This data release contains several datasets that provide an overview of oil and gas well history and production of the United States, from 1817 to September 1, 2022. Well history data is aggregated into 1-mile and 10-mile squares indicating the total number of wells and counts of wells classified as oil, gas, dry, injection, hydraulically fractured, and/or horizontal wells. Well history is also separated into layers binned on 1-year increments from a well's spud date (date drilling commenced). Production data is aggregated in 2-mile and 10-mile squares that sum the total production of oil, gas, and water volumes. Production data is also separated into layers binned on 1-year increments to reflect the year of production. These aggregations are compiled from data from IHS Markit, which is a proprietary, commercial database. No proprietary data is contained in this release. This data release was updated May 2023 to reflect an offset of 1 year on the original release.

This data release contains several datasets that provide an overview of oil and gas well count, as well as oil, gas, water production, and water injection volumes in counties that overlap the Colorado River Basin in 2015 and 2019. Data are aggregated in 2-mile squares and are compiled from data from S&P Global, which is a commercially available database. No proprietary data is contained in this release.

This data release contains several datasets that provide an overview of oil and gas well count, as well as oil, gas, water production, and water injection volumes in counties that overlap the Colorado River Basin in 2015 and 2019. Data are aggregated in 2-mile squares and are compiled from data from S&P Global, which is a commercially available database. No proprietary data is contained in this release.

A cells polygon feature class was created by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) to illustrate the degree of exploration, type of production, and distribution of production in the United States. Each cell represents a square mile of the land surface, and the cells are coded to represent whether the wells included within the cell are predominantly oil-producing, gas-producing, both oil and gas-producing, or the type of production of the wells located within the cell is unknown or dry. The well information was initially retrieved from IHS Inc.'s PI/Dwights PLUS Well Data on CD-ROM, which is a proprietary, commercial database containing information for most oil and gas wells in the U.S. Cells were developed as a graphic solution to overcome the problem of displaying proprietary well data. No proprietary data are displayed or included in the cell maps. The data are current through 10/1/2005.

A cells polygon feature class was created by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) to illustrate the degree of exploration, type of production, and distribution of production in the United States. Each cell represents a square mile of the land surface, and the cells are coded to represent whether the wells included within the cell are predominantly oil-producing, gas-producing, both oil and gas-producing, or the type of production of the wells located within the cell is unknown or dry. The well information was initially retrieved from IHS Inc.'s PI/Dwights PLUS Well Data on CD-ROM, which is a proprietary, commercial database containing information for most oil and gas wells in the U.S. Cells were developed as a graphic solution to overcome the problem of displaying proprietary well data. No proprietary data are displayed or included in the cell maps. The data are current through 10/1/2005.

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) recently completed a comprehensive assessment of in-place oil in oil shales in the Eocene Green River in the Greater Green River Basin, Wyoming, Colorado, and Utah. A database was compiled that includes about 47,000 Fischer assays from 186 core holes and 240 rotary drill holes. Most of the oil yield data were analyzed by the former U.S. Bureau of Mines oil shale laboratory in Laramie, Wyoming, and some analyses were made by private laboratories. Total in-place resources for the three assessed units in the Green River Formation are: (1) Tipton Shale Member, 362,816 million barrels of oil (MMBO), (2) Wilkins Peak Member, 704,991 MMBO, and (3) LaClede Bed of the Laney Member, 377,184 MMBO, for a total of 1.44 trillion barrels of oil in place. This compares with estimated in-place resources for the Piceance Basin of Colorado of 1.53 trillion barrels and estimated in-place resources for the Uinta Basin of Utah and Colorado of 1.32 trillion barrels. Click here to return to Main Contents

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) recently completed a comprehensive assessment of in-place oil in oil shales in the Eocene Green River in the Greater Green River Basin, Wyoming, Colorado, and Utah. A database was compiled that includes about 47,000 Fischer assays from 186 core holes and 240 rotary drill holes. Most of the oil yield data were analyzed by the former U.S. Bureau of Mines oil shale laboratory in Laramie, Wyoming, and some analyses were made by private laboratories. Total in-place resources for the three assessed units in the Green River Formation are: (1) Tipton Shale Member, 362,816 million barrels of oil (MMBO), (2) Wilkins Peak Member, 704,991 MMBO, and (3) LaClede Bed of the Laney Member, 377,184 MMBO, for a total of 1.44 trillion barrels of oil in place. This compares with estimated in-place resources for the Piceance Basin of Colorado of 1.53 trillion barrels and estimated in-place resources for the Uinta Basin of Utah and Colorado of 1.32 trillion barrels. Click here to return to Main Contents

A cells polygon feature class was created by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) to illustrate the degree of exploration, type of production, and distribution of production in the United States. Each cell represents a quarter-mile square of the land surface, and the cells are coded to represent whether the wells included within the cell are predominantly oil-producing, gas-producing, both oil and gas-producing, or the type of production of the wells located within the cell is unknown or dry. The well information was initially retrieved from IHS Inc.'s PI/Dwights PLUS Well Data on CD-ROM, which is a proprietary, commercial database containing information for most oil and gas wells in the U.S. Cells were developed as a graphic solution to overcome the problem of displaying proprietary well data. No proprietary data are displayed or included in the cell maps. The data are current through 10/1/2005.

A cells polygon feature class was created by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) to illustrate the degree of exploration, type of production, and distribution of production in the United States. Each cell represents a quarter-mile square of the land surface, and the cells are coded to represent whether the wells included within the cell are predominantly oil-producing, gas-producing, both oil and gas-producing, or the type of production of the wells located within the cell is unknown or dry. The well information was initially retrieved from IHS Inc.'s PI/Dwights PLUS Well Data on CD-ROM, which is a proprietary, commercial database containing information for most oil and gas wells in the U.S. Cells were developed as a graphic solution to overcome the problem of displaying proprietary well data. No proprietary data are displayed or included in the cell maps. The data are current through 10/1/2005.

This reflects a collection of tabular, geospatial and textual information from 3 CD-ROMs published in 1995 and 1996 from the USGS in support of the 1995 National Oil and Gas Assessment Project. This includes USGS DDS Series 30, 35 and 36. This collection was available online through various web platforms hosted by USGS Central Energy Resources Science Center / Central Energy Team since initial recovery from the CD's in early 2000's. This contains the data collection from the original data archives. Over 11,000 files are part of this collection, with 1,524 shapefiles, 648 PDFs and 189 Tab-delimited data files. Limited qa/qc was performed on this due to time constraints and acknowledging that this is a representation of a product over 20 years old.