national
energy policy, more sensible federal government decisions and concerted
efforts at energy conservation appear mandatory to meet this goal.
Georgia
With the exception of electricity produced at several hydropower sites,
the State of Georgia is now, and has been for decades, totally dependent
upon sources ontsid0' the St.:::te for its .., ,,,-,, .. resources. Ct'nrgia t,.,:, never
produced any crude oil or natural gas, ond in recent years, its very small

10

production of coal has been exported as a source of high-quality coke to foreign steel industries. No uranium as nuclear fuel has ever been produced either, although a small amount of monazite, a mineral source of thorium, also a nuclear fuel, has been recovered near Folkston in Charlton County. No energy production based upon indigenous geothermal steam has ever been realized.
As shown in Table 2, Georgia's overall energy consumption as indicated by the percent of energy resource relied upon is reasonably similar to that of the country as a whole. In fact, Georgia is dependent upon petroleum for 77 percent of the State's energy needs, or exactly the national total.

Table 2 Comparison of Energy-Resource Use Between Georgia and the United States for 1973

Crude Oil Natural Gas Coal Hydroelectric Nuclear

Georgia

United States

(values in percent)

48

46

29

31

21

18

2+

4

~1

1

100

100

Petroleum products refined from crude oil are delivered to the State primarily by pipelines from major oil-producing areas along the Gulf Coast, namely eastern Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi. Some products are brought in by ship to coastal ports and distributed from storage terminals by truck. Pipelines operat2d bv Co]nnial and Plantation supply the State with ?nsr> 1 lnP

11
and various distillate fuel oils. EXXON operates a propane pipeline under assignment to the Dixie Pipeline Company. Annual consumption of liquid petroleum fuels approximates 110 million barrels out of a national demand in excess of 6 billion barrels. Reflecting the State's large geographic area, Georgia ranks lOth among states in the consumption of gasoline, consuming in excess of 3 billion gallons in each of the years 1973 and 1974. Two small refineries, located at Savannah and Douglasville, produce asphalt from heavy crude oil with some byproduct recovery of distillate fuel oils. In addition to the 75 percent utilized in the transportation sector, some 23 percent of the petroleum liquids are used for residential-commercial heating and industrial uses. The remainder is used to generate electricity.
Nearly 350 billion cubic feet of natural gas is annually consumed in Georgia. This volume is transported into the State by pipelines from the Gulf Coast Region. Most of the supply is met by Southern Natural Gas Company with a lesser amount furnished by Transcontinental Gas Pipeline Corporation. Distribution within Georgia is largely handled by The Atlanta Gas Light Company and South Georgia Natural Gas Company. When a liquified natural gas (LNG) facility being installed at Savannah by El Paso Natural Gas Company and Southern Natural Gas Company goes into operation, an additional 125 billion cubic feet of supply will be realized. Delivery of this gas is expected in the next year; the gas will come from and be liquified in Algeria.
Most of Georgia's electrical-generating capacity is based upon the combustion of coal (Table 3). In fact, nearly 96 percent of the coal brought ~into the State is consumed in steam power plants. Kentucky and Tennessee supply more than three-quarters of this coal, with the remainder coming from Indiana, Alabama, Illinois and Virginia. Some coal is also used for industrial

12

purposes and a small percentage is still utilized for residential heating, although the latter application is on the decline. Transportation is mainly by rail, although some movement is by water barge-rail combination. Three electrical-generating plants rely upon fuel oil, while various peaking units use this liquid fuel and/or natural gas. Hydroelectric sites account for 9 percent of the State's early 1975 generating capacity of 10,043 megawatts (MW). The latter total assumes the 810-11W Hatch Plant of The Georgia Power Company to be operating at 60 percent of its rated capacity. This plant, located at Baxley, represents Georgia's first nuclear power plant. The Georgia Power Company, Savannah Electric and Power Company and the U. S. Corps of Engineers are the principal producers of electricity, although Electric Membership Corporations and municipally-owned (and one County-o>vned) systems distribute this energy to users as well.

Table 3 Contribution of Energy Resources to Production of Electricity in Georgia as of February, 1975

Electrical Generation Capacity (1)
(value in percent)

Coal

65

Petroleum (fuel oil and

21

natural gas together)

Hydroelectric

9

Nuclear

5

(1) includes peakicg units and assumes 60 percent capacity of 810 W~ nuclear plant
~
(data modified after Cooper, 1975)

13 Viewed from a total energy-resource perspective, Georgia is presently able to furnish only slightly more than 2 percent of her internal energy needs, and that is solely from hydroelectric facilities. Only Georgia's logistical position in reference to the Appalachian coal fields and the Gulf Coast petroleum province has been a favorable offsetting element when the paucity of in-state energy resources being produced is considered.
~

GEOLOGICAL SETTING OF GEORGIA
PHYSIOGRAPHIC-GEOLOGIC PROVINCES To fully appreciate the potential of indigenous geological energy
resources within the State of Georgia, an understanding of the several physiographic-geologic provinces developed in the state is instructive. Physiographic provinces generally display characteristic landforms and an identifiable topographic expression as the result of surficial geologic processes acting throughout long periods of time. Processes such as weathering, erosion, and stream dissection which act upon various rock types arranged in certain structural configurations give rise to the individual geomorphic development typical of each physiographic province.
Within the State of Georgia, there may be found portions of these five physiographic provinces: Atlantic Coastal Plain, Piedmont, Blue Ridge, Valley and Ridge and Cumberland (or Appalachian) Plateau (Figure 1). Of these, the largest is the Coastal Plain which embraces 60 percent of the state's land area. The second largest land area is contained within the Piedmont Province, which together with the remaining three provinces, collectively represents subdivisions of the larger physiographic unit known as the Appalachian Mountains. The brief descriptions of each province which follow are meant only to provide a summary of the more salient geologic and geomorphic features.
The Atlantic Coastal Plain, bordering the Piedmont along a southwestnortheast trending boundary called the Fall Line, consists of relatively unconsolidated serlimentary strata which range in age from Lower Cretaceous to ~the Holocene. The strata dip gently toward the Atlantic Ocean and Florida, although local departures are present in the subsurface as the result of several gentle uplifts and intervening basins. A maximum thickness of nearly
14

ATLANTA

15
0 Piedmont (Igneous-metamorphic)
1/H}~ Valley and Ridge (Sedimentary)
~~~~~ Cumberland Plateau (Sedimentary)
II~III] Atlantic Coastal Plain (Sedimentary)
P7/'77-l Blue Ridge (Metamorphic and [;{..{L.(J igneous; some sedimentary)

0 MILES
FIGURE 1. PHYSIOGRt... Pt-:lC-GEOLOGIC DIVISI0\'1'3 V/ITHI~J GE("'RGIA

16
8500 feet is reached by the sedimentary sequence along the southwest and southern portions of the state. There is, however, considerable conjecture regarding the bedrock surface which underlies these sedimentary units. Data from several deep oil-well tests indicate the nature of this so-called "basement" is highly variable, both in reference to rock type and geologic age. Discussion of this specific geologic quandary is not, however, germane to this report.
A second significant trend of thicker sedimentary strata occurs adjacent to the coastline, in a feature generally referred to as the Southeast Georgia Embayment. The thickness of the sedimentary section ~n this area approaches 5000 feet, although the sequence undoubtedly thickens in the offshore continuation of this basinal feature.
As demonstrated by Cramer (1974), the relatively thin sequence of sedimentary strata in the Coastal Plain is dominated by clastic units such as sands, silts and shales, although several intervals such as the Paleocene and much of the Eocene, consist mainly of limestone.
Adjacent to the Fall Line, the sedimentary units of the Coastal Plain have been extensively weathered and maturely dissected into an area of gentle hills, somewhat unlike the rest of the province. This sector is termed the Fall Line Hills or the Louisville Plateau. Because the Cretaceous and Eoceneage bedrock contains appreciable sand, the section is also locally called the Sand Hills. An area of rolling hills and dissected stream valleys, called the Tifton Upland, lies to the southeast and is developed on Miocene-age strata. ~Between this belt and the coastline occurs a broad area of successive old coastal terraces. Erosion has been moderate although stream dissection has obscured several of the terraces. Drai;:;.age is commonly poor, resulting in

17
numerous swampy areas. Shoreward, the terraces, being less eroded, become more prominent. Along the coast proper lie the Sea Islands, a persistent belt of stable islands separated from the mainland by salt marshes, lagoons and estuaries. These islands appear to be due to both erosional and depositional processes, modified by submergence of the coastline. Beach ridges and sand dunes are well developed along the Sea Islands.
The other prominent physiographic province underlain by sedimentary rocks is the Valley and Ridge in northwest Georgia. Here, the rocks are Paleozoic in age, ranging from the Cambrian to the Mississippian. The strata include fully consolidated shales, sandstones, limestones and dolostones, which have been folded into asymmetric fold structures. The repetition of these anticlines and S)~clines has been broken by several thrust faults along which the movement of displaced units has been to the northwest. The province is also bounded along the south and east by a major regional thrust fault called the Cartersville Fault. Thus, the contact between this province and the Piedmont and Blue Ridge is abrupt as delineated by this significant fault structure.
Because of the more prevalent thrust faulting and the asymmetry of the folds, the development of alternating ridges and lowlands is not as pronounced here as it is in this same province throughout Virginia and Pennsylvania. Nevertheless, the province is mountainous, with a number of topographically high areas elongated with a northeast-southwest orientation. Ridges such as White Oak Mountain, Taylor Ridge, Lavender Mountain and Gaylor Ridge plus others illustrate this condition. Despite the development of these erosion-
~
ally resistant features, much of the province, as delineated by Lookout Mountain on the west and Cohutta Mountain in the adjacent Blue Ridge Province

18
to the east, is a broad, relatively flat, valley-like region. This is believed to represent a major erosional surface or peneplain (Butts and Gildersleeve, 1948).
Weathering has been pronounced in some areas, especially where carbonate bedrock underlies the surface. Thick clay-rich residuum has developed in these areas. Solution features have also been extensively developed in much of the carbonate bedrock, giving rise to numerous caves and other karst features.
Lying immediately to the northwest of the folded and faulted Paleozoic sedimentary strata of the Valley and Ridge Province are less deformed Paleozoic strata which range in age from Cambrian to Pennsylvanian. This small region, essentially confined to Dade and Walker Counties, belongs to the Cumberland Plateau Province which represents the southern extension of the Appalachian Plateau. Lithologies, similar to those exposed in the Valley and Ridge Province, occur here, although the Pennsylvanian sequence contains more shale and sandstone units, together with several coal seams. Toward the northwest, the strata are largely flat-lying; in the area toward the province's southeast border, the rocks occur in gently folded anticlines and synclines. For example, both Sand and Lookout Mountains, along which coal seams are exposed, structurally involve broad synclinal folds.
The Cumberland or Appalachian Plateau within Georgia exhibits elevations nearly as pronounced as the adjoining Valley and Ridge Province. Resistant Pennsylvanian-age sandstones cap, for example, both Sand and Lookout Mountains. Although there are fewer ridges, the area does exhibit appreciable relief in
~
its expression as a dissected plateau.

19
In northeastern Georgia, and extending into eastern Tennessee and western North Carolina is the Blue Ridge Province. Unlike the three provinces described to this point, the Blue Ridge is largely composed of metamorphic and igneous rocks as opposed to sedimentary varieties. ~~ny of the metamorphic rocks, however, were originally sedimentary, and although they appear now as quartzites, schists and slate, the rocks commonly retain sedjmentary textures and structures. Igneous rocks found here include metamorphosed volcanics and basalt together with granites. The rocks of the Blue Ridge are mainly Precambrian age, although some quartzites and coarser-grained metasedimentary units are Cambrian in age.
This province adjoins the Piedmont Province to the south along an abrupt boundary called the Blue Ridge Scarp, a feature which is less pronounced here than to the northeast in North Carolina. A variety of geologic explanations has been given for this prominent topographic feature. As summarized by Thornbury (1965), this boundary has been ascribed to: (1) differential erosion along a zone of crustal bending; (2) differential erosion as influenced by varying resistance exhibited by the rocks of the two adjoining provinces; (3) faulting, modified by more recent landscape-forming processes; (4) development of different erosional levels in the geomorphic history of the Appalachians; (5) various combinations of the causes previously cited.
Also composed of igneous and metamorphic rocks is the second largest province in Georgia, the Piedmont. Expressed as rolling hills, the Piedmont Province represents a long-eroded, dissected upland formed on bedrock composed of granite, granite-gneiss and schist. Throughout much of Georgia and Alabama,
~
this upland maintains elevations near 1,400 feet, but rises to nearly 1,800 feet near its juncture with the Blue Ridg~. Relief between hilltops a~d

20
stream bottoms rarely exceeds 150 feet, although the residual soil and saprolite caused by long periods of weathering, can reach 100 feet in places.
The igneous-metamorphic terrane of the Piedmont developed from several episodes in the Lower Paleozoic; weathering responsible for the thick red soils and saprolite is the result of Pleistocene and younger events. Within Georgia, the Piedmont is considerably wider than to the northeast, reflective of a more distant coastal plain along the southeast margin of the state. Unlike the Valley and Ridge Province, where drainage and topography bear a close relationship to the underlying rocks and their structural orientation, there is little evidence of this situation within the Piedmont. Streams flow across a variety of rock types and the land surface also appP.ars uniformly developed. One exception is the occurrence of large resistant masses of generally igneous rock which rise well above the general elevations of the uplands. These so-called monadnocks are best illustrated in Georgia by Stone Mountain east of Atlanta.
Farther to the northeast in North Carolina, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, the Piedmont has been extensively faulted into several elongate basins in which thick wedges of largely non-marine Triassic-age reeks have accumulated. At the same time, widespread formation of basalt and related igneous rocks occurred in and adjacent to these Triassic fault basins. Although none of these features a~e exposed in outcrop within Georgia, there is evidence that similar faulted basins have developed in the portion of the Georgia Piedmont wh~ch is overlain by the Coastal Plain. Marine (1973) has reported on the hydrologic characteristics of one such buried Triassic basin which lies astride
~
the Georgia-South Carolina border, while Arden (1974) has, from geophysical data, postulated the existence of another similar fe-:1tnre buried at depth in

21
southeastern Georgia. Brown (1974) has similarly postulated the existence of several such buried fault basins within the "basement" underlying the Georgia Coastal Plain.
ENERGY RESOURCE POTENTIAL OF GEORGIA'S PHYSIOGRAPHIC-GEOLOGIC PROVINCES As noted previously, the United States primarily relies on geological
energy resources for the majority of its current production of energy. Crude oil, natural gas and coal are all obtained from geological deposits, and these resources account for 95 percent of the energy produced in this nation. Electricity generated at hydroelectric sites and in nuclear power plants, the latter relying upon uranium obtained from geological deposits, provides the remainder of our domestic energy production.
Different geologic regions, measured in terms of their rock types, structures and historical development, exhibit contrasting capabilities with regard to the formation of those geological energy resources cited above. Some conditions may even preclude the occurrence of certain energy resources. For example, terranes characterized by igneous and metamorphic rocks reflect past episodes of intense structural deformation, and as such, are incapable of yielding either petroleum or coal. These "fossil fuels" were either destroyed or lost as the result of excessive heat and structural rearrangement involved in the formation of these rocks. Expressed differently, the energy resources, petroleum and coal, are formed and found only within sedimentary sequences of rock.
It therefore stands that the several physiographic-geologic provinces ~within the State of Georgia exhibit different potentials with regard to the occurrence of geological energy resources. What is to be considered here is

22
not what- energy resources have been discovered to date, but rather which resources are most likely to be found in these different regions. In the following sections, the various provinces are viewed in the order of their respective geographic size, not in terms of their resource potential.
The Atlantic Coastal Plain Province consists predominately of sedimentary strata of Cretaceous and Tertiary age. Although rock sequences of these ages are known to contain significant reserves of lignitic, subbituminous and bituminous coal elsewhere in this country, especially within the Northern Great Plains of North Dakota, the geologic conditions existent in Georgia during these intervals of time appear not to have been amenable to the formation of such coals. Despite the fact that some of the stratigraphic sequence was deposited under non-marine conditions, extensive swamp and delta environments favorable to coal genesis, however, did not persistently develop. This contrasts, for example, with conditions present in the nearby Gulf Coastal Plain of Alabama, Arkansas and Texas \vhere seams of lignitic coal of Tertiary age farmed throughout a wide geographic area. These lignites are important energy resources in Texas where they are actively strip mined for use as power-plant fuel (Kaiser, 1974). Scattered lignitic material within Pleistocen- 1ge clays along coastal Georgia has, however, been reported (Herrick, 1965).
Swampy conditions have given rise to deposits of peat in several coastalplain areas withi~ Georgia (Fortson, 1961). The most significant deposits of peat are those formed during the last 6500 years in the Okefenokee Swamp of southeast Georgia (Cohen, 1974). Given sufficient geologic time as measured
~
in millions of years, this type of environment would conceivably allow these peats to proceed through the complex process of coalification into either

23
lignite or bituminous coals. Several small, relatively insignificant peat deposits have also been reported from Effingham, Screven, Miller and Lowndes Counties. Several of these appear to be bog accumulations of organic matter developed within limestone sinkholes although the Effingham County occurrenee formed along an old coastal terrace.
With the exception of a few minor occurrences where petroleum, generated in overlying sedimentary materials, has become entrapped in buried and fractured igneous-rock reservoirs, deposits of crude oil and natural gas are found only in sedimentary provinces. Thus, with a sizeable geographic extent and a stratigraphic sequence which exceeds 8000 feet in places within its onshore portion, the Georgia Coastal Plain displays those characteristics generally favorable for the formation and ultimate occurrence of petroleum. For any sedimentary province or basin to actually contain potentially discoverable petroleum, the following specific geologic conditions or features must be present: (1) adequate volume of certain geologic units, called source beds, which are sufficiently abundant in organic matter that petroleum hydrocarbons can be generated within them and expelled into adjacent strata; (2) presence of other rock units which display sufficient porosity and permeability so that they can act as reservoir rocks for accumulations of migrating petroleum; (3) a variety of structural and stratigraphic conditions which can combine with appropriate reservoir rocks to "trap" the hydrocarbons against further migration; these so-called oil traps include such geologic features as anticlines, faults, salt domes, unconformities, carbonate- reefs and latc~ral permeability barriers; (4) inclusion within the stratigraphic sequence of
~
certain rock types, such as shale, gypsum--anhydrite and salt, which cari combine with any of the traps above to seal the petroleum within associated reservoir(s).

24
Geological and geophysical studies of the Atlantic Coastal Plain in Georgia reveal that there are many potential petroleum reservoir rocks. The latter are mainly sandstones and sands, especially within the older Cretaceous sequence. Some limestone units also exhibit desirable reservoir characteristics. Many of the potential reservoir rocks, especially sandy zones within the Tertiary of the onshore portion, have been unfortunately flushed with fresh water, a condition generally not conducive to the retention of petroleum hydrocarbons.
Evidence gathered to date does not reveal the existence of salt domes, carbonate reefs or major fault structures which could act as traps in this province. Some relatively small-displacement faults are known, and if other conditions were favorable, entrapment could occur along the deeper portions of these geological structures. Within the c.djacent Gulf Coast petroleum province, large-scale faults, with displacements measurable in hundreds to thousands of feet, have formed there in conjunction with the rapid Tertiaryage sedimentation. These so-called growth faults, together with other major faults caused by salt movement, often bend sedimentary units into anticlinal configurations adjacent to these faults. Such features, known as rollover anticlines (or closures), are prolific oil traps in the Gulf Coast. Comparable conditions, however, do not appear to have existed in the Georgia Coastal Plain, and this type of oil trap is thou~ht not to be present.
Other petroleum traps which may have developed in this province are gentle anticlinal folds or uplifts, unconforrrdties, lateral porosity-permeability changes caused by variable sedimentation, or combinations o these.
~
Effective seals appear to be lacking in much of the Tertiary sequence, although clay-shale units do occur. Evaporitic waterial reported as minor

25
occurrences from different Tertiary intervals is not thick or extensive enough to act as an effective seal. Cramer (1974) believes that the Tertiary strata, as they thicken into the offshore region, may develop favorable sealing units in league with abundant sandy reservoirs. Clayrich sealing strata are a definite likelihood within the older Cretaceous sequence of the onshore region.
In summary, the Georgia Coastal Plain Province contains some positive elements necessary for the generation and entrapment of petroleum, even though many appear to be marginally developed. Considering the areal extent of this province, and in spite of this limitation, there certainly is some potential for petroleum, albeit not major reserves, to be ultimately discovered here.
The world's largest deposits of oil shale, or very fine-grained sedimentary strata which contain oil in a solid form called kerogen, occur in several Tertiary-age intermontane basins in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming. These Green River deposits are the result of extensive lacustrine or lake sedimentation within several structural basins of the Rocky Mountain system. Although the Georgia Coastal Plain contains a moderate Tertiary sequence, structural developments and associated lacustrine sedimentation did not resemble that found in these western basins. Thus, the occurrence of this alternative geological energy resource is not considered likely in this portion of the State.
As a world leader in the production of uranium, the United States primarily utilizes deposits developed with~n sedimentary sequences. Most of ~ these ores occur in coarse-grained rocks such as sandstone and conglomerate. The major producing sites are Jurassic-age strata around the Colorado Plateau in Colorado and Nu; ::<c:cdCc> :li::i Terti<:r,- ,~- :.ntls in ~:v'l't ,: !,:J ;;J ..:ith;n

26
Wyoming.and in Karnes and adjacent counties within the Gulf Coastal Plain of Texas. All of these deposits are believed to owe their origin to deposition by ground water in clastic strata which contain appreciable carbonaceous matter such as macerated wood fragments and leaves (Finch, 1967). Hydrogen sulfide or methane gas may have been present to aid in the deposition by also creating reducing chemical conditions. The Tertiary-age sequences which have productive uranium deposits also contain appreciable volcanic ash and associated debris. This is especially true of the Texas deposits (Eargle and others, 1975). Certain related aspects are known from the Tertiary stratigraphic section in the Georgia Coastal Plain, and support some measure of optimism with regard to hydrogeochemical exploration for uranium in this region.
There also exists the potential for very low-grade uranium resources in the Coastal Plain. The Tertiary sequence, especially beneath Chatham County, contains commercially feasible phosphate deposits (Furlow, 1969). Like those extensively mined in central Florida and eastern North Carolina, these deposits contain very low percentages of associated uranium which could possibly be recovered if commercial mining of this Georgia phosphate were ever undertaken.
Although most nuclear power is obtained from reactors fueled with enriched uranium, the high-temperature gas (helium)-cooled reactor utilizes thorium as its principal nuclear fuel. To date, only a very small production of thorium-fueled nuclear energy has been realized, but because of higher operating efficiencies, electrical energy from this type of reactor
~
can be expected to increase in the future. The principal source of thorium in the United States is the mineral monazite, which most commonly is found

27
in so-called "heavy-mineral" sands. These deposits are formed due to the mechanical concentration by moving water of various minerals having high specific gravities. Such deposits are called placers, and typically result from the activity of stream currents or waves along modern and ancient beaches. The latter generally yield more extensive and larger deposits. Conditions conducive to the occurrence of monazite-bearing beach placers are distinctly favorable along the Georgia coastal region. In adjacent South Carolina, for example, McCauley (1960) reported appreciable reserves of placer monazite on Hilton Head Island where current residential and resort construction now precludes development of these potentially useful deposits.
Due to the relatively gentle topography and the general absence of deeply incised stream channels, the Atlantic Coastal Plain has a low capability with regard to potential hydropower sites. The availability of several large rivers and abundant ground-water supplies, however, make this province attractive for the siting of additional fossil-fuel and nuclear-power stations which require large volumes of cooling waters. Due to the very stringent siting requirements established by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for nuclear power plants, the preceding statement should not be construed to mean that all locations in this province are acceptable merely because of suitable vmter supply. All potential sites would rather require considerable evaluation in regard to foundation conditions, seismicity pote~tial, nearby geological structures such as faults, together with ecologic and other environmental parameters.
The Piedmont, and the closely allied Blue Ridge, Provinces, as pre-
~
viously noted, are predominately composed of igneous and metamorphic rocks. These rocks also display a considerable degree of structural comple~ity.

28
These characteristics definitely preclude the possibility of finding recoverable amounts of petroleum, oil shale or coal within these provinces. There does exist, however, some possibility that mineralization associated with past episodes of igneous and volcanic activity might include the formation of veins or other deposits containing primary uranium ores. Although vein deposits of uranium, such as those at Marysvale, Utah, are now relatively minor in importance to the total co~nercial uranium-mining industry in the United States, such deposits and related types are highly productive elsewhere in the world. Deposits within igneous and associated hydrothermally-mineralized bodies in Canada, France, and Czechoslovakia are actively mined to recover uranium. The most logical sites within the Piedmont and Blue Ridge would be those associated with igneous intrusions such as granites and pegmatites. There also exists the possibility that ancient consolidated placers within some of the Precambrian sequence of the Blue Ridge might contain some mineralization.
Within extensive areas of the western United States, especially portions of California, Idaho, Nevada, Colorado and New Mexico, the potential for 6eothermal steam is extremely favorable. In these areas, Tertiary and youngerage volcanic activity, as the source of heat, has combined with favorable subsurface reservoir rocks, suitable capping or sealing units and rechargeable ground-water systems to form a large number of geothermal-steam deposits. The best known occurs in northern California at The Geysers, where dry steam is produced and used to generate an appreciable portion of the electricity for the city of San Francisco (Budd, 1973). Exploration at other sites has
~
shown promise toward further development of tl1is potentially renewable energy resource.

29

One useful preliminary indication of subsurface geothermal-steam deposits

is some form of surface expression, such as geysers, hot springs, mud vol-

canoes and related features. This, however, is not to say that all surface

sites which display these features also have favorable subsurface conditions

needed to develop sufficient steam for a power station. Warm springs are

known from the Georgia Piedmont, but their relatively low temperatures are

several orders of magnitude below those recorded at western sites considered

favorable for geothermal-electricity production. Furthermore, the thermal

mechanism is different, and thus the existence of thermal springs in Georgia

adds little to the geothermal-steam potential within these provinces.

Topographically, the Piedmont and Blue Ridge Provinces have numerous

high relief or mountainous sections. Stream dissection has carved several

deeply incised valleys and gorges. The potential for damming sections of

these natural drainageways and using the impounded waters to drive electri-

cal-turbine generators thus appears favorable. As will be discussed in more

detail subsequently, a balance between generating electrical power in this

fashion and preserving the ecologic-environmental attributes of these stream

.valleys must be considered.

For purposes of this preliminary evaluation, the closely allied Valley

and Ridge and Appalachian Plateau Provinces will be considered together.

Both contain an appreciable thickness of Paleozoic-age sedimentary rocks;

only the greater degree of structural complexity in the former separates

these two provinces.

Inasmuch as both provinces contain sedimentary strata which could con-
~ain petroleum scurce beds, reservoirs and capping seals, there is some

potential for the tlltin'ate discovery of petroleum there. Similar Paleozoic

SL:qucnc,-; inncct:1~-,_

'Lz. '!Cl ::.;.-~t~~e, north~.

J bLr:na and sout~bern

,_

il t.

(\..

30
all contain productive oil and gas fields. Deposits of heavy asphalt or tar sands are also known from northern AlaQama. Although tar sands in the eastern part of the nation are marginally considered only as an alternative energy source, there exists some potential for their occurrence in northwest Georgia.
Another possible future energy resource is low-grade oil shale. Included in this category are several deposits of sedimentary strata which can yield a few (usually less than 10) barrels of oil from the crushed rock upon special thermal treatments. These units thus exhibit a considerably lower potential yield than most of the Green River shales in the western United States, and for this reason are designated as low grade. One of the more extensively distributed units displaying this characteristic is the Chattanooga Shale of Devonian and Mississippian age. Although this unit is exposed throughout much of Tennessee and states to the north and west, it also occurs in these northvrest Georgia provinces. Of additional significance with regard to the Chattanooga Shale is its very low content of uranium, which also qualifies the unit as a low-grade resource of this valuable energy material. Because of the great tonnages of mined rock which would be required to generate cowmercially acceptable amounts of shale oil and uranium, the near-term potential of this kind of deposit must be viewed with some measure of pessimism.
Throughout the eastern and mideastern portions of the United States, the principal coal-bearing strata are contained within Pennsylvanian (= Upper Carboniferous)-age sequerices. This interval of geologic time rep-
~
resents the most prolific coal-forming period on a worldwide basis. Within this country, the long-productive Appalachian coal fields constitutP one of our major domestic sources oE high-grade cokint:'; coal for the ITl('tall:~-:-i<~1L

31
industry, as well as quality bituminous coal and the vast majority of the anthracite domestically mined. Coal seams within the Pennsylvanian stratigraphic sequence occur in the Appalachian Plateau Province, especially where the latter borders the Valley and Ridge Province in northwest Georgia. Thus, the potential for the connnercial recovery of coal in Georgia is good.
The possibility of geothermal steam occurring within these two geologic provinces is very slight. The rather pronounced topography here, however, provides some potential for hydroelectric power sites.
~

ASSESSMENT OF GEOLOGICAL ENERGY RESOURCES

INTRODUCTION

In comparison with the preceding section, the following discussion

focuses on those geologically-related energy resources which are known to

occur in Georgia or are actually utilized in the production of energy.

As. well, this section attempts to assess what the potential is within the

State for those geological energy resources which as yet remain undiscovered

or untapped for technical or economic reasons.

The order in which these resources are treated here agrees basically

with their occurrence and potential. Coal is discussed first inasmuch as

several seams are exposed in the northwestern sector of the State; these

deposits have been mined in the past and presently are being recovered for

use in the several steel-industry operations located outside of the State

of Georgia. Although water may be more appropriately considered a natural

as opposed to a geological resource per se, its use in hydropower facilities

is considered next. There are several hydroelectric facilities within the

State and they produce a considerable amount of electricity. Electricity

and other energy uses can be made from naturally heated ground water, more

commonly termed geothermal steam. Because this geologic material is also

a hydropower resource, it is discussed after hydroelectric facilities des-

pite the realization that no geothermal steam is currently being used for

energy in Georgia.

~

The most important geological e:1ergv resource to both this nation and

the Sti1te is petroleuD. No crude oil or natur:1l gas, however, has ever

been r_<iCll.~ i.n (~\.

:_ : !_ i ._, ,_; i t h i u ' , , . .1. nc s p i t e t h i. s , t ::.

") ?.__

33
potential of petroleum occurrences is discussed for several onshore portions of the State, as well as for the Outer Continental Shelf area, even though the latter is under the regulation of the federal government. The potential of two unconventional petroleum resources, namely oil shale and tar or oil sands is also included.
At the present time, there is only one operational nuclear-power plant within the State. The enriched uranium utilized in the fuel assemblies for the Georgia Power Hatch Plant at Baxley comes from deposits located in other states. No uranium is presently produced in the State, but there is exploration activity underway looking for high-grade deposits. As well, there exists the possibility of by-product recovery of uranium from phosphate deposits, should the latter ever be mined. Thus, the potential for uranium resources in the State is considered with those points in mind. A brief treatment on the occurrence of monazite, a thorium-bearing mineral, is included because thorium is also used as a nuclear fuel.
Lastly, the potential usage of underground geologic space for a variety of energy-related applications is treated in a co~cluding section. With the exception of one excavated-cavern storage facility which stores LPG near Milner in Lamar County, very little use of the underground has ever been made in Georgia.
Information contained in this section and various opinions based upon these data will in turn be utilized in making ~ertain recommendations as ~ concluding section to this report.

3l~.

COAL RESOURCES

As of January 1, 1972, the United States had estimated identified resources

of coal totalling 1. 581 trillion short tons in coal seams lying within 3000

or less feet of the surface (Averitl, 1973). This total includes bituminous

and anthracite coal in seams thicker than 14 inches and subbituminous and

lignite in seams thicker than 30 inches. In this context, identified resources

embrace those known deposits whose contained coal can reasonably be expected

to be recovered under existing technology and economic conditions. Expressed

another way, this huge volume constitutes the known reserves of coal, identi-

fied from a total resource base of 4.8 trillion tons. The additional quantity

of more than 3 trillion tons includes that coal lying as deep as 6000 feet

and in less well mapped or delineated deposits.

In one sense, based on these figures, this nation possesses immense re-

serves of coal usable for future electric-po-v1er generation and possible syn-

thetic-fuel feedstock. Within the nearby states of Alabama and Tennessee,

reserves of bituminous coal total 13.3 and 2.6 billion tons respectively.

Both states have established production by mean~ of both surface strip (area

'and contour type) and underground methods. This production and the future

reserves are to be found within the structurally undeformed sedimentary

strata of the Cumberland Plateau (Appalachian Plateau) Province and the acl-

jacent Valley and Ridge Province whose boundary with the former province is

at places somewhat indefinite. All the coal assigned to the reserve total

in these two states is Pennsylvanian in geologic age.

By comparison, bituminous coal found in several seams of minea~1le thick-
~
ness along Sand and Lookout l'f.'<li1t:ains in Dade and 1.Jalker Counties accou:1ts

foe on1 \' 2!, r.1ill i()T"f >:'<

; .: '"' ; :' i Cc d r e '" c r .; ,, ( r: b '"'on . 1 94 ()) . t,J d i ~ ; .1

35
resources which might predictably occur in the same region, based on geological projections, amount only to another 60 million tons. Thus, the total resource base of coal present in the northwest portion of Georgia is 84 million tons. Although this may seem to represent a very substantial amount, it pales in comparison to the volumes attributable to Alabama (41.3 billion) and Tennessee (4.6 billion). In fact, the 84 million tons assigned to Georgia is the lowest coal resource base of any of the 30 separate states inventoried by Averitt (1973).
Thus, this comparatively insignificant amount of coal in northVTest Georgia is clearly viewed as inadequate to sustain extensive future production for power-generation purposes. Because of the impracticality of recovering the relatively thin coal seams of this small reserve by high-volume, mechanized mining rnethcds, Georgia's coal deposits are totally incapable of meeting the state's annual demand for coal of nearly 15 million tons. Even if it were possible to eliminate all economic, logistical and recovery constraints, the reserves in Georgia could only sustain production for less than two years, and if the less well identified coal resources were utilized, only another three or four more years could be realized. Clearly then, the coal in this sector of the State cannot be considered a viable energy source available to meet the demands of electric utilities as they strive to produce adequate electricity for Georgians.
Figure 2 shows the geographic distribution of the coal seams as mopped in Dade and Walker Counties by .Johnson (1946), and locates those mines known to have been active prio~ to that time. As reported by Butts and Gildersleeve
~
(1948), coal mining in this area antedates the Civil War, with most of the production prior to 1891 havin~ been concentrated in Dade County. Ar~ive

ROCKCASTLE SS.
IJANOV!R SHALE BONAIR SS. WHITW!LL SHALE SEWANEE MEMBER GIZZARD MUliER PNtrteNGTON SHALE
BANGOR LS

36

FORT PAYNE CHERT

CHATTANOOGA SHALE
RED MOUNTAIN FORMATION
SCALE

CHICKAMAUGA LS
~ 100 ,-c; Sfl:liii.TIGRAPHIC SECT m. C> ~ '"'"' ~t:;,

E'lCPLANATION Of SYM9C~5
"o
Jo..,on<)jt'kale ~ ;> hv'l4 Jf +lt>U

""" ol oynt"~

G-~ 0
SJc~~~J ~,"!!~

'1''.:: ).,,,.,.,,l, ""..
:Jtaf(;I..!.,>I a"'.,""

~t]v,, ;:~
lj-li.
l,t

.-~.-..oc~ ,, " ~~ -~- """''~

8,~,.-,-----~ --~..1____~ ~-~ :l

FIGURE 2.

DISTRIBUTLO:~ Of COi\L-BEARING PEN:--;SYLVANIAN-ACE STRATA Q?;
AND LOOKLJ1 1 r ~~u~;:'ilAl~S, DADE A~D HALKER COU~. l1C::S, GEO!:ZC L
(J.fL::;r Johnsou, l94b)

37
underground mining was begun about this time in the Round Mountain portion of Lookout Mountain and from 1891 until recently, the so-called Durham mines of this area furnished the bulk of production. Contour strip mining along Lookout Mountain near the Tennessee state line was begun in the mid-1940's, but has subsequently been discontinued.
Although production statistics are not wholly available for all years, some data have been compiled by the U.S. Bureau of Mines, and indicate that cumulative coal production from this region from 1860 through 1970 has approximated 11.5 million short tons. It is interesting to note that the annual consumption of coal for one year in Georgia now exceeds the total output from these deposits for more than a century! Table 4 summarizes these production figures. The total economic value of this coal is placed at slightly more than 17 million dollars, a figure which obviously reflects the low prices paid for much of this production, especially prior to 1940.
Most of the Georgia coal is low in sulfur, generally ranging less than 1.5 percent. Some values are as low as 0.4 percent. Mineable seams vary in average thickness from 24 to 40 inches. The coal is a low ash and medium volatile type, and has a thermal output between 13 and 14,000 BTU's per pound. Within the last two years, there has developed renewed interest in mining certain of this coal as it makes a high-quality metallurgical grade for the manufacture of coke used in the production of steel. According to the Georgia Surface Mined Land Use Board (personal communication, 1975), there are four companies currently operating in some fashion within the northwest Georgia coal fields. They are: (1) Gregisco Mining Company, a
~
subsidiary of the Isco Company of Birmingham, Alabama; (2) Haynes Mining Company of Atlanta; (3) Charles Ussery of Conyers; (4) Charbon, Inc. of Atlanta.

38.

Table 4 Cumulative Production of Coal By Decades in Georgia (1n millions of short tons)

Interval of Time 1860 - 1890 1890 - 1900 1900 - 1910 1910 - 1920 1920 - 1930 1930 - 1940 1940 - 1950 1950 - 1960 1960 - 1970

Production by Decade 2.919 2.601 3.257 1.412 .558 . 273 .327 .110 .021

Cumulative Production 2.919 5.520 8. 777
10.189 10.747 11.020 11.347 11.457 11.478

No contact could be established with the Charbon operation, and Haynes Mining was merely preparing a strip-mine site along Sand Mountain near Trenton in Dade County. The Charles Ussery extraction effort is located 10 miles northwest of Trenton, and is along Sand Mountain and \lithin only 1000 yards, approxL~ately, of the Alabama border. Production here varies from 1500 to 2000 tons per month, and the entire production is shipped to Japan through the port of New Orleans. The coal is used to make coke for the steel industry. The Gregisco Company is operating the Gregory Mine, a stripmining operation, in southwest Chattooga County near the Alabama line. Here, low-sulfur, low-volatile, high-grade metallurgical coal is currently mined at an output ranging in excess of 15,000 tons per month. The entire product~on is sold to Brazilian interests for use in the steel industry as coke.
Because the Georgia coals make very suitable feedstock for metallurgical coke, and correspondingly command appropriate prices, none of the

39 production is utilized internally within the State. As noted previously, the majority of coal burned as power-plant fuel comes from Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama and other Midwest sources. Ultimately, low-sulfur coal from Utah and Colorado will be utilized in future Georgia Power coal-fired power stations.
In summary, the Pennsylvanian-age coal of northwest Georgia occurs in tonnages entirely insufficient to be considered as a fuel for -in-state electric-power generation. Although presently mined in several small-volume operations, the current output is sold strictly for metallurgical applications within the steel industries of foreign nations. Georgia will thus remain totally dependent on other states for its supplies of coal needed by electricity-generating facilities.
~

40
HYDROPOWER Hydroelectric Sites
Although the majority of electricity generated in Georgia relies upon the combustion of coal in thermal-steam plants, nearly 1350 megawatts (MW) of hydroelectric energy can be produced from the eight large capacity (more than 50 MW) facilities and several smaller sites throughout the State (Tables 5 and 6). These larger facilities are owned and operated by either the U. S. Corps of Engineers or The Georgia Power Company. When full production at the Carter's Dam site is realized, the total installed capacity will become nearly 1600 MW. At the time an additional output of 250 MW is derived from the pumped-storage system at this site, Carter's Dam will furnish a total of 500 MW. Through 1973, the installed hydroelectric facilities furnished only 9 percent of Georgia's demand for electricity. The greatest advantage to hydroelectricity is its use at peaking periods.
All the large-capacity facilities, as shown by numbered sites on Figure 3 and listed in Table 5, are located in the Piedmont and Blue Ridge Provinces. Also shown on that diagram are several large-scale, as yet undevel, oped sites. With the exception of the two locations along the Altamaha River, all these undeveloped sites are also to be found in the Piedmont and Blue Ridge Provinces.
If every large-capacity, undeveloped site were placed in operation, an additional 1400 to 1500 MW could be generated. By also including extensions to already operational facilities,. together with undeveloped sites paving potential capacities less than 100 MW, an additional capacity of between 1200 and 1300 MW is achieved. Thus, if all undeveloped sites,

41
Table 5 Large-Capacity Developed and Undeveloped Hydroele~tric Sites in Georgia (a)

Developed
1. Allatoona 2. Bartlett's Ferry 3. Buford 4. Clark Hill 5. Hartwell 6. Oliver 7. Tallulah Falls 8. Walter F. George

Total

Installed Capacity KW
74,000 65,000 86,000 280,000 264,000 60,000 72,000 130,000
1,031,000

Undeveloped

A. Anthony Shoals B. Carter's
c. Cooper's Ferry
D. Goose Creek Dl. Opossum Creek with Rogue's D2. Opossum Creek with Sandbottom E. Richard Russell F. Spewrell Bluff G. Tallow Hill H. Upper Oconee I. Wallace J. West Point
Total

100,000 250,000 (b) 120,000 169,000 ll5,000 (c) 150,000 (c) 300,000 100,000 172 '000 250,000 108,000 108,375
1,427,375

(a) includes only those sites with capacities greater than 50,000 KW developed and 100,000 KW potential
(b) Carter's in partial operation, but still listed here until fully on line; total does not include pumped-storage capacity.
~ (c) not on map because the Chattooga has been declared a wild and scenic river and the 265,000 KW not included in total potential capacity

(data from Southeast Power Administration)

)
.ATLANTA \
~
MACON.

42
0 Existing Dam Sites Potential Dam Sites

0

50

MILES

FIGURE 3. EXISTiNG M~D PO TEN fiAL HYuROEL.ECTFiiC S!TES IN GEORGL\

43

Table 6 Developed Hydroelectric Facilities in Georgia Having Less Than 50,000 KW Capacity

Operator/Site

Crisp County Power Commission Warwick Subtotal

Georgia Power Company Burton Nacoochee Terror a Tugalo Yonah Morgan Falls Langdale Riverview Goat Rock North Highlands Barnett Shoals Estatoah Flint River Lloyd Shoals Sinclair Dam

Subtotal

South Carolina Electric and Gas Company Stevens Creek Subtotal

Tennessee Valley Authority Blue Ridge Nottely

Subtotal

Installed Capacity in KW
15,200 15,200
6,120 4,800 16,000 45,000 22,500 46,800 1,040
480 26,000 29,600
2,800 240
5,400 14,400 45,000 266,180
18,800 18,800
20,000 15,000 35,000

Total - All Utilities

335,180

Total - All Private Firms

12,527 347,707

~

(data from Southeast Power Administration)

44
large and. small, could be developed within Georgia, the total additional capacity would be 2800 MW at a maximum.
Evidence is at hand, however, which tends to lessen, or at least delay, that eventuality. Although not included in the above total, there are 0.265 megawatts of capacity located at two sites along the Chattooga River, but which seem unlikely to be ever utilized. That watercourse has been declared a wild and scenic river, and as such can be expected to be excluded from such commercial development. Continual and stronger opposition to the Richard Russell site has been recently voiced and there exists a good chance that legal impediments will be placed in the way of damming that site along the Savannah River. At least temporarily, the Spewrell Bluff site has been removed from possible development through administrative action over the past few years. There is little to suggest that this trend in opposing the damming of Georgia's rivers for hydroelectric generation will diminish despite demands for more electricity.
Although hydroelectric facilities are environmentally clean in that they do not produce air emissions, do not pose nuclear-contamination threats, do not require tons of coal to be mined and do not place added burdens on our petroleum-import picture, they are opposed because of a fundamental objection to modifying the natural beauty and hydrologic purpose of streams. A practical element can also be added in Georgia's case. Many of the sites are small to very small in terms of their potential capacity. The amount of construction and alteration of the landscape necessary to produce at the most another 3000 ill~ of electircity could be alternatively accomplished with
t~hree modern nuclear or coal-fl.red power plants!
Growth in the demand for electrical energy in Georgia is presently at slightly wore than 10 i" c, c:nt per year (Georgid Energy Council-Governor's

45
Science Advisory Council, 1973). Projections made by this same group in 1974 suggest that twice the current demand for electricity will manifest itself shortly after 1980. The quandary is how to most efficiently develop additional generating capacity, if that is really the final answer, and involve in that development a fixed resource, namely the number of available hydroelectric sites.
Before 1980, it is anticipated that the full 500 MW capacity of the Carter's Dam site will be available. Planned construction at three other sites could add slightly more than 1000 MW of capacity. Thus, the relative percent contribution from hydroelectric sources to tot?l anticipated electrical growth would be slightly less than the present figure.
Although hydroelectric sites can be expected to contribute somewhat toward meeting Georgia's future demand for electrical energy, the feeling here is that not all the available undeveloped sites should or will be placed into operation. Many small capacity sites, from a practical standpoint, would be better left undeveloped. It may be hoped that electricalenergy conservation and possible substitutions of solar power for certain ,applications can reduce electrical demand so that the pressure to build dams on every favorable stream will not persist. Certainly, some of the larger sites will be placed into use eventually, but the environmental and esthetic arguments will be forceful against even this.
If increased electricity-generating capacity is to emerge in earnest, hydroelectric sites display one other favorable aspect which surely will prove persuasive. At times of changing and escalating prices for combustible
~
fuels, hydroelectrical facilities are removed from this variable, and can produce relatively low-cost energy, in Sfli te of rising construction costs. This economic factor may well sway some opposition into favoring more hydroelectric site development.

46
The .personal view of this report is that a preferable option, even with economics considered, is to more effectively move toward increased conservation in electricity and other energy usage. Increased energy use is no longer as easily equitable with the better life or more production. Electrical energy conservation through better construction insulation, more efficient heating and cooling, more equitable rate structures for industrial and nonindustrial users and less promotion toward using more of a commodity increasingly difficult to make are desirable over the long term. Cutting electrical energy growth from 10 to 8, or even less, percent will emasculate neither the utilities nor the economy if the reduction is phased over several years.
The increased utilization of hydroelectric sites will in many cases depend upon value judgments. Will Georgians prefer to have increased coal mining create various problems elsewhere or will they opt for more nuclear and hydroelectric plants within their own state? Although the answer to that question is partly constrained by the small contribution expected of hydroelectric sites to the State, a part of the answer will be decided this way in the future.
Geothermal Steam In recent years, there has evolved considerable interest in a geological
energy resource that may well be renewable or nearly so, Geothermal energy, relying upon heat naturally generated within the earth's crust, is attractive because it is relatively clean as viewed from an environmental standpoint, is now producing very low-cost electricity and has been only slightly develfped. There are several areas in the United States which appear to have deposits favorable for future cow~ercial production. To many, solar power
and geothermal st:::>:-1':~ -~~~--\ '[.,-r,~,rcc~ ~lS e.:<trerr,..~]~: i~:(~rt2.nt ene:r~y resourc:~.?s _..,f
the decades ahead.

47
As outlined by White and Williams (1975), geothermal-energy resources can be divided into these categories: (1) thermal convection systems; (2) hot igneous sources; (3) thermal conduction systems. To date, geothermal energy has only been recovered from the first of these, but experimental investigations are currently underway to test the feasibility of the other two types. Convection systems exhibit relatively high temperatures at shallow depths and contain water in either the vapor or liquid phase. This water is largely recirculated meteoric ground water, or water which has entered the subsurface from surface infiltration related to the hydrologic cycle. For either the vapor or fluid-dominated systems to be effe~tive as the sources of steam for an electrical-generating facility, the following requirements must be met: (1) a base temperature in the geothermal system of at least 150C; (2) a "steam" reservoir rock having sufficient porosity, permeability and areal extent to permit effective production while showing no significant reduction in steam pressure or volume over time; (3) an effective sealing mechanism to keep the steam and/or heated water contained within the reservoir; (4) adequate ground-water recharge to the reservoir; and (5) water 'with a sufficiently low content of dissolved chemicals that steam production is not adversely hindered by high salinities.
Vapor-dominated systems have to date shown the most development in that the world's two largest geothermal-electrical facilities are operated from reservoirs where steam is essentially the only phase produced. The LardereJlo, Italy plant, first operated in 1904 as the world's initial geothermal-steam facility, and The Geysers in northern California, are each considerably larger
~
than any other site in the world. The Matsukawa deposit in Japan, although only a 20-megawatt facility, also relies upon a dry-steam reservoir. The dry steam at The Geysers produces approxir'1ately 516 H~v of electricity in

48
some eleven, individual generating plants. The steam is supplied from wells drilled and maintained by Union Oil Company of California, in conjunction with Magma Power Company and Thermal Power Company, Inc., to Pacific Gas and Electric who operates the turbine-generating facilities and markets the electricity to the city of San Francisco. This geothermal-steam facility is the world's largest, and various estimates suggest that its ultimate developed capacity will range between 800 and 1000 M}l. The Larderello site produces some 406 MW of electricity, but is not expected to add any further generating capacity. These two dry-steam facilities thus account for 922 of the world's current installed capacity of 1,302 MW.
Other worldwide geothermal-steam electricity plants all rely upon fluiddominated systems, wherein superheated water mixed with some steam "flashes" into steam at lower surface pressures, and after cleaning, can be used to drive turbine generators. The largest such operation is that located at Wairakei in New Zealand. In addition to this site, there are two others in that country where electricity is produced or will be shortly. Geothermalsteam electricity is also produced in El Salvador, Iceland, Japan, Mexico and the Soviet Union.
If one were to plot the locations of these facilities along with where exploration for new sites appears promising, a noticeable association with zones in the earth's crust characterized by numerous earthquakes and relatively recent volcanic activity would be clearly shown. The greatest concentration of geothermal-steam resources lies in the arcuate belt surrounding the Pacific Ocean Basin where there exists appreciable large-scale tectonic
~
activity believed by many to be due to the movement of large crustal plates. For those sites not found in this region, there is evident a close relationship to geologically yn\n-,;_: volcanism.

49
Although most of the exploration for undiscovered geothermal-steam deposits has been centered around finding convective systems, some interest has been shown in possibly extracting heat directly from hot igneous rocks even though the latter lack water. At present, the U. S. Energy Research and Development Administration through the Los Alamos Laboratories is examining one such "dry, hot-rock" deposit at The Valles Caldera in New Mexico. The intent here is to drill several wells into the solidified, though still very hot (> 650C) igneous rock, and then to artificially fracture the rock and establish a water-recirculation system by which the injected water would return to the surface sufficiently heated to drive a special type of electrical generating facility (Smith, 1974). Before this approach can be viewed as successful, it must first be established whether the rock is sufficiently hot, whether fracturing can be accomplished so that artificial openings are not only produced but remain open, whether thermal exchange will be effective, and whether a sufficient volume of hot water can actually be returned to the surface. As well, the feasibility of the special binary-cycle turbine generator must also be demonstrated. Thus, it may be several more years 'before the energy-resource community learns if this induced geothermal system can be operated at all, or operated to produce cost-competitive electricity.
Even more problematic is the proposed extraction of geothermal values directly from molten igneous sources. This possibility is also under examination by the U. S. Energy Research and Development Administration in cooperation with Sandia Laboratories of New Mexico, but must be at this time viewed fith a considerable measure of skepticism. Further diminishing the attractiveness of this approach is that it would be limited to only a few areas mostly located in Hawaii and Alaska.

so

Also very speculative at this time is the possible recovery of geo-

thermal energy contained in so-called geopressured reservoirs dominantly

contained within thick shale zones of the Tertiary-age sedimentary sequence

in the Gulf Coast Basin. Through a combination of unique depositional and

structural-geology conditions, as now understood from extensive oil-explora-

tion activities in Louisiana and Texas, geothermally-heated fluids are held

under abnormally high hydrostatic. pressures in sandy aquifers sealed within

certain thick shale intervals. Fluid temperatures in these geopressured

zones range from 140 to 185C. vfuite and Williams (1975) estimate the

thermal content of these regional conductive systems at several orders of

magnitude greater than the more conventional types of geothermal resources.

Some methane could also be recovered if these reservoirs are ever placed into

commercial development. Assessment of this potential resource is really

impractical at this time although estimates have been published by the U. S.

Geological Survey. Many economic, environmental and feasibility questions

require answers first before steps beyond a very embryonic research stage

can be taken. Whether geothermal electricity can ultimately be produced

from these deposits is not known with any degree of certainty at this time.

Meidav (1975) has published data showing, as have others before him,

that the production of electricity using geothermal steam in the United

States is very cost competitive, generally being lower than that based on

fossil fuels or nuclear power. Some limitations or reasons why more of this

resource has not yet been developed despite these favorable economics and

;ncreased interests in several western states are:

1. Necessary exploratory drilling has been limited as less

than 1000 holes have been drilled to date; by comparison,

the c,i] ir1d11strv drills up~vi1rds of 15,000 such test wells

. . . ant1~~.__~

1.. . ::--

-~~l"Lntry.

51

2. Several deposits, displaying promising surface manifestations such as hot springs, etc., lack one or more of the requisite features for a long-term (minimum 30 years) subsurface steam accumulation

3. Contracts requiring guaranteed volumes of steam as stipulated by the utility firms add an additional element of risk to already risk-weighted exploration

4. With the exception of The Geysers and Larderello, largesize deposits of steam at present seem very restricted; thus, most deposits, once found and developed, will support only small, satellite power plants, and it will require large numbers of such facilities before a significant amount of electricity can be produced; large utilities have not been zealous in seeking these smaller-size operations

5. There are undesirable gases and salt-water brines produced which, while less taxing than problems engendered by other energy facilities, nevertheless must be addressed.

Although the estimates published in the literature cover a widely divergent

range, it appears reasonable that this country could expect from 1000 to 3000

MW of installed capacity from geothermal-steam deposits by 1985. This entire

capacity will be concentrated in the West, where deposits in California,

Idaho, New Mexico and Nevada show the greatest possibilities.

We should, however, not limit our thinking about geothermal energy to

merely the production of electricity. Hot water and steam from subsurface

deposits, while inadequate to produce electricity, are used now for industrial

and agricultural purposes in Iceland, New Zealand and Australia, for space

heating in New Zealand (air conditioning, too) and Iceland, for thermal

mining in New Zealand, and for agricultural hothouses in Oregon and northern

California. Though not widespread or spectacular, these substitute uses in

turn reduce d8nands for other energy sources.

~

There is also considerable promise with regard to the eventual utili-

zation of the large volumes of heated geothermal fluids now unsuitable for

conventional electrical gent'ration. The ~>':'1,no1o~:y here is '.:hnt is :'alled

52
a binary-cycle generating facility. In this approach, hot geothermal fluids are produced from wells, pumped through a closed loop from which heat is extracted in a heat exchanger and this thermal energy is used to heat and vaporize a second so-called power fluid. The latter, once heated, expands into a gaseous form and is introduced into a low-pressure turbine-generator which produces electricity (Holt and others, 1973). The Russians have operated such a facility utilizing freon as the power fluid at a site called Paratunka (Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs, 1972). Although the power output of this Russian plant is only 0.7 MW, the geothermal fluids are but 81C in temperature. Research and development on binary-cycle systems using freon or isobutane are currently underway in this country. If successful, this approach could be a significant step toward the installation of many satellite geothermal-electrical plants using not water that otherwise could not be used in the high pressure turbine-generators of existing plants. Greater use of geothermal steam and geothermal fluids for industrial and agricultural uses should also be pursued much in the fashion that Iceland and New Zealand have done.
The overall geology of Georgia is not especially well suited for geothermal-energy resources. First, although the Coastal Plain contains some thickness of Tertiary-age strata, the latter were not deposited under the same conditions as those thicker, geopressured intervals underlying the Gulf Coastal region. No evidence has been found in the more than 140 oil tests drilled in the Georgia Coastal Plain to suggest the presence of geofressured units capable of yielding geothermal fluids. Secondly, although much of the Piedmont and some of the Blue Ridge is igneous in origin, the geologic age of the granitic and other rock types is considerably olJ(r than those igneous events associated with geothermal steam deposits in th .., western

53
United States. Vulcanism and related subsurface activity in the latter region are measured agewise in terms of a few tens of millions of years, with some events having occurred as recently as the last five million years. By contrast, the age of Georgia's igneous rocks extends back to the Paleozoic and Precambrian intervals of geologic time, or several hundreds of millions of years ago. Thus, any significant residual heat from these much older igneous events has long since been dissipated. There is no evidence of any Tertiary or Quaternary age vulcanism in the State even though air-borne valcanic debris from sources outside Georgia was deposited in some Tertiary sedimentary intervals. Thirdly, there is no evidence of abnormally high geothermal gradients in the State. Although the specific nature of this phenomenon varies from location to location, the basic aspect is that the temperature of crustal rocks increases as greater depth is reached. Data supporting this fact have come from deep wells and mines and scientific measurements. It is common for geothermal-steam deposits to occur within areas having both surface manifestations and abnormally high geothermal gradients. Where the former are lacking, the latter may still point favor' ably toward possible geothermal deposits at depth. High values of surface heat flow can aid in finding areas of abnormal gradients. No evidence of this kind has been noted for any area within Georgia, and quite honestly, there is little geologic reason to suspect the presence of any such phenomena.
On the other hand, Georgia does have some thermal or warm springs. The latter are concentrated in a linear, northeast trending belt which extends from southwest of Barnesville to nearly the Alabama state line. Most famous
~
of these thermal springs are those located near Warm Springs in Meriwether County, where President Franklin Roosevc1 L VclS o. frequent visitor. Averaging

54
a discharge in excess of 600 gallons of water per minute, Warm Springs itself is the warmest spring, with temperatures as high as 32C.
Hewett and Crickmay (1937) have rather conclusively established that the water emanating from these thermal springs originally falls as precipitation on adjacent Pine Mountain, and enters a ground-water aquifer called the Hollis Quartzite. Due to the folding and faulting present in this area, this unit extends some 3000 feet into the subsurface, where the meteoric water is heated by a normal geothermal gradient (approximately 1F rise in temperature for each 100 feet of depth increase) and returns as warm water at the surface.
These spring waters have been mainly used for bathing and supposed therapeutic applications. The very low temperature eliminates any potential for their use in geothermal-steam electrical generation, even if a binary-cycle system is considered. It is further most unlikely that they could be used for space heating or other energy-substitute uses.
Although there are other springs in Georgia, only the belt discussed above has been reported as being noticeable for its thermal discharges. Based on the foregoing observations, this report believes there is little chance for utilization of geothermal energy within Georgia. This refutes the generalized view expressed by Horwath and Chaffin (1971) that the Appalachian Region from Maine to Georgia holds great untapped geothermal energy. Also refuted is these authors' contention that a viable, alternative is the detonation of nuclear devices in the subsurface to artificially create "geothermal deposits." This notion, proposed originally under the Atomic
~
Energy Commission's Plowshare Program, is extremely controversial and destined not to receive favorable reaction by either industry or the general public as viewed by t,~~c,; L,_:cpott. Results obta.i.m;d from similar deto,:Ji::.l

55 tests designed to fracture certain petroleum reservoirs to better recover natural gas in both New Mexico and Colorado have been discouraging both economically and practically speaking. Detonation of such devices to produce nuclear-thermal chimneys from which thermal values could be recovered appears even less likely to be successful. The general clamor among Colorado citizens after the last gas-stimulation experiment, called Project Rio Blanco, resulted in a state moratorium against all such future subsurface blasts. Attempts to use such devices in the more populous eastern states would almost certainly be blocked by citizens and state governments. Thus, this report also rules out nuclear-geothermal stimulation as having any future potential in Georgia.
~

56
PETROLEUM RESOURCES
Coastal Plain Province As noted in preceding discussion> only two geologic provinces> the
Atlantic Coastal Plain and the combined Valley and Ridge-Cumberland Plateau Region> have the potential for containing petroleum in Georgia. To date, more than 160 exploratory oil-test wells have been drilled within the State (Table 7). Although a few of these wells exhibited oil-stained rock samples and so-called "petroleum shows," no commercial production has ever been established. Of the total, some 146 have been drilled in the Atlantic Coastal Plain province, while 10 others penetrated the sedimentary rock sequences in the two provinces of northwestern Georgia. The remaining five wells were inexplicably drilled into Piedmont rocks! Locations and pertinent data on depth and permit number for all these wells are presented in Figure 4 (see rear pocket).
Results experienced from the coastal plains within the adjacent states of South and North Carolina have similarly been discouraging. More than 60 unsuccessful exploratory tests have been drilled there, including several deep efforts in 1974. Although several small oil fields have been discovered in the Gulf Coast portion of South Florida, and a major discovery known as the Jay Field has been made in western Florida (McNabb, 1975), drilling within the northern tier of Florida has not been especially promising.
Even though southwest Alabama, southeast Mississippi and northwest Florida contain several significant petroleum fields, and exploration activity is high> fhere is little geological chance that the same productive horizons extend into Georgia. Drilling targets in the three areas cited are very deep Jurassic-age units called the Smackover Limestone and Norphlet Formation, and require

57

Table 7

Petroleum Exploratory Wells Drilled In Georgia

County and Well Name

GGS Permit Number

Appling W. E. Bradley No. 1
Atkinson Doster & Ladson No. 1
Ben Hill Unnamed Hell
Brantley Timberlands No. l H. F. Helleilln No. ST-1
Brooks Gerald Livingston No. 1 E. M. Rogers, Sr., No. 1-B
Burke W. G. Green No. 2 H. G. Green No. 3
Calhoun G. W. West No. 1
Camden John A. Buie No. 1 Union Camp B-1 Union Camp C-1
Catoosa F. W. Brown No. 1
Charlton 0. C. Mizell No. 1
Chatham Cherokee Hill No. 1
Clinch Dickerson No. 1 Dickerson No. 2 Gillian No. 1 ~J. E. Mathe\vs No. 1 Alice Musgrove No. 1 Alice Musgrove No. 2 W. J. Barlow No. 1

148
107
171 720
184
316 220
192
153 1198 1199
876
62
123 124
86 481 167 144

Year Drilled

Total Depth (feet)

1947

4106

1945

4296

1919

830

1946 1961

920 4512

1936 1949

292 3850

1923 1923

1033 1002

1950

5265

1948 1970 1970

4960 4690 4600

1932

1625

1963

4577

1920

2130

1940 1940 1940 1942 1944 1944 1947

350 435 1507
180 4088 3513 3848

58

Table 7 (continued)

County and Well Name
Clinch Lem Griffis No. 1 Timber Products Co. No. 1
Coffee Unnamed Hell Hattie Knight~vell No. 1 Nina McLean No. 1 Nina McLean No. 1-A Susie Harper No. 2 T. H. Knight No. 3 D. D. Byrd No. 4 C. T. Thurman No. 1 J. H. Knight No. 1 C. T. Thurman No. 2 W. D. Wall No. 1 0. Fussell et al No. 1
Colquitt D. G. Arrington No. 1
Crisp Cecil Pate No. 1
Dade J. C. Wallen No. 1 Trenton No. 1 K. B. Cureton No. 1
Decatur Hetcalf No. 1 'H. W. Hartin No. 1 W. P. Scott No. 1 J. R. Sealy No. 1 Spindle Top No. 2 G. E. Dollar No. 1
Dodge B & L Farms No. 1
Dooly B. F. Hill No. 1 H. E. Walton No. 1
Do~gherty Reynolds Lumber Co. No. 1 Reynolds Lumber Co. No. 2

GGS Permit Number
338 496
-
444 445 446 447 448 468 508 509 510 3127
170
108
-
1021. 3123
168 191 206 387 832 540
3105
-
619
11 183

Year Drilled
1953 1956

Total De:eth (feet)
4588 4232

-
1943 1954 1954 1954 1954 1954 1955 1956 1956 1956 1974

1290 1210
383 1903 1441 1953 1605 4130 U51 3550 2734 4342

1948

4904

1946

5015

1954 1964 1974

292 1617 6808

1944 1947 1950 1953 1954 1957

6152 3717 4200 3005 4005 5000

1973

4529

1954 1960

2319 3748

1942 1942

5012 5310

59

Table 7 (continued)

County and Well Name

GGS Permit Number

Early A. C. Chandler No. 1 R. V. Ellis No. 1 W. B. Martin No. 1 Edith Harvey No. 1 J. S. Hilloughby No. 1 Great Northern Paper Co. No. 1 Great Northern Paper Co. No. 2

121 483 484 485 486 1145 2135

Echols

Superior Pine Products Co. No. 1 166

Superior Pine Products Co. No. 2 169

Superior Pine Products Co. No. 3 150

Superior Pine Products Co. No. 4 158

Bennett & Langsdale No. 1

189

Emanuel

Unnamed Well

J. J. & Perry Kennedy No. 1

172

Floyd No. 1 No. 2

Glynn Roy H. Massey No. 1 C. E. P. Curry No. 1 W. C. McDonald No. ST-1 Union Bag Camp Paper No. ST-1 Union Camp Paper Co. No. 1

362 376 719
724
1197

Heard Williamson No. 1 Middlebrooks No. 1 D. H. Shephard No. 1

Houston

J. D. Duke No. 1

193

H. B. Gilbert No. 1

194

Jeff Davis Altanaha Oil & Gas Co. ~o. 1 ~Lillian B. No. 2 Unnamed \.Jell J. L. Sinclair No. 1

3128

Year Drilled
1943 1954 1954 1954 1955 1969 1969

Total Depth (feet)
7320 3175 3100 3250 3130 7580 7346

1944 1945 1947 1948 1949

3865 4062 4003 3916 4182

1932 1948

2232 1855

1903 1903

1200? 1850

1953 1954 1961 1961 1970

4614 2050 4737 4642 4435

1947? 1950 1950

1100 1000 1000

1949 1949

1494 1698

1922 1933 1974

1105 1375
828 4063

60

Table 7 (continued)

County and Well Name
Jefferson Black No. 1 Enola Kelley No. 1 J. R. Phillips, Jr. No. 1
Laurens Grace HcCain No. 1
Liberty Jelks & Rodgers No. 1
Lmvndes J. Cole No. 1 J. T. Stalvey No. 1 L. P. Shelton No. 1-A Langdale Co. No. 1 E. N. Hurray, Jr. No. 1
Macon J. F. Forhand No. 1
Marion J. S. Bergin No. 1 F. N. Winkler No. 1
Hitchel1 Unnamed Well J. H. Pullen No. 1
Hontgomery , Unnamed Well Moses No. 1 Moses No. 2 Moses No. 3 Lonnie Wilkes No. 1
Morgan A. 0. Williams No. 1
Pierce Adams-McCaskill No. 1 Adams-McCaskill No. 1
Plf!laski E. H. Tripp No. 1 John Dana No. 1

GGS Permit Number
-
480 1159
51
363
3099 3113 3115 3120 3122
-
476 505
-
109
-
128
-
190
-
119 120
472 491

Year Drilled
1907 1955 1955

Total De]2th (feet)
1143 787 550

1945

25!+8

1954

425'~

1973 1973 1973 1974 1974

5244 8550 5002 5052 5003

1954

2140

1956 1956

1770 4010

1932 1944

125 7487

-
1938 1939
1939 1946

2297 1180 1619 1906 3443

1916

1105

1938 1939

4375 4355

1954 1957

2684 6035

61

Table 7 (continued)

County and Well Name

GGS Permit Number

Pulaski E. H. Tripp No. 2 Griffith No. 1

960 3137

Richmond Unnamed Well

Screven

Helen H. Pryor No. 1

855

Seminole H. E. Harlow No. 1 Grady Bell No. 1-A Spindle Top No. 4 J. R. Sealy No. 1 Spindle Top No. 5 Gibson Construction Co. No. 1 Gibson Construction Co. Saunders Co., Inc., No. 1

187 204 654
513 3001

Stewart

W. C. Bradley Co., Inc. No. 1

716

Sumter

Smith Moore No. 1

296

I.Jalter F. Stevens No. 1

442

Walter Sullivan No. 1

Smith Moore No. 1-R

725

Talbot Rena H. Cook No. 1

Tattnall 0. C. Ray No. 1

Telfair

H. G. Sampler No. 1

Henry Spurlin No. 1

375

Thomas I. E. H. Sedgewick No. 1-A

3114

Toombs

Gibson No. 1

95

~B. M. Brown No. 1

146

T. M. & W. B. Green No. 1

* Second attempt reached only 7518 feet

Year Drilled
1959 1974

Total Depth (feet)
2929 6184

1921

400

1963

2677

1949 1950 1958 1961 1962 1964 1964 1971

3572 3810
247 4500 5318
386 7620 1< 7098

1958

2916

1952 1955 1956 1960

2998 5240 2250 2980

1960

94

1967

20

1920? 1953

450 4008

1973

6672

1945 1947 1964

3681 3185 3665

Table 7 (continued)

County and Well Name

GGS Permit Number

Treutlen

James Fowler No. 1

127

James Gillis No. 1

730

James Gillis No. 1

789

James Gillis No. 2

964

James Gillis No. 1

Dviggs Cline B. Patrick ~o. l Ga. Kraft Co. No. 1

3H7

Halker

Vernon Close No. 1

382

Vernon Close No. 1-B

J. H. Fiztpatrick

344

Calvin Fowler No. 1

477

Ware

Fredel No. 1

Fredel No. 2

63

Unnamed Well

Washington

Lillian B. No. 1

223

Wayne C. A. Gilson No. 1 Brunswick Peninsula Corp. No. 1
Dean No. 1
Dean No. 2 Union Bag & Paper Co. No. 1 Scott & Mead Timber Co. No. 1-B Scott & Mead Timber Co. No. 1-C

52
651 3146 3145

Wheeler Dugas No. 1 Fitzsimmons No. 1 Clyde E. Hinton No. 1 Charles M. Jordan Heirs No. 1 Ronnie Towns No. 1 D. B. McRae No. 1

221
336 3080 3084

62

Year Drilled
1940 1961 1962 1964 1967

Total Depth (feet)
2125 3240 3180 3253 3100

1960 1975

300 1560

1953 1954 1954 1954

1925 3008 2064 2490

1918 1957

1220 3.040 4200

1921

605

1906 1944 1945 1945 1960 1975 1975

1901 4626
345 1965 4552 4491 4500

1919 1923 1953 1956 1972 1972

2100 3384 3630 4002 4075 3642

~

63
wells from 15,000 to 23,000 feet in depth. Wells drilled in extreme southwest Georgia have encountered geologic units known to be stratigraphically well below these Jurassic horizons without ever penetrating the latter. None of these southcvest Georgia tests have exceeded 8000 feet in depth. Thus, the favorable Jurassic-age Smackover and Norphlet intervals appear not to have been deposited this far east, and cannot be viewed as exploration targets in the onshore portion of the State.
Although the density of exploratory-well coverage is nat great, seven decades of interest have discovered no commercial quantities of cruC.e oil or natural gas in Georgia. lfhat are some of the reasons behind this continuing failure, and on what premises might we estimate the potential for reversing this dismal historical trend?
Cramer (1974), in an effort to compare the Georgia Coastal Plain to other petroliferous regions, calculated that the total volume of sedimentary rocks in the province amounted to nearly 22,000 cubic miles. Although some caution certainly must be exercised in any direct extrapolations bet\veen sedimentary volumes and petroleum reserves, there are several significant ' petroleum-bearing geologic basins which contain less than or no more than the volume of sedimentary material in the Georgia Coastal Plain. The two most notable examples are the Ventura Basin of California and the Anadarko Basin in Oklahoma. So, mere sedimentary volume at least does not rule out the possibility of future hydrocarbon occurrences, nor does the amount of sedimentary volume in Georgia assure that the proper combination of petroleum generation and trapping mechanism was closely enough related in time
~
to ensure commercial accumulations.

64
Attempts to assess the potential of any sedimentary basin in terms of the amount of petroleum hydrocarbons still to be discovered and produced are fraught with many problems, especially if the exploration to date has proven totally unsuccessful as has been the case with the South Atlantic Coastal Plain. Estimates of various authors who use different criteria and different degrees of experience at calculating undiscovered reserves typically vary. In fact, this very topic has been the source of considerable recent controversy with regard to published figures on the total undiscovered petroleu~ reserves of the United States, including offshore provinces. At the center of this discussion are the widely divergent estimates by Theobald and others (1972) whose view is that of the U. S. Geological Survey, the National Petroleum Council (1973), Hubbert (1974) and the National Academy of Sciences (1975). Values presented by these several sources for undiscovered crude oil and natural-gas liquids (liquids separated from natural gas) are 450, 103 (crude oil only), 67 and 113 billion barrels respectively. Although limitations in the scope of this report preclude detailed discussion on this vexing situation, the large range of estimates from these qualified and reputable sources clearly underscores the problem of assessing undiscovered petroleum deposits.
In 1970, the American Association of Petroleum Geologists in conjunction with the National Petroleum Council published a two-volume assessment on the future petroleum potential of the United States as divided into 11 regional provinces (Cram, 1971). As part of this effort, Spivak and Shelburne (1971), in evaluating the future hydrocarbon potential of the entire onshore Atlantic Coastal Plain, estimated that 260 million barrels of crude oil, 50 million parrels of natural-gas liquids and 1.7 trillion cubic feet of natural gas could be expected from the Georgia Coastal Plain. Total hydrocarbon potential

65
of the Atlantic Coastal Plain Province from Florida to New Jersey was placed at 1.1 billion barrels of crude oil, 230 million barrels of natural-gas liquids, and 7.3 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.
More recently, Miller and others (1975) have revamped earlier, more liberal U. S. Geological Survey estimates and list the potential for the Atlantic Coastal Plain Province (onshore portion only) as having from 200 millio~ to 2 billion barrels of undiscovered crude oil, and from 400 billion to 2 trillion cubic feet of undiscovered natural gas. In comparison with other estimates for the nEttion as a Hhole as cited above, these authors calculate reserves of undiscovered crude oil to be in the range of 50 to 127 billion barrels.
By noting that the Georgia portion of the Atlantic Coastal Plain contains some 55 percent of the sedimentary volume found in this regional province, the figures from Miller and others (1975) would suggest that between 110 million and 1.1 billion barrels of crude oil and between 220 billion and 1.1 trillion cubic feet of natural gas might be contained here. Such figures overlap with those presented by Spivak ~nd Shelburne (1971) although the crude-oil estimate seems more liberal and the natural-gas figure seems more conservative. Regardless of whose estimate is cited, the question which comes to mind is: Where in the Georgia Coastal Plain is all this still undiscovered petroleum?
One possible answer is that both these estimates and others not cited here are vastly in error, and no such volume of hydrocarbons will ever be found beneath this part of Georgia. Some data from the exploration conducted ~o date tend to bear out this observation. The Tertiary sequence of strata, despite having good porous and p~rmeable reservoir rocks, is relatively thin, lacks really effective sealing units and the reservoirs have largely been

66
flushed with fresh water, a situation \vhich usually destroys any previously accumulated hydrocarbons. The older Cretaceous sequence, especially where it has been deposited under the fluctuations of deltaic systems, such as in southwest Georgia, appears promising (Cramer, 1974), although effective sealing units are not known. Despite the optimism expressed by Pickering (1974) in the unmetamorphosed Paleozoic-age rocks which underlie the Cretaceous strata in south-central and southwest Georgia, Meyerhoff and Hatten (1974) believe these units have little potentj_al. They cite the follm.;ing reasons: (1) th::se rocks experienced 2 Long p2::-iod oi expclsure to ero::: io:c, th,,s facLlitating loss of any hydrocarbons generated within them, and (2) the sequence is thin and any potential reservoir rocks; especially the sandstones known to be present, are very tightly bound, making them relatively impermeable.
The several known and postulated Triassic-age fault basins which lie beneath the Cretaceous elsewhere under the Coastal Plain also exhibit little promise. The sediments which fill these elongate basins are largely nonmarine in origin and the oxidizing depositional conditions would not have been conducive to petroleum generation (Rainwater, 1971). The potential sandstone reservoirs display low permeability and the associated igneous activity during Triassic time would tend to minimize retention of hydrocarbons if any had been generated.
Another speculation which tends to downgrade the petroleum potential of the Georgia Coastal Plain is the general lack of significant geologic structures. The seeming paucity of such structures may, however, be the result of relatively sparse drilling. Certainly, no major anticlinal, fault ~or fault-closure traps appear evident, and geophysical coverage and related drilling would have probably proyen the existence of such major features by

67

now. The broad semi-regional uplifts typical of this geologic province do

not appear to have created sufficient structural trapping or closure to en-

trap hydrocarbons. On the contrary, gentle deformation within strata adja-

cent to these uplifts could have yielded some small, yet effective structural

traps. Also in an alternate view is the possibility that some faults and

certain very low-relief anticlines are so subtle in their development as to

go undetected even though the resolution of modern geophysical-explor-ation

Inethoc:.s 1-tas heEn g:r12atl]/ Cdl-::._:n,~ed .

rho~[ ~1:1cl T-la_t~~'.!t (l97!t), fo-r c<-:::~~~1-~,

point:: u:._:t that oil froill the' S'.JLutLLanJ Field ir;_ oonr~i1 ~- iOt_-i_da js pr=<~~~__ ::~--~__~ r~--="'::-:.

low-relief anticlines having less than 40 feet of structural closure.

Lacking any apparent significant geologic structures, the best choice

for hydrocarbon entrapment in the Georgia Coastal Plain rests with several

different stratigraphic traps. Cramer (1974) feels that areas of lateral

lithologic (= rock type) changes, especially where deltaic sedimentation has

prevailed, offer a particularly good possibility. This potential probably

increases as the focus of interest extends from the onshore to the offshore

portion of the entire stratigraphic sequence. Both Maher (1971) and Spivak

and Shelburne (1971) favor the possibility of entrapment associated with ero-

sional breaks (= unconformities) in the rock sequence, especially within the

Cretaceous interval.

The opposing general view is that the undiscovered-reserve estimates

are approximately the correct order of magnitude, and that exploration to

date has simply failed to detect any trace of this significant volume of hydro-

carbons. Despite renewed drilling interest as the result of our national ~energy crisis (18 wells have been drilled in the Georgia Coastal Plain since

1970, and several more are in varying stages of permit processing), the

68
Georgia Coastal Plain remains relatively unexplored. Many of the wells drilled in the past did not examine the entire stratigraphic section to the non-sedimentary basement rocks below. Well density amounts to only one serious drilling effort per 800 square miles of area underlain by sedimentary rocks (Pickering, 1974). The oft-used oil industry adage, ''You never know for certain if oil is present until you drilL'' may in part pertain to the Georgia Coastal Plain. Ht~)rcin l iJ:l~::; .:J trnuhll--:)~-:;oue p,1rado::. :-\1 t~1ou:~h the domestic pet:rol::oum industry is dri 1 _[ ing ceeper, in nnre re'";].::t:Y ()lltDC):;t Llc~:-(t i o n s , fc1rtber into t:h:: vCC:~~il~ r~~ pr()\/i_:l(~t-: ~-~nr~~ ,-;:-' TJ.'JT:~' l';_,_-~:-c?L-l;l} --~il~;rl 1 '"-(' l,-, ::--~--pects than in the past, some encouragement or promising evidence is alHays needed to induce management to commit itself to additional exploratory drilling. Many of the potentially more promising features and trends in the Georgia Coastal Plain have already been tested by exploratory drilling. Nothing of a really encouraging nature has ever been found. Furthermore, and in spite of no success in the onshore, industry interest js shifting toward the offshore continental shelf along the Atlantic Coast. Here, the stratigraphic sequence is thicker, units not present onshore are sedimentologically developed and the possibility of better seals, oil traps and source rocks appears more promising. In the face of this shifting interest, we can expect a coincident decrease in exploration interest onshore unless some significant offshore discoveries are made near enough to land to warrant renewed interest in the former area.
The present author feels that the more pessimistic view of the Georgia Coastal Plain is more likely to hold true. Based on the exploration con~ducted to date, the lack of major structures, the subtle nature of any undiscovered stratigraphic traps and certain other unencouraging information,

69

it appears doubtful that the estimates previously cited \vill ever be realized.

Some volume of petroleum undoubtedly remains trapped in the subsurface se-

quence of the Coastal Plain, and either by luck or very prudent exploration,

a commercial discovery will someday be made in onshore Georgia. Hmv long

this will require in time ls open to speculation. This author, furthermore,

is dot1btful that any sizcablP ClC'Cttmulatinn of petroler1m h\-c:rc,:::-?.rbon~; vil1 be

found in the onsh-:)re. Tt1t~~ pc(~~r:Lsc~ f,-. :_-;~_u1--:la's h,-_:'COlLLin; J~1t:i::tatc2_~,- -~-n-

volV(-:;-1 in th!~ p~trolcllli~; r).,1;:~i-

r -:

~ ;1 ,-

fc:dcr-:t.i.ly-1eased Ot;.t-:.~r C.l\:-:-c t~l._

. ::),_

(' : :::,

., ..

Georgia coast.

Outer Continental Shelf

After many years of indecision and non-action, developments which will

lead eventually to exploratory drilling in Outer Continental Shelf tracts

along the Atlantic Coast of this country have taken place recently. These

include the following:

1. Selection by the federal government of three regions in the Atlantic OCS where leases \vill ultimately be let to major American oil companies. From north to south, the general tracts have been designated the Georges Bank, Salisbury Embayment-Baltimore Canyon and the Southeast-Georgia Embayment-Blake Plateau (Scott and Cole, 1975).

2. Acquisition of basic geologic and geophysical data within these three regions by the U. S. Geological Survey for use in the preparation of assessment analyses to aid the Bureau of Land Management in assigning reasonable financial values to specific leases on which industry bids will be received.

3. Requests by the Bureau of Land Management for suggested

tract nominations from industry so that those tracts re-

ceiving the greatest interest will be among ones actually

~

nominated.

4. Preliminary studies by several federal agencies and the petroleum industry toward acquiring and evaluating data necessary from the preparation of draft and final Environmental Impact Statements now required by the National Environmental Protection Act.

70
5. Initiation of drilling the first of two off-structure, stratigraphic-analysis wells, the data from which will be jointly shared by the federal government and cost~partici pating petroleum companies. These wells are not exploration efforts, but are designed solely to recover basic information about the stratigraphy, potential reservoir rocks and seals present and other earth-science data useful in correlating geophysical information. Governmental agencies receive these data at no cost and will utilize them to aid their selection of tracts for bid nomination and assignment of proper lease-purchase figures.
6. Acquisition by petroleum-industry firms of proprietary geophysical data of several degrees of resolution for their assessment of both the Mid-Atlantic and North Atlantic regions in time for lease sales nmv schedulcod for ~lay and August ol' 1976 respectively. Preliminary ~eophysical data also has been acquired for the South Atlantic sale region.
Although a variety of environmental problems, certain federal-state
government conflicts about coastal-zone management and other political and
economic situations will all require eventual resolution, the message is
clear in that there will be exploratory drilling for oil and gas along the
Atlantic Coast OCS within this decade, and probably before the end of the
next two years. A less clear, but very important, message is that no one
knows for certain how successful these offshore-frontier ventures will prove.
The consensus of industry feeling, although many industry observers view
,the Bay of Alaska as a more promising exploration target, is that the
Atlantic Coast OCS has definite promise despite a total lack of successful
onshore wells (Scott and Cole, 1975).
For one thing, there are much thicker stratigraphic sequences in all
three leasing areas, thus adding to both the volume of potential petroleum-
generating sediments and the depth to which exploratory tests can be drilled.
Within offshore Georgia, namely the Southeast Georgia Embayment and deeper-
~
water extension into the northern Blake Plateau, the sedimentary sequence
onshore not only expands, but is also underlain by a thick wedge of Lower

71

Cretaceous and Jurassic strata not present onshore. The total sedimentary

sequence may reach 30,000 feet under the Blake Plateau, although water depths

exceed 600 feet throughout this area and can reach more than 2000 feet in na.ny places. A stratigraphic thickness up to half that under the Bla~ze

Plateau may be present in the center of the Southeast Georgia Esbayuent .

.:-:;ccon:::I rc~-1son f0r surrc: nptir-;;.isrn is thr.1t tht~re rP f~-~\'"()T~i;._;l_~_::: ::.~

~~-;_ n~;:-

s~r'J,~' .~Jr:'._), t''-'"1~--.::l,)n.l

c::;_:)- --~): -,:u

i [; ': ;, ~-

n ,J t. ;__":. 1.:1 u r12 r .J : ~ :=:. \~ .~ p r 'J -~1 ;__ ::..

-..; I

-.; .

. ::1

_-;

~: "--: '- '-.;

i.ntere.st at lease-sale time. Less is knm.;n geophysica lly d;)L'Ut the Soc1th

Atlantic leasing areas, but some industry leaders feel that considerdbly

more seismic exploration will be conducted in this area in the near future
(Oil and Gas Journal, 1976).

With regard to offshore Georgia, there also exists a good possibility

that the thicker Cretaceous sequence will contain elements favorable for the

presence of stratigraphic traps. The latter may be expected where marine

sand-shale intervals interfinger throughout the thicker stratigraphic section.

' Deeply buried structures, while not exploration targets themselves, may also

have favorably affected overlying sedimentary units to produce smaller struc-

tural and other types of stratigraphic traps.

Two points of caution must, however, be introduced. First, the only

extensive offshore drilling activity along the Atlantic Coast has been \.Jithin

the Scotian Shelf, east of Canada. There, a favorable sedimentary sequence

and salt-related structures akin to those in the Gulf of Mexico have not
~
proven especially productive in terms of discovered petroleum. Inasmuch as

the geology of this area is in many ways even more favorable than the three

72

leasing areas in American waters, the lack of success there casts some doubt

on the overall potential of the Atlantic Coast OCS (Frey, personal corm:mnica-

tion, 1976). Secondly, the degree of success experienced in early drilling

efforts in the first two, more northern leasing areas may have some adverse

effect on the degree of exploration interest exhibited toward offshore Georgia,

Although leases will certainly he acquired hv oil-industry firms, a no~~

shc't.Tiog in the Bal_ ti~n:c Cany--)~1 :J:-~:1 C2orge_~s B.:_1::-1>:. :-t:-~,--:~; rn.a 7; ten=l L~_: ~~,:-_ :.-:

h

7 ,.:_.! 1_ :~ ~ ,? ~"': ;) _l ~ > :~ 2 i;.:= ~~,"

.,)

t l >') ~ t -':. ;- ~L' ~~ l ;-) :_: ('\

ward its once liberal figures regarding the volume of undiscovered :.ar~-

carbons in this country. Within the range of 5 to QS percent probability,

the revised figures for the entire Atlantic Coast OCS range from 0 to 6

billion barrels of undiscovered crude oil and from 0 to 22 trillion cubic

feet of natural gas. These figures are considerably less than past Survey

estimates and some oil-firm calculations. Undiscovered hydrocarbons that

might be found in the South Atlantic Continental Shelf and the adjacent

Blake Plateau in water depths less than 1800 feet, as reported at the 5 per-

cent level of probability, are 1.5 billion barrels of crude oil and 2.8

trillion cubic feet of natural gas (Dillon and others, 1975). The reader

is reminded that these figures are only the best estimates which the avail-

able geological and geophysical data allow under the constraint of evalua-

ting undiscovered petroleum resources. Lacking any well data sa~e that of

the several onshore failures and some shallow scientific drillholes in the

far offshore, these figures can only be viewed as educated "guess-estimates."
~ne need only recall the recent dismal failure of drilling efforts on the

Destin Anticline in offshore Florida to realize that estimates of undiscovered

73
petroleum, even for features thought to have great promise, do not necessarily make exploration successes!
It is beyond the scope of this report to accurately evaluate the undiscovered hydrocarbon potential of the South Atlantic OCS lease area to any greater degree than the estimates presented above. A second restriction confronted here is that exploration conducted in any frontier offshore area is based largely on geophysical data, Without the latter, selection of prospects for drilling would be impossible. This type of information is, however, highly confidential and proprietary, and is unavailable to those outside the oil industry or people involved in certain federal government agencies. Again, it must be observed that even promising geophysical evidence is no guarantee to finding oil. The thousands of "dry holes" drilled on geophysically defined features attest to that fact.
Lacking, however, any such confidential geophysical evidence, the only available tool to identify the more promising areas in the South Atlantic OCS has been to ob-serve the industry reaction to date. When asked by the Bureau of Land Management to submit nominations of tracts for this area, the following nine firms responded: (1) Amoco Production Company; (2) Columbia Gas Development Corporation; (3) EXXON Company; (4) Louisiana Land and Exploration Company (5) Marathon Oil Company; (6) Mobil Oil Corporation; (7) Shell Oil Company; (8) Skelly Oil Company, and (9) Tenneco Oil Company. On Figure 5 is shown those tracts which received any industry response as well as the two centers of considerable industry interest. It is a reasonable assumption that the exploration staffs of these companies are in agree-
~
ment that the areas outlined in black on that figure show the greatest promise.

... ,

\ \

SOUTH CAROLINA

'

""'' '"'--
'""\' ' ... ' \

Charleston

\ ...
'\

74 Cape Fear

GEORGIA
Brunswick
I,-....._... _
a..----------\_)
FLORIDA

Southeast Atlantic OCS Leasing Area
OCS Blocks Showing Industry-Nomination Interest
OCS Blocks Showing Extensive Industry-Nomination Interest

FIGURE 5. SOUTHEAST ATL;\1\J :ic OFFSHORE CONTi~jEi'JTAL SHELF (OCS) LEL\S ,,_; 1\F\E/\.
OFFSHORE SOUTH CAROLINA. GEORGiA AND FLORIDA.

75
These features or centers of interest as identified lie approximately 60 miles offshore from Charleston, South Carolina and Brunswick, Georgia respectively. Interest in the latter area appears more diffuse, but may reflect a greater view toward attempting to locate stratigraphic traps along the eastern margin of the Southeast Georgia Embayment. Some published geophysical evidence shows what has been interpreted as a deeply buried ridge which could mark the eastern limit of this basin (Dillon and others, 1975). The feature lying to the east of Charleston is more compact, underlying only 28 lease blocks. The inference, although highly conjectural, is that this may represent an area of promising structure, possibly a large anticlinal feature or several such structures.
Petroleum is clearly becoming more difficult to find. More remote areas are being investigated, more marginal featuresare being tested and leases in much deeper waters are now being drilled. The very favorable conditions found in our largest offsho~e province, the Gulf of Mexico, may have in part jaundiced the industry to those areas lacking similar structures and sediments. Along the Atlantic Coast OCS, including offshore Georgia, there occur both attractive potential oil-trapping structures and a generally thick stratigraphic sequence. In essence, features known elsewhere to be petroleum productive, are to be found in the Atlantic Coast OCS. This report feels it is reasonable to conclude that petroleum will be found in some amounts within this offshore region before 1980. Some oil and gas more than likely will also be found in the section lying offshore from Georgia. How much petroleum? Nobody can answer that question! Only after an appreciable
~
amount of actual drilling is conducted will this state and the nation have the answer.

76

Northwest Georgia Provinces

The Paleozoic-age stratigraphic sequence contained within the Cumber-

land Plateau and Valley and Ridge Provinces of northwest Georgia has been

relatively untested by exploratory petroleum wells. As shown on Figure 4,

only ten wells have been drilled in this region, and of these, six have

been shallower than 2000 feet, and a seventh well barely exceeded that depth.

Two other test wells were drilled to depths each less than 3100 feet. Only

the Sonat Exploration Company Cureton No. 1 Well can reasonably be considered

a thorough exploration guide to the total stratigraphic section present.

This well was drilled to a final depth of 6808 feet, but failed to reach

non-sedimentary "basement" rocks. As correlated with other deep wells within

adjacent Alabama (Kidd, 1975), the Cureton well bottomed in limestone and

shales of the Cambrian-age Conasauga Formation, several hundred feet above

the igneous basement. Thus, we can conclude that the Paleozoic sedimentary

sequence attains a thickness from 7000 to 7500 feet under the Cumberland

Plateau Province. Due to a lack of deep drilling and the greater measure

of structural disturbance in the adjacent Valley and Ridge Province, it is

not possible to know what the total sedimentary thickness is there.

Most exploration efforts, especially the few wells drilled in Dade and

Walker counties, have been drilled on anticlinal structures whose existence

is known from surface evidence. Although several of these wells failed to

penetrate a unit called the Knox Group, this Cambrian-Ordovician age sequence

is dominated by dolostones and some limestones and has been a principal

target of deep wells drilled in other states. In surface outcrops, indi-

~
vidual mapping units

( = formations)

can be

recognized

in

the

Knox,

but

in

the subsurface, this recognition is commonly not possible. The Knox is also

typically sandy and contalns cht~rt nuduLv'; i.,l varying amour.ts.

77
Throughout areas in the eastern Midcontinent, the Knox Group reaches a thickness of nearly 7000 feet, and is penetrated by the majority of deep exploratory tests in adjacent Tennessee (A. T. Statler, 1975, personal communication). In northwest Georgia, the Cureton well penetrated more than 4200 feet of Knox, and one well in Tuscaloosa County, Alabama, penetrated more than 5300 feet (Kidd, 1975).
Although the Knox Group is a thick and widely distributed carbonate interval, which is commonly oil-stained and characterized by minor hydrocarbon shows, it has generally not been an important petroleum producing zone in either states adjacent to Georgia or in the eastern Midcontinent. The Knox does contain commercial amounts of hydrocarbons in fields located in Indiana, central Ohio and along the southern boundary of Kentucky. Considering the significant extent and thickness of the Knox, and the relatively limited number of wells which have tested it, there still exists a definite measure of optimism regarding its regional petroleum potential.
The Cureton well did test the fluid content of one porous interval in the Knox between 2810 and 2850, but recovered only salt water. One apparent limitation to the Knox in other test wells has been a lack of zones with adequate porosity and permeability. The fact that the deep wells drilled in Alabama and Tennessee, plus the one deep test in Georgia, have all failed to find commercial hydrocarbons in the Knox seriocsly downgrades that interval's potential locally. As reported by Cate (1975), there has been, however, an upswing in drilling activity within the Black Warrior Basin of northwest Alabama and northeast Mississippi. Several wells already drilled and others
~
either drilling now or permitted are expected to evaluate the Knox and other deep Paleozoic exploration targets. If the results here prove promisin~. the rather dismal dri11 i:-,'~ record afforded by the Kncx in the Southen:-;t

78
could possibly be reversed. Should that take place, additional deep exploration in northwest Georgia might follow. There is, however, no way to know with what measure of success such efforts would meet. Shallower Paleozoic intervals also appear to lack much potential, especially in the Valley and Ridge Province. Here, the strata are fractured due to folding and faulting; thus, effective seals may be lacking. In addition, where there are porous zones, they typically contain fresh ground-water (Cressler, 1970, 1974). This condition excludes petroleum entrapment. Several of the carbonate units are also deeply weathered and have thick clay residuum lying above the bedrock interface. This proximity to a surface of long-duration weathering also diminishes their petroleum potential.
Both the adjacent states of Alabama and Tennessee have oil production established from much shallower Paleozoic-age ~nits than the Knox Group and other Ordovician strata. In Scott and Morgan Counties of east-central Tennessee, several shallow, but very economically rewarding, oil fields have been discovered in the Mississippian-age Fort Payne Formation (Winston and others, 1974). Lesser production has come from the Monteagle and Bangor Limestones in the same general area. The Fort Payne oil fields are found at less than 1700 feet in depth and produce from elongate trends of porous limestone. This same formation, although composed mainly of shale and bedded chert (silica) is exposed extensively in northwest Georgia (Butts and Gildersleeve, 1948). Its numerous exposures and proximity to the surface elsewhere tend to reduce its potential. Although some limey zones are known from this unit in Georgia, no porous limestones like the productive ones in Tennessee
~ave been discovered. This report is forced to view the Fort Payne Formatio~
in this state as having little hydrocarbon potential on the basis of the available information.

79
Within the Black Warrior Basin of Alabama are several small oil fields whose principal productive horizon is the Mississippian-age Carter Sandstone. Other accumulations have been found in the Bangor and Hartselle intervals, also Mississippian in age. Most of the fields are located in Lama~, Marion and Fayette Counties, along the western border of Alabama. One very shallow field, discovered before 1900 and now abandoned, produced some natural gas in Madison County which lies closer to Georgia than these other localities.
Although the Mississippian sequence which is productive in northwest Alabama is exposed in Georgia (some of the specific stratigraphic names are different this far east), no production has been found to date from it in either eastern Alabama or northwest Alabama. The Mississippian is at the surface throughout much of the Cumberland Plateau or overlain by a relatively thin veneer of Pennsylvanian-age sands, shales and coal seams. The fairly shallow depth of the Mississippian certainly does not rule out any petroleum occurrences, but the latter are not especially enhanced by the shallow depths of the potential containing strata. Where the latter are more deeply buried as the result of folding, there may exist improved possibilities of suitable entrapment.
Faced with the combination of relatively few exploratory wells and a record of no really nearby commercial production from these Paleozoic strata, it is difficult at this time to look with much favor at the northwest Georgia provinces. Although subsequent events could produce more exploration activity here, the immediate near term does not appear promising. The lack of appreciable data, however, n1akes it impossible to fully rule out the occur~rence of petroleum here.

BQ
Unconventional Petroleum Resources
Essentially all of the world's petroleum, either in the form of liquid crude oil and natural-gas liquids, and naturai gas, has been produced from conventional petroleum fields through wells drilled into subsurface accumulations of these resources. Oil shale, as discussed in the first portion here, and tar sands or petroleum-impregnated sedimentary rocks, as described subsequently, are best considered as unconventional petroleum reresources. This is because the petroleum contained in deposits of these geologic materials occurs there as solid or nearly solid hydrocarbons. Thus, the deposits must be first mined prior to special processing in order to recover the contained petroleum.
Oil shale has been defined as: "organic-rich shale that yields oil in substantial amounts by conventional destructive distillation methods" (Stanfield and Frost, 19~9). Many fine-grained sedimentary rocks called shales are rich in finely-divided organic material. In tne western Tertiary-age Green River shales (which are not technically shales because their composition is dominated by the minerals dolomite and calcite; these rocks would more appropriately be called marlstones), this organic fraction is termed kerogen. The latter is a fine-grained, resinous material produced from the alteration of millions of microscopic animal-like plant (algae) remains. It is this kerogen, which upon special thermal treating called pyrolysis, breaks down and eventually yields a viscous product called syncrude. Upon additional processing, this latter material can be made into an acceptable grade ~of crude oil suitable for further refining. Other true shales, commonly black to dark brown, yield much less syncrude as measured in gallons per ton of procc:ssed rock th:1n the Grc:.,n River,.-'' ..':aceous marlscones.'' .. hereas

81
much of the Green River sequence is capable of yielding 25 to 30 gallons of syncrude per ton of treated rock, most of these black shales produce only from 5 to 10 gallons of syncrud per ton. If, however, the processing ineludes a hydrogenation stage, these black shales can be made to yield from 15 to 20 gallons of light oil or up to 2,600 cubic feet of synthetic hydrocarbon gases per ton (Culbertson and Pitman, 1973). Most noteworthy of these black shales is the Devonian-Mississippian age Chattanooga Formation exposed in the central and eastern United States. This or correlative black shale units extend from eastern Ohio along the western side of the Appalachian Mountains into Tennessee and Alabama (Conant and Stanfield, 1968). The Chattanooga black shale also is to be found throughout several counties in northwest Georgia, where it attains a maximum thickness in excess of 40 feet in western Chattooga County (Glover, 19591.
A considerable amount of oil shale has historically either been burned directly as fuel or crudelY. processed for its oil in several European and Asian countries. Duncan and Swanson (1965) have estimated that prior to 1961, the total amount of equivalent oil produced from such deposits approximated 400 million barrels. At present, the only technically-sophisticated recovery venture which produces oil from oil shale is the project operated by the Brazilian national oil company called Petrobras. This facility, located in southern Brazil, has operated since 1972 and produces nearly 5000 barrels of syncrude per day .
. The world's largest deposits of oil shale are the marlstones of the Green River Formation as contained in several structural-sedimentary basins
~ocated in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming. Dinneen and Cook (1974) estimate
that the in-place kerogen is equivalent to a volume of slightly more thdn

82
2 trillion barrels of syncrude. For several years now, a wide range of research and pilot-plant efforts has been underway in both Colorado and Utah with an aim to producing syncrude from this solid-petroleum source, thus reclueing our national dependence on foreign sources of crude oil. To date, there has been no commercial production in spite of the fact that the federal government has leased four, expensive tracts in the oil-shale basins, in addition to the mineral-lease rights obtained by the oil industry from numerous private land owners.
At this point, several critical observations are necessary to place the potential role of oil shale as a future petroleum source into proper perspective. An initial realization is the knowledge that much less than the estimated reserves of 2 trillion barrels of syncrude can ever be recovered. The general consensus of several energy experts is that, even given favorable economic, political and technical factors, the amount of recoverable oil is closer to 200 or 30Q billion barrels. Some figures are even less, suggesting that only 150 billion barrels could practically be recovered. There are many geologic and other reasons for these reduced totals. Some oil-shale areas are overlain by a greater thickness of overburden than is suitable for practical mining. Other areas contain too much low-grade material (those units yielding less than 25, and in some cases less than 10, gallons per ton) to warrant economic extraction. There are other serious environmental and water-resource related restrictions. Even if only 200 billion barrels were obtainable, and suitable pyrolysis technology exists as it does, why then has there been no production to date? There are three
~
major reasons in answer to that perplexing situation. First, the prevailing price of crude oil, as partly regulated by federal-government policy, is too

83
low to provide sufficient return on the huge investments necessary to mine and process the oil shale. Inflation and higher construction prices have caused the cost of the first announced commercial plant to increase from $300 to $800 million (Guccione, 1975). This cost increase has caused a suspension in that plant's construction program. Secondly, the federal government owns more than 80 percent of the higher-grade oil shale property and the direction of future lease policy remains unclear. Third, environmental considerations with regard to air and water pollution control, and land reclamation will add significant costs to any new oil shale industry. Without acceptable government policy to support such a sizeable commercial undertaking, pilot plant testing and related research is all that is presently being pursued at this time in these western energy resources.
Although this view appears gloomy, there is still a high measure of optimism that these problems can be properly addressed, and that oil from the Green Riv2r shales will be reaching refineYies sometime in the 1980's. An important consequence of this is that the commercial viability of oilshale processing will be established first in these more abundant, highergrade deposits of the western states. Only after a successful, and probably long-term, development will there be efforts to recover from other, lowergrade shales. The total resource base, established on yields of 10 to 25 gallons per ton of rock with hydrogenation, for the Chattanooga and other black shales is only 200 billion barrels. If the same factor of reduction were to be applied to this total as that for the Green River sequence, we might anticipate possible recovery of some 20 to 30 billion barrels. Considering the great areal extent of the Chattanooga over several states, as compared to the very small land area of the' Green River Formation, there

84
exists a great degree of doubt that oil will ever seriously be extracted from these eastern United States black shales. The difficulties of mining, the relatively low yield (20 billion barrels is only equivalent to one of several oil fields in the Middle East), serious environmental problems and the greater degree of urbanization in the East all point strongly to the preclusion of such recovery.
Although the more rich Gassaway Member (averages 10 gallons on oil per ton without hydrogenation) is the unit found principally in northwest Georgia, the formation is no more than 10 feet thick throughout much of its areal extent. Where thicker than 15 feet, or the suggested minimum mineable thickness, the unit is essentially limited to two counties--Walker and Chattooga. The conclusion reached here with regard to the future petroleum potential of the Chattanooga shale for Georgia is not promising. There is little to suggest that within the next several decades that this unit would be mined, and even less to indicate that, if it were, the amount of recoverable oil from the portion contained in Georgia would amount to any significant volume.
Deposits consisting of sedimentary strata impregnated by asphalt, tar, viscous or other low-gravity crude oil occur at or close to the surface in several areas within the United States (Mullens and Roberts, 1972). The world's largest occurrence of so-called "tar sands" (more appropriately called oil sands) is near Fort McMurray, Alberta, where commercial extraction from the Athabasca deposits is now being conducted profitably after an initial per~od of financial loss (McConville, 1975). Reserve figures for this huge deposit
~
range as high as 600 billion barrels of in-place bitumen, which, if the entire

85

deposit cDuld eventually be mined and processed, might give rise to nearly

330 billion barrels of synthetic crude oil.

Within the United States, the most favorable tar-sand deposits are

found in several belts or districts within the Uinta Basin of Utah. Ritzma

(1973) has estimated that the deposits at Pear Springs, Sunnyside, Circle

Cliffs and Asphalt Ridge may collectively contain 25 billion barrels of in-

place petroliferous material. Other potentially significant oil or tar sands

occur in California, Texas and Oklahoma. Also of potential interest as a

source of additional petroleum are the shallow heavy crude-oil reservoirs

along the Kansas-Missouri border and throughout several areas of California

and Kentucky (U.S. Bureau of Mines, 1967).

Within the general Appalachian Region and adjacent areas, oil-impregnated

deposits and shallow heavy crude-oil occurrences are known primarily from

Kentucky, Pennsylvania, southern Ohio, and northern Alabama (Meyer and

Sweeney, 1968). The Alabama deposits and related occurrences are of the

greatest interest to this report. Originally described as early as five

decades ago (Clark, 1925; Jones, 1928), asphalt and tar impregnate several

Mississippian-age sandstone and limestone units throughout a four-county area

within the northwestern part of the state. The most persistently impregnated

interval is the Hartselle Sandstone, although a limestone sequence within the

Pride Mountain Formation is also enriched in asphaltic material (Moftah, 1973).

Meyer and Sweeney (1968) show that the amount of recoverable oil from the

Hartselle Sandstone is generally less than 12 gallons per ton or rock on

laboratory-scale processing. Actual production at the much larger Canadian

~eposits yields slightly more than 16 gallons per ton of tar sand. Although

the percentage of asphalt in soMe of these Alab2rna deposits is between q and

9 perce~1L, this fic~t~r~-

oc: i ~-~:; the cut-Ji. ~ :.l_~~d() lor mining the .A~:l~-:

86
deposit where much larger reserves occur (McConville, 1975). No significant tar or heavy oil-impregnated strata are known to occur
in Georgia, despite a number of supposed oil seeps that have been reported from several areas in the Coastal Plain (Pickering, 1974). Butts and Gildersleeve (1948) do indicate, however, that ten feet of sandy strata assignable to the Hartselle Sandstone are exposed along Lookout Mountain adjacent to U. S. Route 11. Croft (1964) has substantiated a similar thickness of exposure in Dade County. To the south in Floyd and Polk Counties, Cressler (1970) considers sandy units within the Floyd Shale to be equivalent to the Hartselle Sandstone of Alabama. As mapped by him, the Hartselle Sandstone supports two topographically high areas, Judy and Rocky Mountains, and attains a maximum thickness of 300 feet. Inasmuch as this represents a significant increase in thickness, there exists the possibility that Cressler's Hartselle unit includes a greater interval than normally is assigned to this geological formation, and therefore is probably not a truly equivalent stratigraphic unit.
Thus, this report concludes that at present, tar sands, asphaltic occur.rences and other heavy-oil impregnated strata do not offer any promise of internally meeting Georgia's needs for petroleum, now or in the future.
~

87-
NUCLEAR FGELS Uranium
The past several decades have of course seen the emergence of the peaceful use of atomic energy as manifested in the form of nuclear-electrical power plants. With the exception of a few plants which are run on high-temperature gas reactors utilizing thorium as their main fuel, uranium enriched in the fissionable isotope U-235 supplies most nuclear power plants with their fuel.
As observed in a preceding section, most of the uranium mined in this country comes from deposits found in either Jurassic o~ Tertiary-age sandstone units found in several western states. The principal production from Tertiary strata is from the Shirley Basin and Gas Hills areas in Wyoming. The structural and sedimentologic conditions responsible for those deposits appear not to have been active during the Tertiary in Georgia. Another area of appreciable uranium production also involves Tertiary-age sandstones, located in the South Texas District within the Gulf Coastal Plain. As described by Eargle and others (1975), the uranium appears to have been derived from the considerable volcanic debris found in the stratigraphic sequence there by a dry-climate, alkaline ground-water system, and then deposited in very permeable sandstones when reducing agents, involving either carbonaceous matter, hydrogen sulfide or methane, were encountered by the uraniumcharged ground waters.
These Texas deposits are of some interest because similar conditions could have existed during the same Tertiary period of time in Georgia ~(Robert Carpenter, 1975, perso~al comrrrunication). The Tertiary sequence within the Georgia Coastal Plain is know~ to cont~in many pcr~eable. sandy zones; (evidence indicates tilt.' prc:sence c: vu1c.anic material in opa:u12 clays

88
and other strata, and there is enough organic matter to provide the necessary chemically reducing conditions. The most significant question about a similar origin for any undiscovered uranium deposits appears to be whether the climate in Georgia during the Tertiary was sufficiently dry in order to facilitate leaching of the uranium into the ground-water system. The answer to that question is not yet known.
A larger, more significant question is how to explore for these possible occurrences. In an effort to evaluate the United States on a regional basis in terms of its uranium potential, the U. S. Energy Research and Development Administration last year made funds available to several contract laboratories to conduct basic investigations toward meeting this goal. One possible approach would be to conduct geochemical exploration using tne present surface and ground-water systems as the source of samples in an effort to detect anomalies in the concentration of uranium present in these waters. Within Georgia and the Southeast, the Savannah River Laboratories operated by the E. I ..Du Pont Company will be conducting such investigations. Dr. Robert Carpenter of the University of Georgia's Department of Geology has been assisting in the development of this program as a paid consultant, together with other qualified economic geologists knowledgeable in uranium mineralization and geochemical exploration.
To date, no results are available as the program is not yet fully underway. Neither is there any way, other than speculation, to estimate what measure of success will be realized. All that can be stated here is that certain geologic elements found in the Georgia Coastal Plain show some
~otential to1.;ard uranium mineralization, and exploration efforts to more
fully evaluate that potential are current]v in pro~ress.

89

Uranium has also been detected and recovered from consolidated con-

glomerates (thought by many geologists to be ancient placers because they

also contain gold), hydrothermal veins and granitic pegmatites, which are

very coarse-grained igneous rocks. To date, the only primary uranium

mineralization reported from Georgia is a small, non-commercial occurrence

present in igneous rocks near Stone Mountain in DeKalb County (Butler and

others, 1962). This excludes the small amount of uranium known to occur

in monazite, a thorium mineral, which has a much wider distribution within

the various geologic provinces of the State.

Veins and granitic-pegmatite bodies have not been especially productive

of uraniur- 1::1. the United States. With relatively few reported occurrences

in Georg l', a first conclusion may be that this type of uranium mineraliza-

tion does not occur within the State. On the other hand, there is consider-

able volume of granitic, granitic-gneiss and pegrnatitic rock in Georgia,

and concerted exploration for uranium might uncover deposits in some of

these rock types. This report, however, remains skeptical of this possi-

bility, albeit on limited data.

In addition to the major ore deposits of uranium mineralization con-

tained in sandstone units within Texas, New Mexico, Utah, Colorado and

Wyoming, there are several low-grade resources which have been repeatedly

viewed as having some potential for yielding uranium values. For ~ost of

those suggested, commercial extraction will depend upon either a significant
increase in the price per pound of concentrated uranium oxides (u3o8 ),
improved extractive technology or the initiation of mining recovery for the

principal resource in the deposits so that the ur~nium could be obtained as
~
a co-product or hypruduct. LO'>-' ;~rade uranifero~1s resources identified t.~

date incLude (BiL~tlieyv

:c ..1 vlikrs, l97l): 1 i1 li~nites in North a~J ~. }J

90
Dakota and eastern Hontana; (2) phosphate-rock deposits in Florida, North Carolina, Idaho, Wyoming, l1ontana, and Georgia; (3) the "leached zone" lying above the phosphate ore in the central Florida phosphate district; (4) marine black shales of which the Chattanooga Shale, with exposures in Tennessee, Kentucky, Alabama and Georgia, is the principal target; and, (5) leaching solutions from existing copper-mine operations which are centered in Arizona and Utah.
The uraniferous lignites of the Northern Great Plains probably will not be mined until the profitability from both the recovery of lignite as a combustible fuel and the contained uranium can be shown. Leached solutions from several copper mines in the West already exist, but the concentration of uranium is only a few parts per million. Economic feasibility must first be clearly shown before the copper industry w~ll expend capital funds for the construction of any extraction plants. The recovery of uranium from a friable phosphatic sandy_layer or the "leached zone" which overlies thE: rich Florida pebble phosphate district, has been lessened because nearly three-fourths of this zone has already been stripped away in the surface'mining, active there for several decades. The discarded leached zone has become incorporated in the heterogenous overburden removed and has been returned as fill to depleted mining areas. At this time, there exists some doubt if commercial uranium recovery from the remaining material \vcmld be economically feasible unless the price of uranium rose appreciably.
For the other two low-grade resources, there is some justifiable interest in Georgia inasmuch as the State has deposits or exposures of each.
~
The Chattanooga Shale underlies nearly 40,000 square miles in the centralsoutheastern United States, including a small outrrup b~lt in nort~{St

91
Georgia as was previously described under the discussion on oil shale. In this Devonian-Mississippian age formation, the upper interval known as the
Gassa\vay Member, contains an average of 0. 007 percent u3o8 . Black shale
units equivalent to the Chattanooga Formation also underlie an area 20 times the cited extent, but contain a grade half that of the Gassaway Member. The U. S. Atomic Energy Commission has supported past research designed to develop the extractive technology to recover uranium from shale, while the U. S. Bureau of Mines has calculated reserves and made economic studies to evaluate this approach (Bieniewski and others, 1971). Not only would this procedure require the mining of billions of tons of shale, but the cost of plant construction, mining and operating expenses would also necessitate a
price in excess of $65 per pound of u3o8 or several times the current price.
In regard to exposu~es in Georgia, Glover (1959) examined several outcrops in Dade, Walker, Catoosa, Chattooga and Floyd Counties. The Chattanooga Shale here is generally thinner, although in one area the unit reaches a thickness of some 40 feet. With the exception of one exposure, he also found uranium values less than the average value cited above. Due to the general thinness of the unit, lower uranium values, thick overburden and an adverse structural setting, Glover concluded that the Chattanooga Shale shows little promise as a uraniuo resource in Georgia. Even with a substantial increase in the price of uranium, his evaluation is still considered valid by this report. Consideration of the Chattanooga Shale as a source of both oil shale and uranium unfortunately does not alter that assessment. At the present time, this report sees no feasible way by which the Chattanooga Shale can be considered a viable energy resource co the
~
State of Georgia.

92
A sizeable deposit of phosphate ore, or phosphorite, is known to underlie much of eastern Chatham County. With a mineable thickness in excess of 15 feet, a suitable grade of contained phosphate and chemical properties favorable for processing, Furlow (1969) calculated that this deposit, where not constrained from mining by residential development, contains in excess of 7 billion tons of phosphatic material. At a 50 percent recovery figure, the deposit could yield nearly 800 million tons of phosphate (BPL) concentrate. Option to much of this deposit has been held for some time by the Kerr-McGee Corporation, but because of many serious environmental obstacles, no mining has ever been permitted by the State. Studies have also shown that this deposit extends out onto the continental shelf east of Savannah. Other less well known and probably smaller phosphate deposits also occur in the coastal plain of south-central Georgia.
Comparable deposits in central and northern Florida contain an average
of 0.015 percent u3o8 and a deposit mined in Beaufort County, North Carolina
exhibits a grade somewhat lower. One standard method of treatir.g phosphate ore to recover the phosphate is the so-called 11vJet process," in which sulfuric acid is used to digest the ore. After this treatment, an acid solu-
tion containing about 30 percent P2o5 and calcium sulfate (gypsum) is pro-
duced. The majority of uranium in the raw phosphate rock is concentrated
in this P2o5-rich acid, and after removal of the gypsum, ~an be separated
by solvent extraction. As reported by Ross (1975), the Uranium Recovery Corporation, a subsidiary of United Nuclear Corporation, is nearing fullscale commercial recovery of uranium from several "wet process" operations
~
controlled by fertilizer manufacturers in the central Florida district. If all "wet process" plants could also be out. fit ted Hi th uraniur.i-recovery units,

93
nearly 6 million pounds of u3o8 could be recovered annually, according to
hm.
The question applicable to Georgia is whether the Chatham County deposit will ever be placed into production to recove~ the phosphate in the first place. To date, despite strong industrial interest, this has not come to pass. Considering the several environmental questions, such as mining disruption, effects of the recovery on the marshes and possibly deleterious impacts on ground-water aquifers, plus the passage of more restrictive legislation, there exists serious doubt that commercial phosphate recovery will ever be undertaken. If not, uranium recovery as outlined above would of course not be possible. At this time, there is no way to accurately forecast whether the Chatham County phosphate deposit will or will not be mined. The question of whether in-situ leaching recovery of either the phosphate or uranium or both will ever become feasible is uncertain as well. Viewed in a stringent manner, the answer to this possibility leans toward the negative because many environmental and legal problems are also involved.
The conclusion reached here is that recovery of low-grade uranium from Georgia's phosphate deposits is definitely not possible within the near term, and unlikely over even the next few decades. Development of an improved and environmentally acceptable recovery process, short of dire~t surface mining, could alter this situation.
Thorium In addition to several non-energy applications, thorium can be used as
fertile material in a nuclear device known as the high-temperature, gas ~(helium)-cooled reactor. Thorium-232, when bombarded by neutrons from a radiation source' '3'tc!1 :1''' 11r<lni11:::-235, is convcrtc.d to fissionable ur.c:.r.i:.-J-233

94
and the latter isotope, upon fissioning, produces heat to operate the reactor power plant. This type of reactor has some inherent advantages over the conventional uranium-fueled reactors now in wider use. Thoriumfueled reactors are more efficient, do not create as much thermal pollution and require less costly fuel. Because of the atomic reactions involved, however, this newer type of reactor produces higher levels of dangerous gamma radiation and must be more heavily shielded with special protective equipment. Although only two thorium-fueled reactors are now in operation (Peachbottom, Pennsylvania and Fort St. Vrain, Colorado), four larger-size units have been ordered by two electric-utility firms.
Thorium is principally recovered from a mineral called monazite, which is a phosphate of several rare-earth elements. Small amounts of uranium occur in most occurrences of this mineral. Monazite is known to occur geologically in (Overstreet, 1967): (1) certain metamorphic rock types; (2) various igneous bodies, many of which are relatively uncommon rock types; (3) hydrothermal veins associated with igneous activity; (4) beach and stream placers, and consolidated ancient examples of these deposits. The reason monazite can be concentrated by stream and wave action is that it is one of several so-called "h.:=avy minerals." Like ilmenite, rutile, zircon and other high specific-gravity minerals, monazite, once released from a primary igneous, metamorphic or vein occurrence, can be transported by streams and remain largely unaltered because of its resistance to chemical weathering. Monazite has a specific gravity of nearly five, and when currc'nts or waves reach a point of reduced carrying power, grains are concentrated ~with other heavy minerals in sand and gravel deposits. These deposits are called placers whether they occur in modern stream valleys, at higher- levels

95
reflective of older stream courses, along modern beaches or in abandoned beach ridges indicative of higher level shorelines.
Considerable monazite is currently mined with other rare-earth minerals from an unusual igneous-vein deposit at Mountain Pass, California. Production here largely is a controlling factor on the price and availability of thorium (Norman Herz, 1975, personal cvmmunication). Monazite has been recovered in the past from a number of stream placer deposits in western North Carolina (Mertie, 1953). Mo-re recently, this thorium mineral has been recovered as a co-product from Holocene-age beach-ridge deposits near Jacksonville, Florida and at Folkston, Georgia, where the titanium minerals ilmenite and rutile are the principal resources recovered. The Folkston deposit is now depleted although titanium processing is still done at the plant there.
A great many placer and igneous-metamorphic occurrences of monazite within Georgia and South Carolina are summarized from the literature by Mertie (1953) and Overstreet (1967). As mentioned in an earlier section, a sizeable beach placer deposit is located on Hilton Head Island, South Carolina; however, no production w-ill probably .ever be realized due to the residential and resort development there (McCauley, 1960). Fluvial placers have been reported in the Georgia Piedmont and along rivers crossing the Coastal Plain. Other possibly significant heavy-mineral sands have been identified along several of the Georgia Sea Islands. Some drill-core and mapping exploration has been conducted within the Coastal Plain in the past by the former Hines, Mining and Geology Division. Hore recent exploration activity has also been directed toward heavy-mineral sand deposits in the Coastal Plain.
The Cosstal PJaLns i~c>',:'on:1;_ Cm~mission, "rt coordination 1.-Jith the r' S.

96
for a series of aeroradioactivity surveys to be flown over some 16,000 square miles of the CaYolinas, Georgia and portions of Florida and Virginia. These surveys were made available in 1975 for possible use in exploration programs. The resulting maps indicate only variations in the concentration of radioactivity at or near the land surface. Where higher values are observed, there is the distinct possibility that monazite, containing both thorium and uranium, or other radioactive minerals such as uraniferous phosphate, are present. The surveys are not diagnostic and may lead to erroneous interpretation as high-potassium clays can also give anomalous readings.
Both the federal government, through a contract let to the Bendix Corporation to assess low-grade nuclear resources throughout the country, and private industry, such as E. I. Du Pont de Nemours Company and National Lead Company, are very interested in the resource potential of heavy-mineral deposits within the Georgia Coastal Plain. Although the latter firms are largely interested in titanium minerals, co-product recovery of monRzite is an attractive side benefit. The most significant hurdles to commercial development of some of these monazite-bearing sands are the environmental concerns engendered by surface mining to be used in their recovery, and the obvious land-use conflicts along the coastal zone with regard to recreational and residential development. Some deposits known now or discovered in the future will probably not be developed due to these conflicts.
There is little question that there exist placer deposits within Georgia that someday could become commercial, and from which valuable quantities of monazite will be rec~vered. Also as a possibility is the occurrence of mona-
~
zite in sufficient amounts within stream placers in several areas to justify coornercial recoverv. Strc:on placers, hi' " ;-.,r;,o. ''rratic, s;;,o.ller in size and o1ten lo\.rer in :.,r.:;de, ~1rc' .:;_;re ri''"Y <JJ J,\elop than placc:r llt'd<_n deposics.

97
Although.much of the monazite identified from igneous a:1d metamorphicbedrock exposures is too low grade to be commercially reco'Tered, larger deposits may possibly prove favorable as exploration targets within the Piedmont and Blue Ridge Provinces.
In summary, the potential for recovering monazite from deposits within Georgia appears very promising. If the high-temperature, gas-cooled reactor tech:1ology proves acceptable, Georgia's monazite-bearing deposits could become increasingly important as a nuclear-fuel resource. Development of any of the beach placer deposits will, however, largely be coupled to the economics of recovering a variety of heavy minerals, not simply monazite alone. This stipulation could change if monazite is found in grades high enough to warrant production of that mineral as the principal resource.

SUBSURFACE GEOLOGICAL SPACE IN ENERGY MANAGEMENT
A typically overlooked geological resource when solutions to energy
problems are considered is subsurface or underground space. Experience
gained from several areas throughout the United States and elsewhere in the
world points clearly to an enlarged use of this little-tapped resource and
the need for a more unified policy approach to avoid conflicting competitions
(National Academy of Sciences, 1974).
Specific energy-related applications of underground space either imple-
mented to date or proposed for future consideration include:
1. use of depleted gas reservoirs or non-productive reservoir horizons for the storage of off-season natural gas to be resupplied later for peak shaving;
2. use of abandoned mines for the following: a) storage of LPG, crude oil or crude-oil products to establish reserve capacities or better pipelining distribution b) construction of installations such as data-retrieval storage vaults, refrigeration-cold storage terminals, manufacturing businesses, regional warehousing depots and strategic military posts; energy utilized for heating, cooling and other demands shows a reduction in this manner;
3. construction of caverns in appropriate rock bodies for the storage of LPG, LNG or crude oil, either for improved peak shaving or the establishment of reserve capacity;
4. location of energy-producing facilities such as components of
pumped-storage hydroelectric plants, and nuclear-power stations;
5. recovery of energy values from either oil shale by in-situ retorting or coal by in-situ gasification;
6. disposal of low and high-level radioactive wastes separated from fuel assemblies used in nuclear-power plants.
Inasmuch as no petroleum reservoirs have ever been discovered within
~
Georgia, there exists no current potential for depleted reservoirs within
the state. There exists some possibilitv rhnt non-petroliferous-be:1ring re-
servoirs having s:rfC:;.l:icnt pt,ru~'ity, PLt.,:.~;li~~v anJ sealiu,: cbara,:u.:ristil.:s
98

99
to succes.sfully receive and store injected gas can be found. To date, exploration efforts by the Atlanta Gas Light Company (using Earth Science Laboratories, Inc., of Cincinnati as consultants) and Southern Natural Gas Company have uncovered no favorable structures for this type of subsurface gas storage. The most promising area for future activity along this line will be deeper zones the two provinces in northwest Georp,ia. The general absence of geologic structure and effective seals in the Coastal Plain reduces this province's potential. The overall lack of success demonstrated in exploring for peak-shaving subsurface storage may well tend to minimize future activity.
Based upon European success in locating industrial or other business complexes in the underground, the U.S. Department of the Army (1956) conducted a feasibility study to identify and evaluate potential domestic sites whose excavated space was the result of mining activities. The general Kansas City region has been a leader in effectively making secondary use of its abandoned, underground limestone mines (Stauffer, 1974). Although the bulk of mining done in Georgia is at the surface, this report did identify four separate mines in the Chatsworth talc district of Murray-County (located within the Blue Ridge Province) as existing sites potentially suitable for underground installations. One small limestone mine (drift type) near Whitestone in southern Gilmer County was similarly cited. Due to an abundance of favorable surface locations nearer urban-industry centers and the generally remote location of these mines, no interest in using them for industrial installations has ever been shown.
As a result of the energy crisis in the early 1970's, the Federal Energy ~Administration has expressed, together with the. domestic petroleum and pipeline industry, a subsUi!1 1~ i:d interp::t in 0rovidin"': this ni.ltion vlith a reserve oi~ (crude oil and/or reC i!;-= pr,duct) storage capacity. In addition to ,.,.,,.. i,t1:: l

100
and expensive above-ground facilities such as steel tanks, a great deal of enthusiasm has been voiced with regard to a better utilization of underground space. This has produced renewed interest in abandoned mines or those which will shortly cease production. One of the four mines in the Chatsworth talc district originally cited in the earlier study by the Department of the Army has been recently reviewed in terms of its oil-storage potential. The Georgia Mine, as evaluated by the consulting firm of Acres American Incorporated of Buffalo, New York, is, however, not considered a particularly favorable site. Very complicated mine workings, incomplete knowledge of the mine geometry and undesirably high water inflows are the major objections (J. D. Thomas, personal communication, 1975). Considerable remedial and cleanup work would also be needed to prepare the mine, and even though the talc body itself is relatively linpermeable and thus favorable for oil storage, the overall site was rated no better than 1.5 on an arbitrary scale of 5. Having personally visited and evaluated other Chatsworth mines for their storage potential, this writer feels that water inflow through old mine workings plus fractures and other openings in the non-talc bedrock would be a major limiting 'factor. Thus, this report concludes that these talc mines have only a minimal potential with regard to developing an oil-storage capacity within the state.
Since 1950, nearly 80 mined-storage caverns have been constructed in a rariety of suosu:-face rock types for the storage of various petroleum products (Cobbs Engineering, 1975). The uajority of these facilities store LPG, or liquified petroleum gas(es). Petroleum products such as butane and propane are normally gases, but upon application of increased pressure or reduced
~
temperatures, they can be converted to liquids, and thus stored in underground caverns. The latter :1ctunl1v consist usuaJlv of ';~any rooms or chamher::; <;eparated by pi_llars r:.e~~.:.cci L,, 6Up>:>(Jrt the overlvi,,, rot:k mass. Nost LPC;-:ot.

101
caverns have been constructed in unfractured and highly impermeable shales. Some have been developed in limestones, while others have been built in various crystalline rocks such as granite, gneiss or complexes of these igneous-metamorphic rock types. Although roof collapse has been experienced in some caverns and water-inflow problems :i.n others, a record of generally favorable operation has been established in most.
Caverns for LPG storage have also been developed in salt domes along the Texas and Louisiana Gulf Coast. As summarized by Halbouty (1967), some 25 such facilities have been constructed in these massive intrusions of salt. The caverns are produced by pumping fresh water down wells and dissolving the salt to some calculated size. The resulting brines are pumped out by other wells and discarded. According to The Oil and Gas Journal (1975), a similar scheme has been proposed to create the necessary crude-oil storage related to the first so-called superport off the coast of Louisiana.
From a geological standpoint, Georgia totally lacks salt domes, thus eliminating these structures for possible LPG or crude-oil storage. To date, there has been only one LPG-mined cavern constructed in Georgia. This facility, with a capacity of 325,000 barrels, is located near Milner in Lamar County. Excavated in crystalline bedrock of gneiss and schist, the caverns are part of a propane system involving the EXXON Company and the Dixie Pipeline Company. This facility has, however, experienced some reduction in storage volume due to high water inflow and an apparent roof fall. Despite these proble1ns, the caverns, excavated within the interval of 340 to 580 feet below the land surface, have been operated since 1964.
Because of the poorly consolidated nature of the sedimentary rocks found in the Coastal Plain Province, together with high ground-water flow conditions,

102

subsurface caverns for LPG can be eliminated as possibilities in that part

of the State. To be economical and practical, such caverns generally are

located less than 1000 feet below the land surface. None is located deeper

than 1900 feet. Thus, construction within the granitic-gneissic bedrock

underlying the Coastal Plain's sedimentary sequence is similarly unlikely.

Construction in that rock might be geotechnically possible, but econoreic and

logistic objections make selection of that bedrock type very remote. Where

granitic bedrock lies near to the coastal-plain land surface, it could be con-

sidered if certain advantages were to be gained. An example is the new sub-

surface LNG facility operated by the Sun Oil Company at Marcus Hook, Pennsyl-

vania (Sun Oil Company, 1974). To store volumes of this cryogenic material

prior to conversion back to natural gas, caverns in the granitic bedrock

below the Coastal Plain have been constructed because they are safer and more

economical than above-ground facilities. Despite the hardness of the bedrock,

mining remains feasible because of the relatively shallow depths involved.

The only LNG facility in Georgia is that presently being constructed by

the Southern Natural Gas Company (in cooperation with El Paso Natural Gas

Company) on Elba Island in the Savannah River, near Savannah. Designed for

handling LNG imported from Algeria, the facility will be capable of regasi-

fying and distributing 350 million cubic teet per day. Beginning either in

late 1976 or early 1977, this plant will add some 125 billion cubic feet of

gas per year to the Southern distribution system. Construction of subsur-

face caverns either here or elsewhere along the Georgia coast is prohibitive

because the granitic bedrock lies between 3500 and 5000 feet below the land
~
surface.

For several areas through the PiedmoJJt, esp0cially where bodies of ~rani-

t:ic r-o~,J':_ are 1~u )\_.,:-.

~)ping,

tr""_, c;__n1[~idt:ration ~:.:i1nulL1

103
and economic studies n1ade comparing above-ground storage with undergroundcavern storage when peak-shaving facilities are pondered in the future. If such caverns could be situated well below the zone of nearer-surface fracturing, thus avoiding water-inflow problems, LPG facilities could well be economically constructed in such settings. In fact, the excavated granite could undoubtedly be sold as crushed stone to local markets, thereby offsetting some of the subsurface mining costs. Other potentially favorable sites may we11 exist in the Cumberland (Appalachian) Plateau, and possibly in certain sections of the Valley and Ridge Province where thick shale units occur within the overall stratigraphic sequence. Although consideration of sites in either of these geologic settings is definitely warranted, this report hastens to point out that only detailed geologic studies followed by test drilling and related analyses can positiv~ly delineate the feasibility of subsurface-cavern storage. Despite the initial potential of this method for certain general geologic sites, such detailed studies, as is commonly true in exploration, could demonstrate negative elements which would preclude selection of this method for petroleum storage.
Under the present cloak of construction and capital problems faced by electric utilities in relation to nuclear-power plants, and the presence of favorable surface sites within Georgia, use of underground space is unlikely to command much attention in the near future. Likewise, most hydroelectric facilities will be patterned along conventional lines. One pumped-storage facility is being constructed at the Carter's Dam. This approach is possible at other sites, but it would be unrealistic to suggest that pumped storage ~ill make that much of an impact on Georgia's electrical-generating co.p.:1city without surplus off-peak power available. Pumped-storage facilities '~~vc proven ~~ucc.essf~1l ._,li-:C,i.\'ll.. r-~_2 (~.;ccr~~a~h c:nd \..;i.l_.lo::_tt, 197-~~), anJ sl1culC. t_: :.~c sidered with future hydropower sites.

104

Inasmuch as Georgia has relatively limited reserves of coal in its north-

west sector, the seams are generally thin, somewhat erratic and available by

conventional recovery methods and the coal mined is metallurgical grade, re-

covery of energy from these occurrences from in-situ gasification is essen-

tially out of the question. The technology behind recovering energy from

coal in this Inanner is still in the pilot-testing stage (Campbell and others,

1974). Furthermore, if this method proves feasible, the principal applica-

tion will be directed toward thick coal seams whose recovery by underground

mining is difficult. Thus, in-situ coal gasification would find its use in

some of the Western United States coal fields. Although Georgia does have

some low-grade oil shale within the Chattanooga Formation, recovery by in-

situ methods here 8eems likewise remote. At the least, the following three

reasons support that pessimistic contention: (1) the Chattanooga Shale is

extremely thin in Georgia, a condition not conducive to in-situ recovery;

(2) the potential yield from this unit, as measured in gallons of shale oil

per ton of processed rock, is quite low, especially when compared to the

Green River Shales of Colorado and Utah; (3) both economic and extractive-

technological feasibility must still be demonstrated, and ~his combination

of factors will occur in the vTestern oil shales first. It \vill take 2 ~cht~

period of time before recovery from lower-grade oil-shale deposits is even

attempted. As pointed out in a preceding section, it remains very d.-n,[Jtful

if extraction of shale oil from the Chattanooga Shale will ever seriJusly

be attempted in Georgia within the foreseeable future. The chances for in-

situ recovery appear even less promising.
~
As our national reli2nce on nuclear power plants for the incrc2sed

generation of elc'Ctlicitv r1n<'~:ts. production :1f hi.~h-lr"><Pl radinacti,

,,_.
' .... ~

105
separated from the spent uranium-fuel assemblies can similarly be expected to increase (Blomeke and others, 1973). At present, no acceptable method for the ultimate disposal of high-level wastes, either those already on hand from the manufacture of munitions or anticipated from the nuclear-power industry, is presently available. A variety of different rock types has been suggested as sites for the repository-storage of these wastes, once the latter are placed in a solid form. The geologic environments proposed as repository sites are nicely summarized by ~>linograd (1974), while an article by Kubo and Rose (1973) reviews several non-geologic, engineering schemes.
Some rock types and subsurface geologic settings suggested for radioactive-waste storage and disposal include: bedded salt, salt domes, dry limestone strata including chalk, shale, talc-serpentine, alluvial fill in remote desert areas and granite. To date, the prime emphasis has been placed on trying to find acceptable sites containing thick, bedded salt deposits. Extensive investigation along these lines has been conducted in Kansas, and is currently underway in New Mexico. Other promising areas include northern Ohio and western New York.
Georgia lacks both bedded salt and salt domes; thus, this approach is .not applicable for this state. In addition, there are no well developed chalk units, and other limestone strata present in the subsurface of the Coastal Plain, Cumberland Plateau and Valley and Ridge Provinces are either important ground-water aquifers or have abundant water contained within them. The presence of such water precludes their use as repository horizons. If shale sequences are given serious consideration, there is a slight possibility that some nnits in nortrnvest Georgia miR;ht have acceptable character-
~
istics. There are, hm.;ever, m.:1ny other .cn":ls in the country 1:vhere thick, .Lr~lpc:r.:.~":.;.f}l.c and \\}i.d'-~ ly c<::Lt..:.:lS i ., . ~~i~:l:_, ''" t: L. '~.) ,'iCe b.._:t.-tc r .._i~.~"v,.cluj~~- ..:, and

106

this report is forced to conclude that these other shale formations would be

vie~ved with more favor than those in Georgia. Also remote is the possibility

of ever using the thick zones of clay developed in several areas within the

Georgia Coastal Plain. Although impermeable in many cases, these units

would prove difficult in which to construct storage caverns, lie in close

proximity to important ground-water supplies and are a mineral resource in

themselves except where deeply buried. Such clays, though not permeable,

do contain some water and additional water could be expected to be driven

from the mineral constituents of these units in response to thermal condi-

tions induced by the stored radioactive wastes. This report, therefore,

does not view the clays of the Coastal Plain as having much potential for

repository storage. The talc bodies near Chatsworth have been reviewed ~y

Weaner and Gonzales (1975) and found to show little promise along these

lines, mainly due to high water inflows from old mine workings and fractured

rock units near the upper parts of the mines and the rather irregular nature

and distribution of the impermeable talc bodies. Talc-serpentinite else-

where in the eastern part of the country shows $Ome\\rhat greater promise.

The suggestion to use excavated caverns in granite or other impermea-

ble igneous rocks might have some promise if problems in thermal-expansion

can be resolved. Although granitic bodies are being evaluated in some areas

for repository storage of solidified wastes, this method does not rank as

high as disposal in salt or dry limestone units. The possibility of sub-

surface caverns in granitic rock within GeorgiA, however, should not be

totally overlooked. But, the potential of granite, either in this or other
~
states, will be larg~ly dictated by what success is obtained with other,

higher-priori cy rock t'<'CS. :\! C'TIC' time, the r. s. Atomic Energy Coi",r,Li S' ; 1:1

(nn..~ i:,.,_,, J.;(_;;,JL_-

.l~- r ;;y l<t:~t."~'":.; ~l, ~:;Hi Develupment 4-\diiliL,..~.-~ ~: 1 ,:Jl /

107
gave consideration, with reference to the Savannah River Plant in adjacent Aiken, South Carolina, to storing high-level wastes still in liquid form within excavated caverns in granite under the plant. Geologic evidence suggested that this might be feasible because the granitic bedrock was hydrologically isolated from water-bearing sedimentary units above (Siple, 1964). More recent thinking has moved toward storing high-level radioactive wastes only in a solidified form. Unlikely anywhere in this country is the geologic disposal of high-level wastes in the liquid state. Therefore, the potential of granite as a host repository rock appears more aligned toward subsurface caverns receiving solidified wastes. To be acceptable, granitic bedrock would need to be developed well below the land surface, or at depths of at least 1500 feet or more depending on exact conditions. The rock would need to be impermeable or devoid of joints, fractures and other openings, not be involved or have comraunication with ground-water systems, be sufficiently competent to support open subsurface caverns and be located in areas where erosion cannot be expected to reach the cavern levels within the next 250,000 years.
In summary, the use of subsurface space within Georgia for energy-related applications has been very minimal to date. There exists some potential in the future for this resource to be used in one or more of the methods discussed ~hroughout this section. The use of su~surface space should, therefore, be given a greater measure of evaluation and consideration for certain future projects. Several underground-space applications have, however,
little to absolutely no chance oZ i~plementation within the State.

RECOMMENDATIONS

Despite the less than encouraging assessment of Georgia's geological

energy resources as given in the preceding sections, there are certain

potential investigations which are worthy of comment and recommendation.

By way of summary, little can, however, be recommended in regard to further

studies on coal, tar sands, oil shale, geothermal energy, or low-grade

uranium from shale. As viewed by this report, none of these resources are

either sufficiently abundant or have a high enough potential to warrant

additional investigations. Neither is there much to recommend in the area

of exploration for conventional petroleum other than to encourage the

appropriate state agencies to readily assist interested companies to conduct

additional exploratory drilling.

Exploration in the offshore continental shelf areas remains largely

within the purview of the federal government and large petroleum firms or

combines of the latter. Should petroleum be discovered in that frontier

province, there will of course remain the need for production facilities

such as drilling platforms, pipelines and onshore facilities to be in-

stalled. The latter two certainly will have impacts upon local, regional

and state governments in terms of land use, economic impact and environ-

mental considerations. Therefore, there exists a strong need to properly

plan and evaluate siting of such facilities onshore. Studies in the past

along these lines have been conducted by the Cl)astal Plains Regional Corn-

mission, but more is needed specifically within Georgia. Mainly neQded

will be concurrence by the Stat~ with the findings of the CPRC's study
~
which has recomah::ndcd a c1eep-\vat:er fat:ility southeast of Savannah and a

rofin'r': :;cveral I'I;:,"-' ,~,

'\ ~- t r-- ;- .~

~"' l. '..:it1~i t~'-,

: t 21

1 ('S

109
zone, as .those nor.v being evaluated by agencies in State government, and
ones further inland should be selected and investigated in a comprehensive
report. Implementation of elements from both the Marshlands Protection
Act and the Coastal Zone Management Act will bear significantly upon these
topics. Siting of terminals and possible refineries a"ay from the fragile
marshes and estuaries of the coastal zones should definitely be given prime
consideration and studies to delineate suitable locations made well in ad-
vance of any actual offshore discoveries. Although contingency plans for
oil spills and other inherent hazards related to offshore drilling will be
coordinated between agencies at the federal level and industry cooperatives,
the State of Georgia should also coordinate plans with various local and
regional agencies to insure that no confusion develops in the event of an
unfortunate offshore event.
With reference to individual resources covered in this report, the
following recommendations are extended:
1. The potential of underground space within the State for a variety of energy related projects is not well known and certainly bears more promise if it can be fully evaluated. Studies should take the view to evaluate individual geologic settings in terms of specific end uses, i.e., LPG storage, pumped-storage, etc.
2. The uranium potential of the G2orgia Coastal Plain should be more fully evaluated. On the one hand, this would require close coordination with existing agency efforts and possibly involve cooperative studies looking at the possibility of uranium mJneralization in the Tertiary stratigraphic sequence. Although hydro-geochemical exploration is underway, detailed geologic mapping and core drilling would be anpropriate efforts for geoscientists from 1oth the University system and th~ Division of Earth and Water,
3. Evaluation of Geor;,.;ia's i'hospho.te deposits in terms of b~1th their phosphat,~ value an(i co-product generation of lm,r-gr:lde
ur,::r~i.'.::~ ~,':Jr~~;~: -~ :urthc~Y" cons-lc1cro::ion. ~1ore inforrr.2tiL'.-L

llO

feasibility of offshore phosphate mining and possible in-situ recovery methods from the Chatham County deposit should be conducted.
4. More detailed assessment of Georgia's monazite deposits, especially beach and stream placers within the Coastal Plain and igneous occurrences in the Piedmont and Blue Ridge could furnish very useful information relating to the future potential of thorium, a possibly important nuclear fuel of the future. The monazite content of submerged offshore sand and gravel deposits should also be included as a study topic.

In addition to those topics mentioned above, there are several points

which, while they bear upon geological energy resources in a somewhat ancil-

lary fashion, are worthy of serious consideration as well, First, inasmuch

as 65 percent of Georgia's electricity is produced in coal-fired thermal

plants, and the latter are not more than 35 percent efficient, potential

uses for all the waste heat \vhich exits to the environment from these plants

ought to be investigated. Rather than cooling and condensing the steam,

the latter or hot water might be made available for community heating (and

cooling), as process steam for industries which could be located near the

power plants or circulated through agricultural hothouses also located

nearby. Once the thermal energy had been extracted from the steam-water

mixtures, pipes could return the cooled effluent to the power plant for addi-

tional steam generation. The practicality and economics of such modifications

to existing plants plus the feasibility of designing these capabilities into

new plants are in need of study.

Secondly, the amount of coal used annually within Georgia is nearly 15

million tons. Because all this coal is moved by railhaul at some time in

~its delivery sequence, consicl~rRble diesel fuel mtst be consumed to power

the tre1ins ..:hich mov<' thP coal from beth :hljaccnt and distant stotes. The

tc ~,

t: c': r s 1t 1: ~ 1 1 :' ,_. l ~ ,._,, () r

l.. .. \1

'. [ c ~. ~),

111

especially coal, is still in its infancy. There are, however, signs that

this situation is apt to change soon and rapidly. In the last year alone,

plans to construct several slurry lines, each more than 750 miles in length,

have been preliminarily announced. Many of the pipelines have their point

or origination in a water-deficient area, generally in a far western state.

The utilization of slur:cy pipelines in the eastern portion of the United

States is minimal in that only one line which transports coal in Ohio is

active. The potential for slurry pipelines in the water-abundant East is

appreciable, in this writer's opinion. There are, however, technical, legal,

economic and logistical questions which need to be answered. Comparisons

of energy savings and the economics of transfer between slurry lines and

conventional railhaul methods are needed. An in-depth study along these

lines is definitely warranted for both the East in general and Georgia

specifically.

Thirdly, natural gas exhibits the most critical supply and demand situ-

ation of all the geologica] energy resources in the United States. Many

Georgia industries and residences depend heavily upon the avajlability of

this clean-burning fuel. Implementation of peak-shaving storage capacity

can be expected to become more crucial in the years ahead. Possible storage

methods include: (1) use of depleted gas-field reservoirs; (2) use of suit-

able subsurface reservoir rocks not associated with once-productive gas

fields; (3) excavated cavern storage for elt:~ec LPG or LNG; (4) constructed

storage facilities above ground for LPG or LNG. In the case of liquified

natural gas in either of the lJst two approaches, cryogenic and regasifi-

cation facilities would of cot1rse need to he bt1ilt at any peak-shaving site.
~
Althouvh the n;Jtur:d-g::s fir1:1s Hhich serv.icc Cc'CiT L3 have cond11ctcd so'.ue

1~ j \

L i ~: :_-; , 1

'1-(

~~ t

l i

i'.

- s 11., c ,_: .. ~:

112 methods are feasible, where the best sites are located and plan for their implementation over the long term. A thorough examination and evaluation of numerous geological parameters is definitely necessary in such a multifaceted study.
This report urges that the State of Georgia Energy Office and other coordinative state agencies give serious consideration to several, if not all, of these recommendations. Federal funds should be sought from among agencies such as the Federal Energy Administration, Economic Development Administration, Energy Research and Development Administration, U. S. Geological Survey or the U. S. Bureau of Mines, and combined with state monies to financially support any studies selected from those outlined above.
~

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: ': ~ ~ .)) "~ 'r) .

i t CoH~n

t l .. 1t t_ ,-)

~~ ~ ! :

and 1-, l<-:<.LC''t:

r :'-;_ t !..- {1 irs ,
1:.1 t" ~:~CJTil:"1. 1L.:.~ t; r ~
JJ3

. '0 t 1 lcr1ne1l erH. r .~\Y 1
;t. No. 92-31, 41,~ ...

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~

V. lf1 , I!O. l , p . J- ~ 5.

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~._~! ~ rr,.~c"

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117

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~

talline rocks at the AEC S;w::.nnah River F;;;flt.; Scuth :=drolin,l: U.S.

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Thornbury, W. D., 1965, Regional geomorphology of the United States: New York, N. Y., John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 609 p.
U. S. Bureau of Mines, 1967, Heavy crude oil: U. S. Bur. Mines Inf. Circ. 8352, 76 p.
U. S. Department of the Army, 1956, Underground plants for industry: Washington, D. C., Dept. Defense Publ., U. S. Gov't. Printing Office, 109 p.
Wenner, D., and Gonzales, S., 1975, Geologic feasibility of talc and ser-
pentinite bodies from the Appalachian Mountain Region of eastern United States ~vith regard to siting of radioactive-~vaste repositories: Consultant Report, Union Carbide Corp., 56 p .
. White, D. F., and Williams, D. L., ed., 1975, Assessment of geothermal resources of the United States--1975: U. S. Geol. Survey Circ. 726, 155 p.
Winograd, I. J., 1974, Radioactive waste storage in the arid zone: OES, Trans. Amer. Geophysical Union, v. 55, no. 10, p. 884-894.
Hinston, G. 0., Barnes, R. H., and Bohnsack, R. L., 1974, Eastern Te.-c:'cssee drilling going strong: Oil and Gas Jour., v. 72, no. 48, p. 142, 144 and 149.
~

TENNESSEE

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