At the Institute of Applied Geosciences (AGW), Chair of Structural Geology, we seek a PhD student (75%) TV-L E13 The position is funded for 3 years. Our research and teaching is on deformation of reservoirs, diagenesis and rock magnetics. This includes energy- and mineral resources and associated value chains. Job description: This project aims on detailing our understanding of magnetic and microstructural features due to heating of shocked material and their distinction from new formed magnetic minerals in impact structures. The discrimination of different secondary processes leading to enhancement or destruction of magnetic signals over impact structures is one important key to explain magnetic anomaly pattern over different kinds of impact craters on Earth and other planetary bodies. Your tasks: (1) Constrain effects of post-shock thermal treatment of shocked material under laboratory conditions using magnetic and microstructural methods (2) Investigate the shock and post-shock history of natural samples from two impact structures using magnetic and microstructural methods: Chicxulub impact crater and the Nördlingen impact crater, and compare them with experimental results. Qualification: MSc in Earth Sciences The candidate must have a strong interest in experimental work on magnetic materials. Knowledge of mineralogy and material science are required. A successful candidate will study magnetic properties, such as magnetic susceptibility and remanence at different temperatures, and apply mineralogical methods such as X- ray diffraction, SEM, MFM and TEM. Salary:The remuneration occurs on the basis of the wage agreement of the civil service in TV-L, 0.75 E 13 Institute: Institute of Applied Geosciences Contract duration: 3 years limited
Starting date: 1st June 2020 (tentatively) Application up to: 31st March 2020 Application: Complete applications must include a curriculum vitae and contact details of two referees familiar with the academic ability of the candidate, and should be emailed to: Prof. Dr. Agnes Kontny, Email: agnes kontny∂kit edu
News
20.12.2023 AGW-SGT & AG xmas party
We thank our team for their continuous support and wish them a nice xmas party today. Many thanks also to our customers for fruitful cooperation. Merry xmas to all of you!
07.12.2023 Reaccreditation TU Berlin Study Program
Chris is happy to support TU Berlin as member of the reaccreditation team on their BSc and MSc study program Geotechnologies (in German)
30.11.2023 BMWK visit in Berlin
Chris discussed with staff of BMWK on raw materials and circular economy in Berlin.
28.11.2023 Talk by Prof. Ulrich Glasmacher at KIT
Prof. Dr. Ulrich Glasmacher from Heidelberg University gave an inspiring lecture on salt geology at KIT.
24.11.2023 DVGeo annual meeting in Berlin
As member of the DVGeo extended board, Chris attended today's annual meeting in Berlin. The DVGeo is an association of several geologist associations i.e. DGGV, DMG and Paleontology with DGG and FH-DGGV as guests.
22.11.2023 Fluid exhalation in region
Today Prof. Dr. Andreas Schreiber and Chris discussed with politicans about fluid seepage in the region.
15.11.2023 Chris' keynote @ Ressourceneffizienzkongress, Stuttgart
Chris gave a keynote in session "Strategische Rohstoffsicherung und resiliente Rohstoffversorgung für den deutschen Industriestandort" on "Geopolitische Rahmenbedingungen und Rohstoffverfügbarkeit" at the Ressourceneffizienzkongress in Stuttgart.
08.11.2023 DGMK meeting in Hamburg
The annual meeting of the Board of Directors and Advisory Board of the scientific association DGMK took place in Hamburg. We discussed about the challenges of the energy transition and how to make it happen succcessfully.
07.11.2023 acatech's materials session, Munich
Chris joined acatech's Themenkonferenz „Werkstoffe – Wertstoffe – Rohstoffe. Beitrag kreislauffähiger Werkstoffsysteme für eine nachhaltige und resiliente Rohstoffversorgung" in Munich today.
28.10.2023 BDG's board meeting, Garbsen
Chris joined BDG's Board of Directors Meeting in Garbsen today. BDG e.V. represents the German Geologists.
19.10.2023 Handing over recycling-RawMaterials report to BMWK Berlin
Chris contributed to the report accessing raw materials, compiled over the last two years, which now was handed over at BMWK to the state secretary Michael Kellner (BMWK) and Dr. Bettina Hoffmann (BMUV).
27.10.2023 Chris' keynote at TU Munich
Today Chris gave a keynote at BVEG e.V. on "Climate, Raw Material Supply and Energy Transition", the talk Chris currently presents as DGGV's Distinguished Lecturer across Germany.
17.10.2023 Antrittsvorlesung Frank Schilling
Today Frank Schilling celebrated his 60th birthday with a nice in-house conference of alumni and as surprise guest speaker we had Prof. Dr. Gerd Ganteför.
10.-13.10.2023 Chris on panel in Shanghai
Chris joined the opening ceremony of Tongji University's new Sino-German Center of Environment and had fruitful discussions with local collegues, DAAD, BMBF and other attendees to deepen collaboration with KIT's Center of Climate and Environment. Climate and Environment Challenges are beyond borders. He was invited to join a panel discussion and later gave a short speech. Chris also visited Taizang industrial park and thanks the colleagues from Tongji, their guests and the representatives from Taizang for their hospitality.
29.09.-5.10.2023 Agnes & Chris Mapping Course with KIT-students
Agnes and Chris had 3./4.th semester mapping exercise around Heiligenbösch. Excellent students, great location, wounderful geology.
28.09.2023 Chris' podium discussion at DMV e.V. Alsdorf
Today Chris is invited for a podium discussion on the German Mining Law at the German Mine Surveyors Association DMV e.V. in Alsdorf.
22.09.2023 KIT Reservoir-Geology field trip with students
Today we went to Gaggenau to study the red-bed alluvial fan deposits. This one day of a week's field trip studying source rocks, reservoir rocks, cap rocks, depositional settings as well as fracture and faults of the Rhine Graben Rift.
19.09.2023 Tongji Vice-President at KIT
Today KIT's Vice-President Thomas Hirth and a KIT-team including Chris welcome the delegation of reserachers from Tongji University at KIT.
17.09.2023 a final visit
Today was Chris last visit of his father-in-law at the hospital in Langenfeld who died later that day. May his soul rest in peace. Although not related to professional life, I thought it is worth to note since being there when life is getting tough is more important than any sort of shiny professional life - at least from Chris' point of view.
12.-16.09.2023 OGV Conference, Freiburg
As new president of OGV e.V., Chris welcomed about 150 conference attendees to this year's annual meeting in Freiburg. OGV e.V., the Upper Rhine Geological Association e.V. founded in 1871, enjoys regional geology, offering 14 field trips over 4 days. We are also happy that Prof. Dr. Volker Lorenz was awarded with a honary membership.
02.-08.09.2023 DGGV Conference, Berlin
We from AGW-SGT participated in the annual conference at FU Berlin, contributing with talks and sessions by Benjamin, Chaojie and Jasemin. Chris and colleagues from DGGV's Section Energy & RawMaterials FUTURE also organized the plenary talk by Constanze Veeh from the European Commission, Belgium, on "The EU Critical Raw Materials Act - the role of research and knowledge in policy making" and the Plenary Discussion on „Nachhaltige Energie- & Rohstoffverfügbarkeit, sowie gesellschaftliche Herausforderungen“, moerated by Dr. Britta Bookhagen, BGR with Panel Members:Dr. Ludwig Möhring | Bundesverbands Erdgas, Erdöl und Geoenergie e.V. (BVEG) Dr. Uta Alisch | GLU Geologische Landesuntersuchung GmbH Freiberg/BGD ECOSAX GmbH Prof. Dr. Hans-Jürgen Burchardt | Professur für Internationale und intergesellschaftliche Beziehungen and Constanze Veeh | European Commission, Belgium. The pre-conference field trip showcased the open pit mine of carbonate rocks near Rüdersdorf.
07.-12.08.2023 Review on CCS
Chris was somehow stuck at home and thus strated to write a review on CCS. Before making up a sort of opinion, he digs into numbers. Thus, why not writing up what he found and discuss with others. There must be solutions to limit anthropogenic emissions of CO2e, and CCS is one of it.
28.07.2023 Kraichgau TV on Geothermal
Today Chris and Stefan Kleck from Stadtwerke Bretten were interviewed in Kraichgau TV, a local broadcast station. I haven't seen it yet, however, the key point from Chris' point of view is that deep geothermal needs both (i) heat and (ii) large volume flow of water at depth. One does not work without the other. Thus, the deeper one drills the higher the risk that the targeted horizon and / or fractures are tight.
25.07.2023 Felix paper on leaking Leopoldshafen fault near KIT-CN online
Felix paper entitled "Fault leakage and reservoir charging in the Upper Rhine Graben, Germany – Assessment of the Leopoldshafen fault bend" on fluid migration along the Leopoldshafen-Fault near KIT-CN is now online. Utilizing old oil fields for geothermal applications may consider lower permeabilities, remnant oil and other research such as "Surface rupturing earthquakes along the eastern Rhine Graben Boundary Fault near Ettlingen-Oberweier (Germany)" by Pena-Castellnou et al.. Felix's abstract reads: "Faults control subsurface fluid flow in sedimentary basins worldwide, often affecting hydrocarbon migration as well as geothermal fluid circulation. Since the Upper Rhine Graben hosts geothermal, lithium brine, and hydrocarbon resources, the role of faults on fluid flow in the basin is of great interest. To better understand structurally controlled fluid flow in the central Upper Rhine Graben, this study investigates the hydrocarbon migration of the fault-related Leopoldshafen oil field. As fault geometry can change along-strike, fault conductivity might also vary spatially as it depends on, among others, the fault orientation relative to the active stress field. Therefore, slip and dilation tendencies are used as proxies for stress-controlled fault conductivity, computed for a strike-slip faulting regime with NW to NNW oriented σHmax. Fault Response Modelling is applied to derive subsurface strain distributions, associated with fault activity during the Miocene phase of basin development. The Leopoldshafen fault, as a fundamental element of the fault-related three-way dip closure trap structure, is characterized by a changing along-strike geometry with NNE-SSW trending fault segments linked by a NNW-SSE trending left-stepping fault bend. Slip and dilation tendencies are highest around the fault bend segment, with a range of considered σHmax orientations. As Expansion Index analysis indicates across-fault thickening and thus fault activity of the Leopoldshafen fault during the main phase of graben rifting (Late Eocene to Oligocene), subsurface strain distribution pattern associated with Miocene fault activity highlight strain concentrations around the fault bend segment, which has acted as a releasing bend. Thus, based on slip and dilation tendency analyses, as well as Fault Response Modelling, the fault bend segment is identified as the upfault fluid migration zone along the Leopoldshafen fault. This underscores the importance of comprehending the structural inventory of the Upper Rhine Graben for the prospect of future subsurface exploration and alternative post-oil utilization."
22.07.2023 Michael's paper on xtal growth out in WRR with AGU
Michael's paper on "Phase-Field Simulations of Epitaxial Crystal Growth in Open
Fractures With Reactive Lateral Flow" is out on Water Resources Research,
59, e2023WR034605. https://doi.org/10.1029/2023WR034605 by Michael Späth , Michael Selzer, Benjamin Busch, Daniel Schneider, Christoph Hilgers, Janos L. Urai, and Britta Nestler. Our abstract reads: "We use a multiphase-field modeling approach, where reactive fluid flow and crystal growth is computed and couple the chemical driving force for grain growth to the local saturation state of the fluid. The supersaturation of the fluid is characterized by a concentration field which is advected by fluid flow and in turn affects the crystal growth with anisotropic growth kinetics. The simulations exhibit good agreement with the experimental results, providing the basis for upscaling our results to larger scale computations of combined multi-physical processes in fractured porous media for applications as groundwater protection,
geothermal, and hydrocarbon reservoir prediction, water recovery, or storing H2 or CO2 in the subsurface."
14.07.2023 a final walk
Today Chris buried my father in the city where I was born. Having buried my neighbor earlier this year, and two more inspiring researchers earlier this summer, death becomes more and more part of life. Although not related to professional life, I thought it is worth to note since being born, living and dying is life and more important than professional life.
13.07.2023 Chris' keynote at ENZo KIT
Today Chris gave a keynote for KIT PhDs and Postdocs at ENZo graduate school on "Climate, raw materials and energy transitions", the talk Chris currently presents as DGGV's Distinguished Lecturer across Germany.
08.07.2023 Our BSc fieldtrip with 2nd semester students
This weekend field trip linked to BSc Earth History 2nd semester crosses the southern part of Germany along a profile from KIT to the Bodensee. Today we are in dismantled quarry near Otzberg.
06.07.2023 KIT Umweltimpulse panel
In this week's KIT-ZKU Wissenswoche we organized the Karlsruher Umweltimpulse with a podium discussion on „Rohstoffe, Ethik und Kreislaufwirtschaft“ with Prof. Grunwald and Prof. Kolb (KIT), Dr. Graf (Ministerium für Wirtschaft, Arbeit und Wohnungsbau Baden-Württemberg) and Christian Masurenko (kollektive Rohstoff Intelligenz) and a keynote by Chris.
02.07.2023 Our BSc fieldtrip with 4th semester students
This weekend field trip linked to BSc Regional Geology 4th semester crosses the northern part of Germany along a profile from KIT to the Lower Rhine Embayment. Today we are visit the open pit coal mine Hambach.
30.06.2023 Chris' keynote in Bühl
Today Chris gave a keynote at the Stadtwerke Bühl annual Workshop "Climate, raw materials and energy transitions", the talk Chris currently presents as DGGV's Distinguished Lecturer across Germany.
26.06.2023 Chris' keynote at Uni Hannover
Today Chris gave a keynote organized by ZKU for Finanzamt Freiburg delegates at KIT, on "Climate, raw materials and energy transitions", the talk Chris currently presents as DGGV's Distinguished Lecturer across Germany.
17.06.2023 Chris' keynote at KIT
Today Chris gave a keynote at KIT's Day of Open Doors at CN on "Climate, raw materials and energy transitions", the talk Chris currently presents as DGGV's Distinguished Lecturer across Germany.
14.06.2023 Chris' keynote at EMC Düsseldorf
Today Chris gave a keynote at EMC (European Metallurgial Conference) Metal Fair at Messe Düsseldorf on "CO2-Speicherung im Untergrund – Globale Herausforderungen & Szenarien für die Industrie".
06.06.2023 Chris in press on hydrogen
To make the hydrogen system happen, today Chris in media pointed to the possible gap of Iridium for PEM electrolyzers. This raw material, like all others, is not geological limited but its availabilty since there are not enough mines available and not enough ore deposits explored. Exploration and mining need to be boosted, taking on average 16 years until operation. More from Chris' interview with DPA in ZeitOnline, WirtschaftsWoche, Süddeutsche, Die Welt, and other newspapers.
05-09.06.2023 EAGE Vienna cancelled but buried inspiring teachers
Chris and Prof. Dr. Tobias Rudolph had a session at EAGE's annual conference, which Chris had to cancel. Instead, Chris buried with some of his classmates his inspiring Chemistry Teacher Dr. Falke Fichtner on 6th in Weeze. And on the 9th, Chris and his former PhD and Postdoc mates buried his inspiring Doktorvater and Geologist Prof. Dr. Janos Urai in Maastricht, who tragically died by a climbing accident in Belgium aged 69 and physically extremely fit.
25.05.2023 Chris' keynote on Geothermal at Bürgerhaus Neibsheim
Today Chris gave a talk for the public on "Geothermiebohrung Graben-Neudorf", followed by a talk by Stefan Kleck from Stadtwerke Bretten. Deep geothermal needs both (i) heat and (ii) large volume flow of water at depth. One does not work with the other. Compared to other energies, it is low risk but not no risk, thus measures have to be taken. Highest risk is, the deeper one drills the higher the risk that the targeted horizon and / or fractures are tight, which is a high economic loss. However, if quality controlled and investments from private buisness, risks for public can be constrained.
24.05.2023 Chris' keynote at BVEG Hannover
Today Chris gave a keynote at BVEG e.V. on "Energiewende und Rohstoffe – welche Optionen hat die Politik?", a talk aligned to the talk Chris currently presents as DGGV's Distinguished Lecturer across Germany.
10.05.2023 Chris' keynote at VKU, Mannheim
Today Chris gave a keynote at BVEG e.V. on "Klima, Rohstoffverfügbarkeit und Energiewende – Deutschland in der Krise?", a talk aligned to the talk Chris currently presents as DGGV's Distinguished Lecturer across Germany.
09.05.2023 KIT-division head visits AGW
Chris as spokesperson of the AGW Institute of his seven colleagues and our ILA representatives welcomed division head Prof. Dr. Johannes Orphal and his team at AGW. After a presentation by J. Orphal and Chris on the division and AGW, and their visions, J. Orphal went for informal discussons with each professor, followed by a lab tour across the AGW. The meeting ended with a sum up all AGW profs and our ILA board.
05.05.2023 Chris on Tagesschau-Faktenfinder
Chris was again questioned on fracking with the German broadcaster Tagesschau and hopes that now the discussion ends, this everything has been said. Chris sees the duty of science to inform and explain public and decision makers about what is known and unknown, about opportunities and risk. Chris does not see the role of science to tell descision makers what to do. That is what decision makers are elected for, who should overlook the social-technological-legal challenges, and who swear: "I swear that I will devote my strength to the welfare of the German people, increase its benefit, avert harm from it, uphold and defend the Basic Law and the laws of the Federation, conscientiously fulfill my duties and do justice to everyone. So help me God." (in German: „Ich schwöre, daß ich meine Kraft dem Wohle des deutschen Volkes widmen, seinen Nutzen mehren, Schaden von ihm wenden, das Grundgesetz und die Gesetze des Bundes wahren und verteidigen, meine Pflichten gewissenhaft erfüllen und Gerechtigkeit gegen jedermann üben werde. So wahr mir Gott helfe."). That I feel is the beauty of democracy i.e. the strength of a system over that of an individual.
22.-23.04.2023 BDG board meeting and rocks near Eibenstock
Chris attended BDG's board meeting in Falkesteinstein (Vogtland), the official announement of BDG's Rock of the Year "Greywacke" and later visited some outcrops and quarries around Eibenstock.
05.-06.04.2023 Board meeting in Hamburg
Chris joined DGMK's board meeing in Hamburg, discussing the future development of the German energy system and related funding.
04.04.2023 Chris' keynote on Geothermal in Linkenheim-Hochstetten
Today Chris gave a keynote to public in the townhall of Linkenheim-Hochstetten on "Abhängigkeiten der Energiewende von Rohstoffen – welche Optionen hat die Politik angesichts der geopolitischen Situation?", a talk aligned to the talk Chris currently presents as DGGV's Distinguished Lecturer across Germany.
30.03.2023 Chris' keynote on Geothermal at Altes Rathaus Bretten
Today Chris gave a keynote organized by Daniel Kößler on "Geothermiebohrung Graben-Neudorf", followed by a talk by Stefan Kleck from Stadtwerke Bretten. Deep geothermal needs both (i) heat and (ii) large volume flow of water at depth. One does not work with the other. Compared to other energies, it is low risk but not no risk, thus measures have to be taken. Highest risk is, the deeper one drills the higher the risk that the targeted horizon and / or fractures are tight, which is a high economic loss. However, if quality controlled and investments from private buisness, risks for public can be constrained.
22.03.2023 Chris' keynote at Leibniz Sozietät Potsdam
Today Chris gave a keynote organized by Prof. Dr. Ulrich Riller, near Hamburg on "Klima, Rohstoffverfügbarkeit und Energiewende – Deutschland in der Krise?", a talk aligned to the talk Chris currently presents as DGGV's Distinguished Lecturer across Germany.
21.03.2023 Chris' keynote WPK at KIT
Today Chris gave a keynote on "Für eine lebenswerte Umwelt - Geothermie (Wärme, Elektrizität) und Lithium" upon the visit of WPK – Die Wissenschaftsjournalisten Wissenschaftspressekonferenz e.V. to KIT-ZKU, among the guests form press also Jean Pütz, a still well known, long retired, but still active journalist. Other presentations by Philipp Blum highlighted to potential of shallow geothermal energy and ATES systems, by Jochen Kolb on Lithium extraction he showed at Bruchsal pilot plant, Frank Schilling and Birgit Müller on the LFZG Geothermal Research Center and Thomas Leisner on how to make clouds. We as KIT-ZKU are happy to had WPK with us and were happy to pass the media representative on to the KIT president for further discussions.
10.03.2023 Chris' visited Aurubis copper smelter in Hamburg
Today Chris visited the copper smelter in Hamburg. He thanks Aurubuis for the opportunity the see the processes how an ore becomes high quality copper plus byproducts, some of them critical raw materials which only can be obtain from the black mass but not from an ore mine.
09.03.2023 Chris' keynote at Aumühle bei Hamburg
Today Chris gave a keynote organized by Prof. Dr. Ulrich Riller, near Hamburg on "Klima, Rohstoffverfügbarkeit und Energiewende", the talk Chris currently presents as DGGV's Distinguished Lecturer across Germany.
03.03.2023 Chris' keynote on geothermal at Linkenheim
Today Chris gave a keynote at KIT's Day of Open Doors at CN on "Abhängigkeiten der Energiewende von Rohstoffen – welche Optionen hat die Politik angesichts der geopolitischen Situation?", the talk aligned to the one Chris currently presents as DGGV's Distinguished Lecturer across Germany.
01.03.2023 Chris' keynote at EnergieCrossMedial, Berlin
Today Chris gave a keynote at KIT's Day of Open Doors at CN on "Abhängigkeiten der Energiewende von Rohstoffen – welche Optionen hat die Politik angesichts der geopolitischen Situation?", the talk aligned to the one Chris currently presents as DGGV's Distinguished Lecturer across Germany.
28.02.2023 Chris in Reichstag, Berlin
Chris today was invited for a meeting on shale gas to the Reichstag in Berlin. After a short presentation of different representatives, we answered several questions from the federal state politicans.
28.02.2023 Agnes editorial highlight in EOS
Agnes published in EOS an Editorial on "Rapid Evolution of Volcanic Systems Reflected in Magnetics". Link here
21.02.2023 Chris' visits WintershallDea
Today Chris visited Barnstorf, the research facility of WintershallDea GmbH, to get a first hand insight and he presented a keynote on "Climate, raw materials and energy transitions", the talk Chris currently presents as DGGV's Distinguished Lecturer across Germany.
14.02.2023 Agnes editorial highlight in EOS
Agnes just published in EOS an Editorial on "Large Geomagnetic Field Changes Recorded by Archeomagnetism". Link here
19.01.2023 Chris at ice core shed in Bremen and later Hamburg
Today Chris visited Uni Bremen and Geomar and was impressed by the offshore instruments and the ice core shed. Later the business trip continued to Hamburg.
12.01.2023 Chris in Herne and Bochum
Today Chris and team visited RAG AG for an interim report on their floodrisk project. We thank RAG AG for their hospitality and the open discussion.
31.12.2022 Our special volume in ZdGG on Post-Mining published
Edited by Dennis Quandt, Tobias Rudolph & Christoph Hilgers, Volume 173(4). 2022
Post-Mining: Geomonitoring, process understanding, and utilisation of former mining areas with an intro on "Post-Mining: Geomonitoring, process understanding, and utilisation of former mining areas" by Dennis Quandt, Tobias Rudolph & Christoph Hilgers in Z. Dt. Ges. Geowiss. (J. Appl. Reg. Geol.), 173 (4), p. 507–511
31.12.2022 Felix paper out on fractures in ZdGG
Felix paper is out on "Fracture network characterisation of the naturally fractured Upper Carboniferous sandstones combining outcrop and wellbore data, Ruhr Basin, Germany" by Felix Allgaier, Benjamin Busch, Thomas Niederhuber, Dennis Quandt, Birgit Müller2 & Christoph Hilgers in Z. Dt. Ges. Geowiss. (J. Appl. Reg. Geol.), 173(4), p. 599–623. Our abstract reads: "Based on 600 m of oriented core material from the Upper Carboniferous strata (Bork 10 wellbore), the analysis of the in-situ fracture network revealed two dominant fracture orientations: N–S and W–E. Fracture intensity indicates a varying degree of fracturing of the drilled sandstone layers for both trends (N–S: 0 to 9.1 m-1, W–E: 0 to 8.8 m-1). Comparison of dipmeter log fracture interpretations with reliable core description data shows a poor match (11%) for depth location (± 6 m) and dip azimuth (± 25°). Slip tendency analysis highlighted near-vertical N–S and NW–SE striking fractures to be generally favourably oriented for reactivation within the active stress field. In total, 10 % of the detected fracture population (Bork 10 wellbore) are critically stressed under present-day stress conditions and may contribute to large scale fluid flow in the subsurface".
31.12.2022 Dennis paper out on diagenesis in ZdGG
Dennis paper is out on "Petrographical and petrophysical properties of tight siliciclastic rocks from the Ibbenbueren coal mine with regard to mine flooding" by Dennis Quandt, Benjamin Busch, Helena Fuchs, Aura Alvarado de la Barrera, Jonas Greve & Christoph Hilgers in Z. Dt. Ges. Geowiss. (J. Appl. Reg. Geol.), 173(4), p. 653–672. Our abstract reads: "we present and discuss petrographic and petrophysical data of Upper Carboniferous (Westphalian B–C), fluvial, tight (most porosities <10%, most permeabilities <1 mD) sandstones and siltstones from the former Ibbenbueren coal mine in NW Germany where mine flooding currently proceeds. Varying and comparatively high compressional (3,809–6,656 m/s) and shear wave velocities (2,126–3,723 m/s), and Young’s moduli (31.3–80.9 GPa) are associated with Cretaceous maximum burial by which the textural framework was predominantly mechanically compacted and subordinately cemented by syntaxial quartz overgrowths. Grain size (0.008–1.1 mm) as a function of the depositional environment controls wave velocities and Young’s moduli. In contrast, the range of Poisson’s ratios (0.09–0.31) is typical for sandstones and depends on stress history, depositional and diagenetic mineralogy. Consequently, the textural and mineralogical heterogeneities of the sample set result in variations in wave velocities, Young’s moduli, and Poisson’s ratios. These petrophysical properties are crucial for the poroelastic behaviour of the subsurface and need to be considered in case studies, which model post-mining ground movements as a result of mine flooding"-
31.12.2022 Jonas paper out on heat and diagenesis in ZdGG
Jonas paper on "Coupling heat conductivity and lithofacies of the coal-bearing Upper Carboniferous in the eastern Ruhr Basin, NW Germany" by Jonas Greve, Benjamin Busch, Dennis Quandt, Mathias Knaak, Christoph Hartkopf-Fröder & Christoph Hilgers is out in Z. Dt. Ges. Geowiss. (J. Appl. Reg. Geol.), 173(4), p. 673–695. The abstract reads: "Rock properties show low compressional velocities with a minimum of 2,886 m/s in sandstones of the delta front, which are negatively correlated with porosities of up to 15.6%. Likewise, porosity is a major control on thermal conductivity with a minimum of 2.3 W/(m×K) for high porosity sandstones. For less porous samples, thermal conductivity becomes less dependent on porosity but more strongly on mineralogy. Comparing our results with accessible thermal conductivity data from North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW), the high values of up to 5.3 W/(m×K) seem promising for potential geothermal applications. Furthermore, the results of this study imply that the classification based on facies associations is less suitable than the classification based on grain sizes in order to assess the geothermal potential. Overall, the Upper Carboniferous (Pennsylvanian) samples of this study show low porosity (mean 5.6%) and permeability (mean 0.1 mD). Thus fluid flow during mine flooding and potential future geothermal applications will primarily rely on permeable faults and fracture systems around the abandoned mine galleries as well as the galleries themselves"
23.12.2022 Petex Educational License Agreement
„We are happy to announce that we now work with MOVE, a standard industry software for geological 3D-modelling, structural analysis and reconstruction of the subsurface. Petroleum Experts Ltd. (Petex) donated 10 MOVE Software Licenses to the Institute of Applied Geosciences, Structural Geology and Tectonics, at KIT. The Educational License Agreement was recently concluded between Karlsruhe Institute of Technology and Petroleum Experts Ltd. (Petex), the technical market leader in the area of software engineering tools for oil and gas companies. Researchers and students at Structural Geology and Tectonics will now be able to study complex geological structures and processes with the MOVE Suite, valued at £1,872,218.26 and donated by the Scotland-based Petroleum Experts Ltd. (Petex). https://www.petex.com/products/move-suite/“
22.12.2022 Ola's presentation
Today at 12h Ola will present his PhD research on the Dahumey Basin and the Niger Delta basin. Ola worked on diagenesis of outcrops and shallow wells, and build a 3D reservoir model of the onshore Niger delta.
15.12.2022 xmas party
Today we are going to have our annual xmas party at SGT! Merry xmas.
5.-10.12.2022 Chris in copper mine in Morocco
Chris visits his colleagues Moha Ikenne, Alaeddine Belfoul and Icame Nourissaid at Ibn Zhor University, Agadir. Alaeddine, Icame and Chris then travelled south to work in on a copper mine. We studied the veins hosting the copper, and the host rock being an Ediacarian limestone. Later we discussed jointly with Moha and follow up collaboration.
2.12.2022 Agnes editorial highlight in EOS
Agnes is Associated Editor in in the highly ranked Journal of Geophysical Research: Soid Earth and just published in EOS an Editorial Highlight on New Mechanism for “Giant” Greigite Growth in Deep-Sea Sediments - understanding greigite formation pathways in sediments is a prerequisite for assessing the marine iron-sulfur-carbon cycle and yield reliable near-syn-sedimentary paleomagnetic records. Link here
30.11.2022 KIT-president visits Center Climate & Environment
Today we welcome our President Holger Hanselka at KIT's Center Climate & Environment ZKU, of which Chris is the current scientific spokesperson. Thanks to the ZKU management team for organizing the the academic topic spokesperson for the their input.
28.11.2022 Visit geothermal drilling project Graben-Neudorf
Chris visited the geothermal drilling project at Graben-Neudorf which currently reached 3400 m depth and more than 160°C. We wish the team of Deutsche Erdwärme GmbH all success to make the economic operation happen!
23.11.2022 Chris' public talk at the Alfried Krupp Kolleg, Greifswald
Chris gave a public talk entitled "Klima, Rohstoffverfügbarkeit und Energiewende" as Distinguished Lecturer of DGGV.
Abstract (in German): Die deutsche Energiewende, die damit assoziierte Mobilitätswende und der resultierende Umbau des exportorientierten Industriestandorts Deutschland bedingen einen steigenden Rohstoffbedarf. Auch der Energie- und Rohstoffbedarf der Welt wird sich aufgrund steigender Weltbevölkerung und steigendem Pro-Kopf-Verbrauch weiter erhöhen. Die mangelnde Resilienz deutscher Lieferketten äußert sich in den gegenwärtigen und drohenden Engpässen einer bezahlbaren, verlässlichen und sauberen Energie- und Rohstoffversorgung der EU und Deutschlands. Was ist der Beitrag der Geologie, die die Prozesse der Erde erforscht und die Versorgungssicherheit von Grundwasser, Energie und Rohstoffen gewährleistet?
16.11.2022 Socar visiting KIT
Today researchers from Socar, Azerbaijan, visited us to discuss collaboration on negative emissions. We at KIT-AGW are happy to drive net-zero.
4.11.2022 Chris at DVGeo
Today Chris joined the DVGeo meeting in Potsdam. The DVGeo is the heading institution of geology, geophysics, mineralogy and paleontology.
3.11.2022 Chris press conference with BDG in Berlin
Chris participated in the press conference of BDG e.V. at Republic Affairs, Berlin, on gas supply and fracking in Berlin. We hope that a factual approach may help public and politics to evaluate their options of energy and raw material supply. Note that natural gas is also a raw material providing hydrogen for ammonia and fertilizer, CO2 for the breweries (among others), and helium for high tech applications. We didn't plan to make video on what we said, but feel it may contribute to transparency. LINK
2.11.2022 Chris' talk at KIT-BrainBites press conference with BDG in Berlin
Chris gives at talk at KIT's Triangle in the series "BRAIN BITES | Energieträger und Rohstoff Erdgas: Gewinnung, Verfügbarkeit und Geopolitik".
26.10.2022 Chris talk for metallurgists on hydrogen
Chris gave a keynote at the conference "Metallurgical Seminar Hydrogen in Metallurgy" by GDMB e.V. in Gelsenkirchen on "Energy transition with hydrogen".
19.10.2022 Chris at parlamentary evening in Berlin
Chris was invited to a parlamentary evening at the Reichstag in Berlin entitled "Climate and Energy" to discuss challenges and opportunities with politicians. The tables labelled with topics covered different subjects including "Materials and Raw Materials". The evening with kindly organized by the German Physical Society (Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft DPG) in collaboration with the German Mathematical Union (Deutsche Mathematiker-Vereinigung DMV), the German Chemical Society (Gesellschaft Deutscher Chemiker GDCh), the Union of Biology, Bioscience and Biomedicine in Germany (Verband Biologie, Biowissenschaften und Biomedizin in Deutschland VBIO) and the Umbrella Organization Geosciences ( Dachverband der Geowissenschaften DVGeo).
12.10.2022 Chris on fracking for Weltwoche
Chris published an article on Does Fracking safe Europe (Rettet Fracking Europa?) in the weekly newspaper Die Weltwoche. LINK
4.-18.10.2022 Agnes & Chris guiding student field trip in Oman
We are happy to have organized the field trip to Oman, guided by Agnes and Chris, with the support of Dennis and Felix. We are happy that all had a good time and stayed healthy. Many thanks to Golden Highlands for organizing the field trip. We crossed the Jebel Akdhar mountains, crossed Whaiba desert, drove along the Indian ocean and finally returned to Muscat for a in-situ precipitation of carbonates in a reef.
26.9.-2.10.2022 Agnes & Chris guiding student field mapping course
We happy to run our Bachelor mapping course around Hattgenstein, Pfalz. Groups of 2-3 students are trained to make a geological map of a given area of a few square kilometers. All stayed healty, only Chris catched the Corona virus and was out for a while.
20.9.-24.9.2022 Chris at OGV conference Nördlingen
This week OGV organized the annual conference in Nördlingen, Bavaria. The Geological Association of the Uppper Rhine OGV e.V. is a meeting on regional geology with a focus on excellent guided field trips.
23.9.2022 Chris at Environment Ministry Stuttgart
Chris was happy to present with Dr. Christian Kühne some results of the ThinkTakn Industrial Resources Strategies TTirs at the State's Environment Ministry in Stuttgart for the Danish delegation.
13.9.2022 Chris on Fracking in radio Deutschlandfunk
Chris contributes to radio by Werner Nording, Deutschlandfunk on the importance of fracking: "Unkonentionelles Fracking: Diskussionen um eine verbotene Födermethode" LINK
12.-13.9.2022 Chris at DGGV Annual Conference in Cologne
Chris is happy to participate in the annual conference of the German Geological Society DGGV.
14.8.2022 Chris on fracking in Frankfurter Allgemeinen Sonntagszeitung
The article on fracking makes it to the front page of the weekly newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung LINK
4.7.2022 EAGE Conference "Geosciences in the Energy Transition" planned
Chris is part of the technical committee, which is planning the EAGE 2022 GET "Geosciences in the Energy Transition" conference in The Hague, Netherlands.
01-04.7.2022 Peter & Paul in Bretten
We are happy to have some guests with us at this open street party with lots of local handicraft.
July/August 2022 Humboldt-Fellow Prof. Mamtani Research Guest welcomed
Agnes' and Chris' guest Prof. Dr. Manish Mamtani, Humboldt-Fellow and Humboldt-funded guest with us at AGW-SGT from some weeks. It is a pleasure to collaborate with Manish from IIT Kharagur, India.
02.7.2022 Visit of Janos in Karlsruhe
Today Chris' former Doktorvater Prof. Janos Urai visited us in Karlsruhe. Together with Agnes' and Chris' guest Prof. Dr. Manish Mamtani, Humboldt-Fellow and Humbold-funded guest with us at AGW-SGT from some weeks, Chris and Manish had lunch with Janos in sunny Karlsruhe and discussed about the future research in structural geology.
30.6.2022 Chris in salt mine, Heilbronn
Happy to be in shaft to 300 m depth in Heilbronn, the local Muschelkalk salt mine. Many thanks to Südwestdeutsche Salzwerke AG, Heilbronn (also Bad Reichenhaller Salz) guiding us and allowing DGGV to make a movie on the need of raw material extraction.
24.-26.6.2022 Field Trip 2 Kraichgau - Alb - Bodensee
Happy to have our Bachelor students on a field trip Regional Geology crossing the Kraichgau, Black Forest and Swabian Alb to the Bodensee.
22.6.2022 Chris' Interview on fracking in DW
Chris gives an interview on fracking with Deutsche Welle on Energy Security "Fracking von Gas in Deutschland als Alternative?" LINK
14.6.2022 DGMK/ÖEGW Spring Conference Celle
The group of Structural Geology & Tectonics take part in the DGMK/ÖEGW Spring Conference in Celle. Beside four poster contributions, Dennis Quandt and Jonas Greve presented reservoir quality studies of the Buntsandstein and the Upper Carboniferous. Jasmin, Ola, Jonas, Felix, Dennis and Benni presented their work at the annual DGMK conference.
10.-12.6.2022 Field Trip 1 Stavelot Venn - Lower Rhine Embayment
Happy to have our Bachelor students on a field trip Regional Geology crossing the Eifel on the Belgian border, called the Stavelot-Venn massif towards Aachen and further north. Hard coal tailings, lignite open pit mining and limestone quarries, among others were on a cross section we developed during the field trip.
8.6.2022 EAGE Anual Conference Madrid
Dennis Quandt, Jonas Greve and Felix Allgaier took part in the EAGE Anual Conference in Madrid and presented reservoir quality studies within the technical programs.
2.6.2022 Benni's presentation at Geotherm, Offenburg
Today Benni presented some reservoir quality data at the annual Geotherm conference in Offenburg. Key is that good reservoir qualities can be better constrained and high flow rates of geothermal brines can also be obtained at horzions by horizontal drilling. Benni and Chris were happy to meet many colleagues over there.
12.05.2022 Dennis' paper out in MPG
Dennis et al. paper out on "Diagenesis and controls on reservoir quality of Lower Triassic red bed sandstones (Buntsandstein) from a marginal basin facies, southwest Germany". Our abstract reads: "After decades of hydrocarbon exploration and production in the Lower Triassic Buntsandstein from the Central European Basin center, the marginal southern German Buntsandstein has gained interest as a potential lithology for geothermal applications and lithium brine extractions. For this purpose and in order to better understand reservoir quality, porosity and permeability in combination with point-counted petrographic data of sandstones from SW Germany covering the Lower, Middle, and Upper Buntsandstein are studied. Textural, mineralogical, and petrophysical data show that the eolian and fluvial sandstones represent a heterogeneous reservoir system. Permeabilities vary over six orders of magnitude from 0.001 to 515 mD, while porosities are in the range of 7.9–21.5%. Different controls on reservoir quality exist. Large grain sizes ≥0.31 mm together with total quartz contents are the major controls on reservoir quality. Additional controls on reservoir quality are exerted by authigenic phases. Since porosity loss is dominated by compaction, the influence of authigenic clay phases on reservoir quality is minor. However, illite coatings on detrital quartz efficiently inhibited syntaxial quartz
overgrowth. Where illite coatings lack, syntaxial quartz overgrowths locally stabilized the granular framework and, thus, preserved primary porosity. These authigenic phases, however, represent a local control, which cannot be applied on a regional scale. Similarly, enhanced secondary porosity due to feldspar dissolution is locally
restricted and minor. The comparison with other studies on the Buntsandstein shows that its reservoir system is highly heterogeneous over small and large scales and within the same stratigraphic levels. In this study, quartzrich and authigenic clay-poor sandstones with relative large grain sizes interpreted as eolian deposits reveal the
best reservoir qualities."
11.5.2022 Chris' eingeladener Vortrag bei MetSem
Chris hält einen Impulsvortrag zu "Klimawende – Energiewende – Rohstoffwende" beim Metallurgischen Seminar mit dem Konferenztitel Chancen und Herausforderungen der Elektromobilität, an der CUTEC GmbH, Clausthal Zellerfeld 11.-12.5.2022.
10.5.2022 Chris on Raw Material in radio Deutschlandfunk
Chris gives an interview with Karl Urban, Deutschlandfunk on the importance of raw material and raw material supply entitled Raw Materials for the Energy Transition: Geologist plead for more mining in Germany (Rohstoffe für die Energiewende: Geologen plädieren für mehr Bergbau in Deutschland). LINK
9.5.2022 Chris key note in Berlin, Natural History Museum
Chris gives a keynote at the German Geologists Day at the Natural History Museum on The Raw Material Supply for Germany - a forgotten probelm? (in German: Die Rohstoffversorgung Deutschlands – ein vergessenes Problem?) entitled "Rohstoffe für Deutschland – welche werden gebraucht und woher kommen sie?", followed by stimulating panel discussion of politicians.
16.5.-30.7.2022 Humboldt Fellow Mansih Mamtani with us
We are happy to welcome our colleague Professor Manish Mamtani from ITT Kharaghpur, India, here at KIT for a research stay on rock magnetics.
12.3.2022 Chris' eingeladener Vortrag bei TSK 19
Chris gibt einen Impulsvortrag bei der TSK 19, dem 19. Symposium zu„Tectonik, Strukturgeologie und Kristallingeologie“, 07.-13.03.2022 an der Martin-Luther-Universität in Halle/Saale zu den globalen Herausforderungen, Untergrund-Reservoire und Strukturelle Diagenese von Christoph Hilgers, Benjamin Busch, Dennis Quandt, Jasemin Ölmez, Felix Allgaier. "Many global challenges are geology challenges. For example, the energy- and mobility transition will result in an increase of raw material demand and the utilization of the subsurface. This includes the long-term storage using CCS to achieve negative emissions, the safe disposal of nuclear waste, the interim storage of large renewable energy volumes in reutilized salt caverns as well as fractured and porous storage sites, the storage of heat and the exploration of geothermal energy. Reservoir characterization and reservoir quality prediction considers porosity loss due to cementation in pores, and the formation, persistence and cementation of fractures. Reservoir-scale geometries and heterogeneities of geological bodies and faults and fractures affect permeability, which are governed by microstructural processes such as creep and cementation. We present case studies that combine results from subsurface exploration, from reservoir to microscale, which may enhance subsurface utilization and reduce risks."
1.2.2022 Chris' eingeladener Vortrag bei DGMK/EAGE/SPE
Chris gibt einen Impulsvortrag zu "Solving global challenges needs subsuface knowledge" und nimmt an der Podiumsdiskussion mit Steve Freeman, Head of Energy Transition / Schlumberger, Catherine Gras, Managing Director Storengy UK & Germany, Throsten Hinz, Manger P&GA ExxonMobil und Frank Strozyk, Head of Tansfer & Strategy Fraunhofer IEG, moderiert durch Gesa Netzeband teil beim online DGMK/EAGE/GSSPE Joint Event ‘Digging deeper – getting ready for future subsurface use’.
13.-17.12.2021 Agnes Vortrag auf Einladung bei der AGU
Agnes spricht in ihrem Vortrag auf Einladung zu "Cooling Rates of Pyroclastic Deposits Inferred from Mineral Magnetism", Co-Autoren Philipp Lied und Horst Kämpf, auf der Konferenz American Geophysical Union AGW Fall Meeting 2021. Die AGU ist die weltgrößte Konferenz zu Geowissenschaften, die dieses Jahr hybrid in New Orleans, USA vom 13-17 Dezember stattfindet. Neben Session GP24A: Paleomagnetic and Rock Magnetic Methods Applied to Volcanology I, trägt Agens zu session GP25B: Paleomagnetic and Rock Magnetic Methods Applied to Volcanology II mit einem Poster z "Emplacement Processes of Pyroclastic Rocks Derived from Thermomagnetic Measurements: a Case Study from Popocatépetl Volcano, Mexico" mit Katarzyna Dudzisz und Luis Alva-Valdivia bei.
29.11.2021 PodCast Rohstoffe bei der Energiewende
Chris wird für die EnergieAgentur.NRW von Frau Kira Crome zu den Rohstoffen bei der Energiewende befragt, den PodCast finden Sie hier.
Die Energiewende ist eine Rohstoffwende. Die erneuerbaren Energien wie Wind und Sonne sind rohstoffintensiv, d.h. sie benötigen mehr Rohstoffe pro erzeugter Energie. Auch die Mobilitätswende mit batteriebetriebenen Kraftfahrzeugen benötigt mehr Rohstoffe pro Fahrzeug als bislang. Wenn die Kohlenwasserstoffe als Energieträger, die derzeit etwa 85% der primären Energie weltweit und 77% in Deutschland (Stand 2020) ausmachen, ersetzt und die globalen Fahrzeugantriebe ausgetauscht werden sollen, ist der Bedarf an Metallen und Baurohstoffen entsprechend groß. Geologisch besteht kein Mangel an den potentiell kritischen Rohstoffen, ob Sie für das Industrieland Deutschland auch mittelfristig verfügbar sind ist bleibt offen. Deutschland grenzt an eine der größten bekannten Kupferlagerstätten, den Kupferschiefer. Es werden aber derzeit weder national Metalle abgebaut, noch global von europäischen Firmen im großen Maßstab exploriert. Bei global wachsender Weltbevölkerung und zunehmendem gobalen Wohlstand kann die Kreislaufwirtschaft aber nur einen Teil des Rohstoffbedarfs decken. Nur durch Innovation bei Bergbau und Recycling können Lieferketten auch mittelfristig gesichert werden.
23.-25.11.2021 EAGE 2te GET Konferenz zu CO2 Speichern
Chris war wieder Mitglied des technischen Kommittees, die zur zweiten EAGE GET21 Geoscience & Engineering in the Energy Transition Conference führte. Zudem leitet Chris die Session "Exploration and Geographical Mapping of CO2 Storage Resources" um 14.45h CET am 24. Nov. 24 zusammen mit JOSE-MARIA GONZALEZ-MUÑOZ von #Repsol.
12.10.2021 GeoKarlsruhe21 am Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT) - Rückblick
Von Christoph Hilgers und Jürgen Grötsch
Vom 19.-24.9.2021 wurde die Jahrestagung der DGGV e.V. GeoKarlsruhe „Sustainable Earth – from processes to resources” mit etwa 700 Teilnehmern aus 36 Ländern am Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT) ausgerichtet.
Nach der Eröffnung der virtuellen Konferenz durch den KIT Präsidenten Holger Hanselka und den DGGV Präsidenten Jürgen Grötsch wurden in sechs parallelen Sessions neueste geowissenschaftliche Ergebnisse präsentiert und diskutiert. Die öffentlichen, live-gestreamten Podiumsdiskussionen und Plenarvorträge adressierten die aktuellen Themen Energiewende, Rohstoffverfügbarkeit, BigData und Wasser.
An den Podiumsdiskussionen nahmen Vorstände und Geschäftsführer von Unternehmen wie der BMW AG, Sachtleben Minerals AG, Scholz Recycling GmbH, Shell plc, ThyssenKrupp Steel Europe AG, T-Systems, VNG AG und Wintershall DEA AG teil, die die aktuellen Entwicklungen und notwendigen Rahmenbedingungen im Bereich von CO2-freier Energie, Rohstoffgewinnung und neuen Verarbeitungsprozesse aufzeigten. Die Leiterinnen und Leiter der teilnehmenden Behörden des BGS, BGR und DERA trugen mit Daten, notwendigen regulatorische Richtlinien und globaler Perspektive bei. Gemeinsam mit der Forschung, u.a. vertreten durch den Vizepräsidenten für Innovation und Internationales des KIT Thomas Hirth, diskutierten Unternehmen, Behörden und Forschung zu den Herausforderungen und Lösungen einer „Energiewende mit Wasserstoff?“, „Kritische Rohstoffe“ und „The Future of Geodata Management“. Die Fachsektion Hydrogeologie der DGGV adressierte mit Vertreterinnen und Vertretern aus Universität, Wasserwirtschaft (ERM GmbH), Stadtwerken und Behörden (Umweltministerium) das Thema „Grundwasser und Trinkwasser – Herausforderungen durch Klimawandel und Landnutzung“.
Plenarvorträge zu den großen Themen Energiewende, kritische Rohstoffe, BigData und Wasser rundeten die thematischen Programme ab. Scott Tinker, BEG Texas, zu “From Poverty to Prosperity: The Real Energy Transition”, Kathyrn Goodenough, BGS, zu “Critical Raw Materials for the Energy Transition”, Karen Hanghøj zu “The Future of Geodata Management” und Bridget Scanlon, BEG Texas, zu “The Relative Importance of Climate and Humans on Water Storage Changes using GRACE Satellite Data” bereicherten das Programm mit ihren externen Sichtweisen.
Das Spektrum der wissenschaftlichen Sessions reichte von „Magmatischer und Metamorpher Petrologie“ über Batterierohstoffe für die E-Mobilität bis zu Themen der Geophysik wie „Induzierter Seismizität und Emissionen von Windturbinen“. Die Sessions wurden von Forscherinnen und Forschern sowie von Firmen wie Beak Consultants GmbH, KBB.DEEP GmbH, DMT & Co KG GmbH und Q-con GmbH initiiert und demonstrieren die Notwendigkeit der Kommunikation von Forschung und Wirtschaft. Lunch Seminare von Agilent Technologies GmbH und Bruker AXS GmbH gaben Einblick in die neueste Analytik. Höhepunkt war der öffentliche und live gestreamte Abendvortrag von John Grotzinger zu „Geology of Mars“.
Die Young Scientist Sessions, der Workshop für Early Career Researchers der jDGGV, das Networking Speed Dating des SGA Student Chapters, sowie das “Exploration Game – do you wanna find heat?” des KIT SPE Student Chapters & der SPE YoungProfessionals dokumentierten das Engagement der jungen Generation.
Eingebettet in das vielfältige Programm der GeoKarlsruhe21 war die Verleihung der wissenschaftlichen Preise des Jahres 2020 und 2021, die an anderer Stelle ausführlich gewürdigt werden.
Trotz der Corona-bedingten Online-Konferenz über die Plattform Scoocs mit eingebundener Zoom Software, einem digitalen IceBreaker mit Wonder.Me, und virtuellen Exkursionen wurden auch „echte“, physische Exkursionen von Dr. Elisabeth Eiche und Dr. Benjamin Walter an den Kaiserstuhl, Dr. Benjamin Busch in den Kraichgau und Dr. Carsten Reinhold nach Pechelbronn durchgeführt.
Die Tagungsleiter Christoph Hilgers (KIT) und Jürgen Grötsch (DGGV e.V.), unterstützt insbesondere durch das weitere Organisationsteam Jochen Kolb, Agnes Kontny sowie Frank Schilling, Armin Zeh und Nico Goldscheider (alle KIT), danken den Kolleginnen und Kollegen für die zahlreichen Beiträge zur GeoKarlsruhe21 und die Leitung von Sessions. Den Goldsponsoren Agilent und Bruker, den Silbersponsoren DEEP.KBB GmbH, Heidelberger Sand und Kies GmbH, Springer Spektrum, ThermoFisher Scientific und BGR, sowie die Bronzesponsoren ISTE/MIRO, Opterra GmbH und Schweizerbart ist herzlich für die finanzielle Unterstützung gedankt. Auch den zahlreichen Helferinnen und Helfern der DGGV um Gerd Röhling und FU Confirm GmbH, dem KIT und vor allem den helfenden Studierenden, Assistentinnen und Assistenten sei an dieser Stelle gedankt.
Die DGGV Konferenz GeoKarlsruhe21 zeigte, dass die Geowissenschaften von den Grundlagen bis zu den angewandten Gebieten, von Forschung über Behörden zu Industrie allen Bereichen eine Heimat für den wissenschaftlichen und anwendungsbezogenen Austausch bieten kann. Mit einer starken gemeinsamen Plattform können die Geowissenschaften zur Lösung der globalen Herausforderungen und gesellschaftlich relevanten Themen beitragen.
21.09.2021 Fachsektion Energie & Rohstoffe FUTURE auf der GeoKarlsruhe21 gegründet
Von Christoph Hilgers und Jürgen Grötsch
Zur Jahrestagung der DGGV e.V. GeoKarlsruhe21 „Sustainable Earth – from processes to resources” am am Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT) beschloss die Mitgliederversammlung am 21.9.2021 auf Antrag die Gründung der Fachsektion Energie & Rohstoffe FUTURE (Forschung und Technik für Untergrund, Rohstoffe & Energie). Die Fachsektion steht den DGGV- und externen Mitgliedern offen.
Die Fachsektion Energie & Rohstoffe FUTURE beschäftigt sich mit integrativen Lösungen zur Energiewende und Rohstoffversorgung. Sie bildet eine geowissenschaftliche Plattform für eine nachhaltige Nutzung des Untergrunds. Hierzu zählen die Aufsuchung und Gewinnung von Energie und Rohstoffen und die sichere Speicherung im Untergrund.
Zunehmende Weltbevölkerung, wachsender Wohlstand, technische Innovation sowie Energie- und Mobilitätswende werden zu einer weiterhin steigenden globalen Nachfrage von Energie und Rohstoffen führen. Sichere Zwischenspeicher für Energieträger aus erneuerbaren Energien und die dauerhafte Verwahrung von CO2 zum Klimaschutz werden an Bedeutung zunehmen. Die nachhaltige Nutzung des Untergrunds und die sichere Speicherung im Untergrund kann nur mit geowissenschaftlichem Fachwissen gewährleistet werden.
Ziel der Fachsektion ist, die geowissenschaftliche Erkenntnis zu den Themen Energie & Rohstoffe sowie Untergrundspeicher zu erhöhen, einen Beitrag zur Nachhaltigkeit zu leisten und wissenschaftliche Erkenntnisse zur nachhaltige Energie- und Rohstoffversorgung mit der Öffentlichkeit zu teilen.
Die Fachsektion adressiert folgende Themen:
- Mineralische Rohstoffe wie für die sichere Versorgung der Industrie und Gesellschaft
- GeoEnergie aus dem Untergrund wie Geothermie und Kohlenwasserstoffe für industrielle Produkte
- Untergrundspeicher für Wärme, große stoffliche Energiespeicher, Dauerspeicher für CO2 und Endlager in geologischen Formationen
Die Fachsektion bietet folgende Services:
- Plattform des wissenschaftlichen Austausches bei Tagungen, Workshops, Symposien, Weiterbildungsveranstaltungen und Exkursionen
- Vernetzung mit nationalen und internationalen, wissenschaftlichen und beruflichen Organisationen, um Technologieentwicklungen zu fördern
- Arbeitskreise zu den Themen Mineralische Rohstoffe, GeoEnergie und unterirdischer Speicherraum
- Informationsplattform für Fachleute und Öffentlichkeit
Kolleginnen und Kollegen der Universitäten RWTH Aachen, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, TH Gregor Agricola Bochum (THGA), Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg, Karlsruher Institut für Technologie (KIT), Hochschule Pforzheim (HS PF), Universität Potsdam (UP), Montanuniversität Leoben MUL, Geoforschungszentrums GFZ, der BGR, DERA und Landesbehörden initiierten die Fachsektion und freuen sich auf weitere neue Unterstützende der Fachsektion aus dem akademischen Bereich der Studierenden, Forschenden und Lehrenden, den Behörden und der Industrie.
Zu den Gründungsmitgliedern zählen Prof. Dr. Tobias Backers (RUB); Prof. Dr. Gregor Borg (Halle); Prof. Dr. Rolf Bracke (IEG, RUB); Dr. Peter Buchholz (DERA); Dr. Christoph Gaedicke (BGR); Prof. Dr. Christoph Gauert (LAGB); Dr. Gabriela von-Goerne (BGR); Dr. Jürgen Grötsch (DGGV Präsident); Prof. Dr. Christoph Hilgers (KIT); Prof. Dr. Jochen Kolb (KIT); Prof. Dr. Michael Kühn (GFZ, UP); Prof. Dr. Peter Kukla (RWTH, IEG); Prof. Dr. Ralf Littke (RWTH); Prof. Dr. Frank Melcher (MUL); Dr. Holger Paulick; Dr. Gerd Röhling (DGGV Schatzmeister), Prof. Dr. Tobias Rudolph (THAG); Prof. Dr. Magdalena Scheck-Wenderoth (GFZ); Prof. Dr. Mario Schmidt (HS PF). Auf der Mitgliederversammlung der DGGV2021 wurde Christoph Hilgers zum Vorsitzenden der FS Energie & Rohstoffe FUTURE gewählt.
19.09.-23.09.2021 Jahrestagung der Deutschen Geo-DGGV Konferenz @KIT
Wir freuen uns, die Jahrestagung der DGGV vom 19.-23.9.2021 mit dem Thema "Sustainable earth - from processes to resources" mit mehr als 600 Teilnehmern aus 36 Ländern am KIT ausrichten zu dürfen, sowie dem nachfolgenden European Geothermal Workshop am 23. und 24.9.. In sechs parallelen Sessions wird Grundlagen- und Angewandte Forschung präsentiert, die von den inneren Prozessen der Erde bis zum Weltram reichen. Unterschiedlichste Aspekte des Klimawandels, der Energiewende inklusive Wasserstoff und CCS, Big Data und natürliche Ressourcen wie Grundwasser, Baustoffe, Industrieminerale und Metalle werden in Vorträgen, Plenaries und Podiumsdiskussionen von unseren Gästen aus der ganzen Welt präsentiert. KIT freut sich, die DGGV Jahrestagung nach der letzten DGG Tagung in Karlsruhe 1855 und der letzten GV Tagung in Karlsruhe 1975 wieder ausrichten zu dürfen. Auch wenn die Konferenz wegen Corona digital durchgeführt weden muss, freuen wir uns, Sie willkommen zu heissen und wünschen Ihnen während der Konferenz eine gute Zeit.
15.09.2021 Keynote Rohstoffverfügbarkeit
Chris präsentiert bei den Meggener Rohstofftagen (15.-17.09.2021) eine Keynote zum "Der Rohstoffbedarf der Zukunft". Das gobale Wachstum von Wltbevölkerung und Wohlstand wird die Nachfrage nach mehr Rohstoffen und mehr Energie erhöhen, weiter angetrieben durch die höheren Rohstoffverbräuche von Eneuerbare-Energien-Anlagen und Edelmetalle für Katalysatoren von Wasserstoff. Strategische Möglichkeiten unterscheiden sich von Land zu Land, und Vorhersagen, wie Warren Buffet einst meinte “may tell you a great deal about the forecaster; they tell you nothing about the future". ASind die Rahmenbedingungen in Deutschland ausreichend, um eine sichere und nachhaltige Lieferketten von Rohstoffen aufrecht zu erhalten?
07.09.2021 Keynote bei der Tohoku Sommerschule, Japan zu Energiewende & Rohstoffe
Chris hält eine eingeladene Keynote an der Graduate School of Environmental Studies (GSES) Sommerschule 2021 "Environmental sustainability from energy, resource, and resilience perspectives", an der Tohoku University, Japan, ausgerichtet von September 6 – 8, 2021, zu "Energy transition and natural resources - global picture and German context". Die Energiewende zu net-zero wird von vielen Ländern vorangetrieben, um die anthropogenen Ausstoß von CO2 zu reduzieren. Dazu gehört ein globaler Übergang von den fossilen Energietägern, die derzeit mehr als 80% der globalen Primärenergie bereitstellen, zu erneuerbaren Energien wie Wind, Solar und Geothermie. Die weiterhin steigende Weltbevölkerung und steigender globaler Wohlstand werden zu einem weiterhin steigenden Bedarf an Energie und Rohstoffen führen, der sich durch die Energiewende weiter erhöhen wird. Eine sichere Rohstoffversorgung wird durch die benötigten Mengen, die notwendigen höheren Raten der Rohstoffförderung und die Rohstoffkosten herausgefordert, sowohl hinsichtlich natürlicher Ressourcen als auch beim Recycling. Daher ist die Energiewende eine geologische und ingenieurwissenschaftliche Herausforderung, die es zu lösen gilt.
06.09.2021 Abendvortrag zu Rohstoffsicherheit
Chris ist zu einem Abendvortrag in Bretten eingeladen, und berichtet zu Wettbewerb um Rohstoffe – haben wir das Nachsehen? Deutschland ist Europas größte Wirtschaft und eine der größten weltweit, bekannt für technologische Innovationen und qualitativ hochwertige Produkte. Um diese Stellung zu halten, sind resiliente Lieferketten von Rohstoffen notwendig. Der Bedarf an Energie- und organischen Rohstoffen, Mineralen und Metallen steigt weltweit, deren Verfügbarkeit hingegen sinkt durch eine steigende Weltbevölkerung und globalen Wohlstand. Durch die Energiewende mit rohstoffintensiven Energieanlagen, der Digitalisierung und Mobilitätswende wird der Rohstoffbedarf weiter steigen. Recycling und Kreislaufwirtschaft, mit Recyclingraten <1% für viele kritische Rohstoffe, werden den wachsenden Bedarf nicht decken können. Welche Strategien fahren Deutschland und andere Wirtschaftsnationen, um die Rohstoffversorgung zu sichern?
03.09.2021 Bennis Paper accepted - erste hydrothermale Zementationsexperimente
08.07.2021 Petex Educational License Vertrag
23.7.2021 AGW Sommerfest
Unter Einhaltung der Corona-Auflagen können wir mit unseren Studierenden, die neben den Schülern die größten Leidtragenden der Corona-Einschränkungen waren, an der frischen Luft unser AGW-Sommerfest ausrichten. Der Orga der Fachschaft herzlichen Dank!
23.6.2021 Institutsleitertreffen Ponyhof
Chris freut sich, dass das alljährliche Treffen der nun acht Institutsleiter zusammen mit der Vertreterin des akademischen Mittelbaus in Flehingen unter Einhaltung der Corona-Auflagen durchgeführt werden konnte. In den offenen und konstruktiven Diskussionen wurden zahlreiche Themen angesprochen, insbesondere zur digitalen Lehre und den Möglichkeiten, einer Dozentenrunde zur inhaltlichen Abstimmung und Anpassung von Kursinhalten und vor allem Möglichkeiten, unsere Studierenden noch besser in der schweren Zeit zu unterstützen. Ein wichtiger Beschluss war die möglichst zeitnahe Durchführung unseres alljährlichen Sommerfests.
25.-26.6.2021 Exkursion Regionale Geologie Teil B
"Solange die Brille trocken bleibt, ist das Wetter gut und es scheint die Sonne." So machten wir uns auf den Weg und das Wetter war entsprechend Definition brilliant. Nach einem kurzen Lauf durch Weingartener Moor gings zur Bohrung der Rheinpetroleum bei Weingarten, die mit dem geförderten Erdöl die Raffinerie Miro in Karlsuhe beliefern wird. Die Miro ist die zweitgrößte Erdölraffinerie Deutschlands und versorgt unter anderem die chemische Industrie mit den notwendigen Rohstoffen. Nach Rheingraben gings in die Karbonate im Steinbruch, den Gipskeuper, Schilfsandstein und Stubensandstein. Selber entdecken, selber analysieren, schau mal hier, und schau mal da, und immer was neues finden - Geologie ist super.
11.-13.6.2021 Exkursion Regionale Geologie Teil A
Hurra, endlich ins Gelände. Chris, Felix und Dennis konnten mit unseren Studierenden die Exkursion ins Variszikum der Eifel durchführen. Nach einem Profil durch die Niederrheinische Bucht bis Nideggen und anschliessender Übernachtung in der Jugendherberge ebendort, entwickelten wir am folgenden Tag ein Profil über das Stavelot-Venn Massif in das variszische Vorland nördlich von Aachen. Dabei wurden unterschiedlichste Sedimentgesteine und Strukturen identifiziert und dokumentiert, und am Abend in Karten und Schmidtschen Netzen ausgewertet. Am letzten Tag widmeten wir uns dem Abraum der Steinkohle, der Entwicklung der Niederrheinischen Bucht und studierten nach der Geologie des Tagebau Hambachs die Rekultivierung zu Forstwirtschaft und Ackerbau.
25.5.2021 Endlich mal Steine
Heute gehen wir Kinkbands in Kalksteinen suchen, wo alle anderen Abschiebungen sehen ;-)
30.3.2021 Alex Paper im Druck
Das Paper "Compaction control on diagenesis and reservoir quality development in red bed sandstones - a case study of Permian Rotliegend sandstones" von Alex, Benni und Chris ist nun zum Druck im International Journal of Earth Sciences angenommen worden.
24.2.2021 Alex' Disputation erfolgreich
Heute verteidigte Alex erfolgreich seine Dissertation "Diagenetic Controls on Fluid Flow and Mechanical Properties in Rotliegend Reservoir Sandstones". Co-Gutachter der Dissertation war Harald Stollhofen. Herzlichen Dank für die Übernahme des Co-Referats.
23.2.2021 Robert's Disputation erfolgreich
Heute verteidigte Robert Egert erfolgreich seine Dissertation zu numerischen Simulationen des Fliessverhalten auf Kluftflächen. Herzlichen Glückwunsch!
1.2.2021 Dr. Amol Sawant with us
Wir heissen Amol als neues Mitglied der Gruppe herzlich willkommen. Amol wird sich um das Ägyptenprojekt und die struktruelle Analyse des Rheingabens anhand von 3D Seismik kümmern. Amol hat seine Disputation am IIT Kharagpur, Indien gemacht.
29.1.2021 ThinkTank Broschüre gedruckt
Unsere 72-seitige Broschüre "Ist die deutsche Rohstoffstrategie resilient? Bergbau, Verhüttung, Recycling" von Christoph Hilgers, Jochen Kolb und Ivy Becker ist nun in der finalen Version unter IRS-THINKTANK Industrielle Ressourcenstrategien und gedruckt erhältlich (doi 10.5445/IR/1000124406).
12.01.2021 EAGE Geoscience in the Energy Transition Konferenz in Planung
Das Technical Committee der EAGE, in dem Chris mitwirkt, bereitet die GET2021 Konferenz Geoscience in the Energy Transition vor. Wir hoffen im November 2021 eine physische Konferenz in Strassburg durchführen zu können.
12.01.2021 EAGE Geoscience in the Energy Transition Konferenz in Planung
Das Technical Committee der EAGE, in dem Chris mitwirkt, bereitet die GET2021 Konferenz Geoscience in the Energy Transition vor. Wir hoffen im November 2021 eine physische Konferenz in Strassburg durchführen zu können.
16.12.2020 Tina ist nun Doktorin
Heute verteidigte Tina erfolgreich ihre Dissertation zu den Reservoireigenschaften des Buntsandsteins in Süddeutschland. Neben den Gutachtern Reinhard Gaupp und Chris waren Thomas Kohl, Jochen Kolb, Agnes Kontny und Frank Schilling Mitglieder der Prüfungskommission. Neben der Forschung managte Tina ein großes Projekt von mehreren Firmen, Universitätskliniken und geologischen Instituten aus Deutschland, Ägypten, Marokko und Tunesien. Im Anschluss an ihre Tätigkeit bei uns wird Tina ihre Karriere in der Industrie im Bereich Geothermie weiterführen. Wir wünschen Tina alles Gute und weiterhin viel Erfolg.
11.12.2020 Chris' Beitrag zur German University of Technology Oman GUtech
Zum zehnjährigen Bestehen der GUtech berichtet Chris im Buch "In honour of the vist of His Majesty Sultan Qaboos bin Said German University of Technology in Oman GUtech - the first ten years (2007-2017)", herausgegeben von M. Jansen, M. Modigell und B. Rauhut, zu "The early years of GUtech - from vision to reality" (ISBN 978-3-487-15946-1).
2.12.2020 Dennis präsentiert das FloodRisk Projekt beim BMBF Kick-off Seminar
Beim BMBF Kick-off Online-Seminar des Projektträgers Jülich zum Themenschwerpunkt „Früherkennung von Erdbeben und deren Folgen“ stellt Dennis FloodRisk vor und präsentiert erste Ergebnisse der beteiligten Arbeitsgruppen. In Zukunft werden diese multidisziplinären Daten zu einem interdisziplinären Modell zusammengefügt.
TODAY 2020 GET2020 Konferenz zu Geo- & Ingenieurwissenschaften in der Energiewende, 16-18.11.2020 in Straßburg Frankreich
Wir freuen uns, auf die erste EAGE 's Konferenz zur Energiewende in Straßburg hinzuweisen. Über Ihre Abstracts zu den Themen Geothermie, Energiespeicher, CO2-Speicher, Cross Use & Synergien sowie Lösungen, Gesellschaft & Politik würden wir uns sehr freuen. Chris ist Kommittee - Mitglied. Abstract Deadline ist der 28.6.2020. Weitere Informationen erhalten Sie hier
8.10.2020 Chris spricht beim Ressourceneffizienz-Kongress in Stuttgart zu industriellen Ressourcenstrategien
Beim erstmals hybrid organisierten Ressourceneffizienz-Kongress spricht Chris in der Messe Stuttgart mit einer anschliessenden Live-Podiumsdiskussion. Der aufgezeichnete Beitrag ist in Kürze auch online verfügbar. Thema sind industrielle Ressourcenstrategien zu resilienten Lieferketten von Rohstoffen. Dabei ergab sich auch die Möglichkeiten eines Gesprächs mit unserer Wirtschaftsministerin Nicole Hoffmeister-Kraut.
5.10.2020 Marita Felder von PanTerra, Niederlande, gibt Shortcourse zu Diagenese
Wir heissen Marita und Nieck Molenaar herzlich willkommen zum alljährlichen Diagenesekurs. In einer corona-bedingt kleinen Gruppe lernen unsere Studierende Tipps und Tricks bei der Analyse und Bewertung von Reservoir-Qualitäten anhand von petrographischer Mikroskopie. Solche semi-quantitativen Analysen ermöglichen die Analyse von Vorhersage von Reservoir-Qualitäten, wie sie für Geothermie, Speicher und Kohlenwasserstoffe benötigt werden.
1.10.2020 Wir heissen unsere neue Mitarbeiterin Katharina Steiger willkommen
Mit iher akademischen und industriellen Kenntnis des Ressourcenmanagements wird sich Katharina mit den industriellen Ressourcenstrategien befassen. Wir heissen Katharina herzlich willkommen und freuen uns auf die gemeinsame Zusammenarbeit.
28.9.-4.10.2020 Kartierkurs in Kirn
Endlich können wir wieder mit unseren Studierenden ins Gelände. Unnser alljährlicher Kartierkurs führt uns nach Kirn bei Idar-Oberstein. Am Übergang von der Nördlichen Phyllitzone im Rhenoherzynikum zum Saar-Nahe Becken finden wir magmatische, metamorphe und sedimentäre Gesteine und ertellen wir eine geologische Karte. Weitere Infos hier.
21.-25.9.2020 Geländeseminar Reservoir-Geologie im Rheingraben
Wegen Corona haben wir unser Geländeseminar von unserer üblichen Region in SW-England in den Rheingraben verlegt. Benni und Chris waren einige Wochen unterwegs, spannende Aufschlüsse zu suchen. Und wir müssen gestehen, es war tooler als erwartet. Alle Steinbruchbetreiber haben uns Einblick gegeben, und so war die Auschlussqualität so gut wie die Kliffs am Bristol- und Ärmelkanal. Dazu kann man das Rheingraben Rift-Becken tatsächlich von der Grabenschulter aus sehen. Zudem wird das Rheingraben-Rift nach wie vor erfolgreich auf Erdöl und Geothermie exploriert. Weitere Infos hier.
11.-13.9.2020 Geländeseminar Rheingraben - Schwarzwald
Teil des Moduls Regionale Geologie BSc 4. Sem. ist ein 5-tägiges Geländeseminar. Nun fahren wir durch den Rheingraben und den Schwarzwald. Wir abeiten und in einem Profil querschlägig zur Rhiengraben, und dann durch den Schwarzwald. Wir trainieren unsere Augen, die Geologie aus den Gesteinen zu lesen und zerschlagen sie nicht. Wir verbessern die Datenaufnahme und deren Dokumentation im geologischen Feldbuch. Weitere Infos zum Teil A hier.
4.-6.9.2020 Geländeseminar Ardennen - Voreifel
Teil des Moduls Regionale Geologie BSc 4. Sem. ist ein 5-tägiges Geländeseminar. Nun fahren wir zur Jugendherberge Simmerath am Rurstausee, Nationalpark Eifel. Wir arbeiten uns in einem Profil querschlägig zur Niederrheinischen Bucht, und dann aus der Eifel in das Vorland. Wir trainieren unsere Augen, die Geologie aus den Gesteinen zu lesen und zerschlagen sie nicht. Wir verbessern die Datenaufnahme und deren Dokumentation im geologischen Feldbuch. Weitere Infos zum Teil A hier.
27.8.2020 Tinas Publikation zu Reservoir-Heterogenitäten online
Wie heterogen ist so einen Sandsteinlage tatsächlich? Kann man von einem Bohrkern auf die laterale Heterogenität schliessen? Tinas Paper "Lateral variations of detritral, authigenic and petrophysical properties in an outcrop analog of the fluvial Plattensandstein, Lower Triassic, Central S-Germany" zeigt an einem Reservoir-Analog auf, was durch Bohrkerne unmöglich ist abzuleiten.
26.8.2020 DGGV Konferenz 2021 in Karlsruhe am KIT
Auf der DGGV Jahrestagung in Utrecht stellt Chris das KIT als Gastegeber der DGGV e.V. Jahrestagung 2021 vor. Wir hoffen auf eine physische Tagung und planen und in alle Richtungen. Mit den Kollegen Jochen Kolb, Frank Schilling und Armin Zeh, unterstützt von den Kollegen Philipp Blum, Nico Goldscheider und Thomas Kohl versuchen wir gemeinsam mit unseren Gästen ein spannenden Progamm zu erstellen.
15.8.2020 Tinas Publikation zu Bleichung online
Warum gibt es weisse Flecken und Streifen in roten Sandsteinen, und haben die einen Einfluss auf die Reservoirqualitäten? Tinas Paper "Compaction and cementation control on bleaching in Triassic fluvial red beds, S-Germany" ist nun in der Zeitschrift der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Geowissenschaften veröffentllicht und gibt Antworten.
11.8.2020 Publikation in ThinkTank Reihe
Seltene Erden sind nicht selten, Recycling im Kreislauf gibts nicht und ist auch nicht per se ökologischer, und zunehmende Weltbevölkerung, Wohlstandswende, Energiewende und Mobiltätswende erfordern einen massiven Bedarf an Rohstoffen. Unsere im Rahmen des ThinkTanks Industrielle Ressourcenstrategien verfasste Analyse von Christoph Hilgers mit Ivy Becker und Jochen Kolb zu Bergbau, Verhüttung, Recycling – ist die deutsche Nachfrage und das Angebot an Rohstoffen resilient? wird in der ThinkTank Reihe veröffentlicht.
11.8.2020 Publikation in Cement International online
Schon mal vom Sandkrieg gehört, oder dem Mangel an Hüttensand und Gips durch das Zurückfahren der Schwerindustrie in Deutschland? Unsere im Rahmen des ThinkTanks Industrielle Ressourcenstrategien verfasste Analyse wird in Cement International - Beton, Verlag Bau + Technik GmbH zum Thema Ressourcen - Beton veröffentlicht. Christoph Hilgers, Ivy Becker und Frank Dehn beleuchen die Verfügbarkeit der Rohstoffe für den Baustoff Beton: Geologische- und STEEPLE-Aspekte zur überregionalen Verfügbarkeit von Rohstoffen zur Herstellung von Beton.
11.8.2020 Publikation in Energies online
Lohnt es sich, aus dem Braunkohletagebau ein Pumpspeicherkraft zu machen? Unsere Publikation Economic Feasibility of Semi-Underground Pumped Storage Hydropower Plants in Open-Pit Mines von Michael Wessel, Reinhard Madlener und Christoph Hilgers geht online im MDPI Journal Energies.
1.8.2020 Dennis Quandt am KIT
Wir freuen uns, unseren neuen Mitarbeiter Dr. Dennis Quandt am KIT begrüßen zu dürfen. Nach seinem MSc in Berlin und seiner Promotion in Graz beschäftigt sich Dennis mit den den Gesteinen des Oberkarbons, und managt das Projekt Floddrisk.
29.7.2020 Nishant Prajapati verteidigt erfolgreich PhD
Heute verteidigte Nishant Prajapati erfolgreich seine Dissertation zum Thema "Computational modeling of syntaxial overgrowth cementation and fracture propagation in sedimentary" an der Fakultät Maschinenbau mit Hauptgutachterin Prof. Dr. Britta Nestler und Koreferent Chris.
21.7.2020 Arbeitsbesprechung GD Krefeld
Heute tauschen wir uns in Krefeld mit den Projektpartnern von Floodrisk aus.
2.7.2020 VDI Vortrag zu Ressourcenstrategien
Industrielle Ressourcenstrategien vor dem Hintergrund der aktuellen Krise ist der heutige Vortrag von Chris in der VDI Reihe Ressourceneffizienz vor Ort.
30.6.2020 Salome verteidigt erfolgreich PhD
Heute hat Salomé Larmier von der Le Mans Universität, Frankreich, betreut von Alain Zanella, erfolgreich Ihre Dissertation verteidigt. Neben Kollegen von französischen Universitäten und der Firma Total war Julia Gale und Chris als internationale Kommitteemitglieder dabei. Salomé hat schichtparallele Adern aus Bohrungen und Aufschlüssen in Schwarzschiefern Südamerikas untersucht.
15.6.2020 Benni's Publikation in Sedimentary Geology akzeptiert
Wir freuen uns, das unsere Forschung zu Sanddünen und deren mineralogische Heterogenität in Sedimentary Geology publiziert wrid. Die detritische Komponenten und ihre Verteilung im Sediment sind für die Entwicklung der Reservoir-Qualität von enormer Wichtigkeit. Dünensedimente können sich zu exzellenten Speichergesteinen entwicklen, als Zwischenspeicher für Wasserstoff, als Endspeicher für CO2, und als natürlicher Speicher für Erdgas und geothermische Energie.
14.5.2020 Chris' Vortrag bei GDMB zur Deutschlands Versorgung mit Rohstoffen
Chris trägt zum Thema "Exploration und Bergbau - weltweiter Vergleich der Strategien zur Sicherung der Rohstoffversorgung" bei der GDMB - Gesellschaft der Metallurgen und Bergleute e.V. in Goslar, wegen Corona als Online Veranstaltung reorganisiert, vor. Durch den ThinkTank Initative Industrielle Ressourcenstrategien und dem neuen Verein RohstoffWissen! e.V., zu dessen Gründungsmitgliedern Chris gehört, soll die Sichtbarkeit der Rohstoffe für eine resiliente Lieferkette zunehmen und praktische Lösungen in den Vordergrund treten.
17.4.2020 Gubkin University zum 90. Geburtstag alles Gute
Mit grosser Freude feiern wir den 90. Geburtstag der Gubkin Universität in Moskau. Im Doktorandenaustausch zu Themen der Offshore Exploration konnten wir erste gemeinsame Projekte initiieren. Gubkin adressiert erfolgreich die heutigen und zukünfitgen Bedürfnisse mit seiner exzellenten und praktischen Forschung, eng verknüpft mit Industriepartnern. Wir als Partner des Karlsruhe Institute of Technology schätzen unsere Partnerschaft und Freundschaft. Wir wünschen weiterhin viel Erfolg und freuen uns auf den weiteren Ausbau unserer Zusammenarbeit.
5.3.2020 unser Freund und Kollege Guido Stahmer verstorben
Mit großer Trauer nehmen wir Abschied von Guido Stahmer, ein exzellenter Geologie mit ausgezeichneter Kenntnis des regionalen Untergrunds. Nach Tätigkeiten in unterschiedlichen Firmen der E&P Industrie lernten wir Guido vor wenigen Jahren bei einem Seminar am KIT kennen. Oft, aber leider zu wenig haben wir über die Geologie und Gott und die Welt philosphiert. Auch bei unserem 1. KIT Reservoir Days mit der Industrie in Leinsweiler war Guido Ratgeber, Partner und Freund, mit dem wir manch geologisches Problem gelöst und auch herzlich gefeiert haben. Viel zu früh ist er von uns gegangen.
1.3.2020 PostDoc Mitarbeiter gesucht
Wir suchen für das Institut für Angewandte Geowissenschaften (AGW), Lehrstuhl Strukturgeologie zum nächstmöglichen Zeitpunkt eine/n Akademische/n Mitarbeiter/in / Post-Doktorand/in (100%) TV-L E13 Die Stelle ist befristet auf 3 Jahre zu besetzen. Die Strukturgeologie forscht und lehrt in den Bereichen Deformation von Reservoiren, Diagenese und Gesteinsmagnetik. Dies beinhaltet Energie- und mineralische Rohstoffe sowie zugehörige Wertschöpfungsketten. Tätigkeitsbeschreibung: Sie und ein/e Doktorand/in arbeiten in einem interdisziplinären Projekt mit Geodäten, Geomechanikern, Geophysikern, dem Geologischen Dienst NRW und Industriepartnern zu Bodenhebungen durch Grundwasseranstieg in deutschen Steinkohlerevieren. Dazu nutzen Sie Aufschluß-, Rißwerk- und Bohrdaten, erstellen Reservoirmodelle und erweitern unser KnowHow bei der Trennflächenanalyse, sowie der petrographischen und der petrophysikalischen Charakterisierung. Persönliche Qualifikation: Erfolgreiche Kandidaten/innen sollten ihren Master und ihre Promotion im Bereich Geowissenschaften, Geophysik oder einem benachbarten Gebiet abgeschlossen haben. Wir freuen uns auf Ihre Bewerbung! Wir bieten Ihnen einen attraktiven und modernen Arbeitsplatz mit Zugang zur exzellenten Ausstattung des KIT, eine abwechslungsreiche Tätigkeit, ein breitgefächertes Fortbildungsangebot und eine Vergütung entsprechend TV-L E13. Wir streben eine möglichst gleichmäßige Besetzung der Arbeitsplätze mit weiblichen und männlichen Beschäftigten an und würden uns daher insbesondere über die Bewerbung von Frauen freuen. Bei entsprechender Eignung werden schwerbehinderte Menschen bevorzugt berücksichtigt. Bitte bewerben Sie sich bis zum 31.3.2020 in elektronischer Form unter Beilage Ihres professionellen Lebenslaufs sowie einer kurzen Darstellung Ihrer Forschungsinteressen und zwei Gutachtern an Prof. Dr. Christoph Hilgers.
01.03.2020 Doktorand gesucht
21.02.2020 Meetings abgesagt
Unsere Tagungen der Geologischen Konferenz in Dehli Indien, der Tagung in Offenburg, des Workshops in Japan, und der Abschlusstagung in Bonn wurden wegen des Corona Virus leider abgesagt. Wir hoffen, dass unsere Kolleginnen und Kollegen innovative Ansätze entwickeln, Cornona Einhalt zu gebieten.
03.02.2020 DGMK Shortkurse veröffentlicht
Wir freuen uns, die DGMK Shortkurse veröffentlichen zu können:
DGMK/DGG Short Course: Machine Learning for Exploration Geophysics, 10 - 12 March, 2020 in Hamburg
DGMK/DMG/SGA Short Course: From Concept to Oil - The E&P Lifecycle, 26 - 28 May, 2020 in Würzburg
DGMK/DGGV Short Course: Indroduction to Well Logging for Earth Scientists, 9 - 11 June, 2020 Hamburg
For the course programs and further information please visit the DGMK website
31.1.2020 Förderzusage Floodrisk
Wir freuen und über die Förderzusage des BMBF zu unserem Projekt Floodrisk. Mit unseren Kollegen der Geodäsie, der Technischen Petrophysik, vom EIFER Institut, der Geophysik an der Ruhr-Uni Bochum, der DMT, dem Geologischen Dienst NRW, und mit Unterstützung der THF Agricola Bochum und der RAG werden wir uns den geowissenschaftlichen Aspekten der Bergwerksflutungen widmen.
29.1.2020 Call for Abstracts offen bis 28.6.2020, EAGE's GET2020 Konferenz in Strasburg
Sie sind herzlich eingeladen zu einem wissenschaftlichen Beitrag der ersten EAGE GET2020 Konferenz - Geoscience & Engineeing in Energy Transition Conference in Strasburg am 16.-18.11.2020. Themen sind die Geothermie, Energiespeicher, CO2-Speicher sowie Cross-Use und Synergien.
29.01.2020 Nishant's paper out in JGR
Nishants Beitrag über die Quarz-Zementation in polykristallinem Sandstein: Die Erkenntnisse aus den Phasenfeld-Simulationen wurden vom Journal of Geophysical Research mit seinen Koautoren Andres Abad Gonzalez, Michael Selzer, BrittaNestler, Benjamin Busch, Christoph Hilgers angenommen. Ein weiterer Schritt in Richtung digitaler Gesteine.
17.01.2020 KIT Bereich IV Strategie Workshop
Wir haben die Strategie des Bereichs IV in einem großartigen, aufgeschlossenen Umfeld ausgearbeitet und müssen sie nun zu Papier bringen.
16. & 17.01.2020 DGMK Board Treffen zu Energie und Rohstoffe der Zukunft in Karlsruhe
Bei einer wachsenden Weltbevölkerung mit steigendem Wohlstand und Einkommen können Energie und Rohstoffe knapp werden. Es ist nicht unbedingt die geologische Knappheit, sondern die Zugänglichkeit. So diskutiert der Vorstand der DGMK Aspekte zu Wasserstoff, Klima und Mobilität.
15.01.2020 Benni zurück von Forschungsaufenthalt in Sendai, Japan
Benni hatte eine gute und erfolgreiche Zeit bei unserem Kollegen Atshusi Okamoto in Sendai, wo er unter hydrothermalen Bedingungen poröse Gesteinen mit Quarz zementierte.
2019
News 2019
31.12.2019 Ivy moves to industry
Dr. Ivy Becker leaves KIT by the end of the month, where she did excellent research on tight reservoir rocks and as member of the state's ThinkTank Industrial Resources Strategies. We wish her all the best for her future career with Equinor .
24.12.2019 Merry christmas and a happy 2020!
Merry christmas and a happy new year to all our partners, friends and alumni, as well as kind season's grettings. Our 3rd year has passed, which kept us busy with the whole team taking part. The refurb of our labs is almost done, some projects and manuscripts were submitted - keep fingers crossed.
15.12.2019 Invitation to the 17th International Workshop on Water Dynamics - Hydrothermal Fluids in Sendai, Japan
Colleague Prof. Tsuchiya invites to the “17th International Workshop on Water Dynamics” from 27.-29.3.2020 at Tohoku University in Sendai, Japan, with whom we initiated first scientific collaborations.
15.12.2019 Session on GeoEnergy in Dehli, India, planned
We plan a Session on THEME-27.6 Structural Geology: Restoration, Geothermal Energy at the 36th INTERNATIONAL GEOLOGICAL CONGRESS (IGC) in New Delhi from 2-8 March 2020 with our colleagues. Link Dieses Symposium lädt zu Beiträgen ein, die sich mit der Integration verschiedener Ansätze befassen, die, ausgehend von strukturellen Untersuchungen, die Gesellschaft beeinflussen und das Bewusstsein in der Bevölkerung erhöhen. Beiträge, die sich einem tiefen Verständnis struktureller Erdsystemprozesse sowie deren Nutzung widmen, sind willkommen. Dies kann die strukturelle und petrophysikalische Heterogenität bei der nachhaltigen Nutzung geothermischer Ressourcen (von niedrigen bis hohen Temperaturen), die Exploration von Kohlenwasserstoff- und Mineralressourcen, die Sequestrierung des Untergrundes, die Anwendung der strukturellen Geologie bei der Untersuchung von Naturgefahren wie Erdrutschen sowie die Restaurierung und Erhaltung von Kulturstätten umfassen. Die Leitung der Session: Rosalda Punturo (Italien), Dominico Liotta (Italien), Christoph Hilgers (Deutschland), Susanta Kumar Samanta (Indien), Sandeep Bhatt (Indien)
12.12.2019 Chris attends Sustainable Mining Invest in Berlin
Today Chrs attends the meeting announced by the division of international mining of the Association of RawMaterials and Mining e.V. (VRB) and DERA at the Canadian Embassy in Berlin. Several SMEs take part, preetning their expertise ranging from exploration and investment, plant engineering to software development. BGR's German RawMaterials Agency DERA presents on recent activities.
06.12.2019 Chris invited to seminar talk in Baden-Baden
Chris gives a presentation on "Availability of economic-strategic raw materials" at an industry-body meeting in Baden-Baden. Primary resrouces are still the basis of almost any industrial process.
05.12.2019 Chris invited to seminar talk in Freiburg
Chris meets with his colleagues Prof. Thomas Kenkmann and Dr. Amar Agarwal in Freiburg and presents some of his group's research at the Freiburger seminar on Strutural Diagenesis in Resevoir Rocks
05.12.2019 Treffen mit Thomas Finkbeiner von King Abdullah University KAUST, Saudi Arabia
Chris and Thomas exchange ideas at KIT on mutual research interests and potential collaboration.
04.12.2019 Alex's paper accepted by MPG
Alex's paper about Rock typing of diagenetically induced heterogeneities - a case study from a deeply-buried clastic Rotliegend reservoir of the Northern German Basin (DOI ) was accepted for publication in Marine and Petroleum Geology.
27-29.11.2019 Chris presents at German-Russian Raw Materials Conference in Sankt Petersburg
Chris talks on "The supply of sustainable georesources" at the 12. German-Russian Raw Materials Conference in Sankt Petersburg and is a member of a panel discussion headed by Dr. Stroink from the Helmholtz Association with the Russian deputy minister for edcuation and representatives from research and technology on German-Russiaon climate and sustainability research.
19.11.2019 BMVI project funded
We are happy that the Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure (BMVI) funds our project on detection of subsurface geohazards detected by drones. Together with our partners from the Institute of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (IPF) and industry we will evaluate the sensitivity of various detectors.
18.11.2019 MERID meeting at KIT
Today the team from Hochschule Karlsruhe, Geotechnical Engineering RWTH Aachen and us met at KIT to discuss the progress of the project. Digital 2-phase microstructural grain scale modeling is working and matches well with our experiments. We also successfully started to scale up to reservoir scale.
16.11.2019 OGV Board meting Rauenberg
Chris as the deputy president is pleased to meet the core team of the Upper Rhine Geological Association 1871 in Rauenburg, to disucss the progress of the association and the coming event in Freiberg.
14./15.11.2019 SPE Student Technical Conference and Award to Chris
Our KIT students and Chris attended the student technical conference in Aachen. We are happy to organize the SPE STC conference in Karlsruhe next year. On the occasion, Chris also received SPE Regional Distinguished Achievement Award for Petroleum Engineering Faculty.
13.11.2019 Earthquakes in Ruhr mining district increase
The state's broadcast WDR writes about an increase of mining induced earthquakes in the Ruhr area. Since hard coal mining ended in December 2018, the M2.3 earthquake is related to the flooding of the subsurface mines.
11.11.2019 ClicKIT Article about the Iceland Excursion
The KIT magazine clicKIT has published an article about this year's excursion to Iceland guided by Dr. Joerg Meixner, Prof. Dr. Agnes Kontny and Prof. Dr. Thomas Kohl.
07.11.2019 Chris to DGMK Hamburg
Chris tried to make it to the annual DMGK general meeting in Hamburg, but due to delays of the train missed almost everything.
04./05.11.2019 Talks on General Geology
We are having invited young researchers with us, who applied for the junior professorship on General Geology.
10.10.2019 Benni's paper accepted by MPG
Benni's paper on Reservoir quality controls on Rotliegend fluvio-aeolian wells in Germany and the Netherlands, Southern Permian Basin - Impact of grain coatings and cements has been accepted for publication with Marine and Petroleum Geology.
07.10.2019 Flora's successfully defended her PhD
Today Flora Feotosa Menezes successfully defended her PhD "Experimental Study of progressive structural changes of anisotropic sandstones" at Martin Luther University, Halle. Main supervior is Prof. Dr. Christof Lempp, Co-Referee Chris.
07.-09.10.2018 Diagenesis course with Dr. Marita Felder
As last year, we are holding our applied diagenesis course with Dr. Marita Felder of PanTerra BV at KIT. Diagenesis describes the alteration of the minerals and the change of the pore volume in the rock by means of thin section analysis.
28.09.2019 Boris in Minneapolis for magnetic measurements
In the coming days Boris will have the opportunity to measure the magnetic properties at low temperatures in Minneapolis, USA. The magnetic minerals, which are exposed to different frequencies, show different deformation structures, which we will publish soon.
23.-25.09.2019 We present at the DGGV Conference in Münster
Lena Merz will give a lecture on her project MudRisk - drone flying of mud volcanoes in Azerbaijan. Alexander Monsees will present on his project MERID - Reservoir Characterization. Boris Reznik will present his results on geomagnetics.
17.09.2019 ThinkTank Industrial resource strategies
At the Strategic Industrial Group of the ThinkTank Industrial Resource Strategies, Chris presents the first results of Dr. Becker on the topic "Global Comparison of Strategies for Securing the Supply of Raw Materials".
16.09.2019 TwinTraining industrial partner
Chris and Tina visit our industrial partners Schlumberger, Dohmen Herzog und Partner and FiW, who are active in the fields of exploration and production of hydrocarbons, deposit planning and management as well as water.
16.09.2019 Project geo risk assessment with drones approved
Initiated by Lena, Ivy and colleagues from the geodesy department at KIT, we are able to determine the potential of drone flights for the early detection of geo risks in cooperation with the State Office for Geology and Mining Rhineland-Palatinate LGB-RLP and a company.
14.09.2019 Prof. Atsushi Okamoto at KIT
Benni and Chris welcome our colleague Atsushi from Tohoku University Japan to discuss Benni's planned joint research and stay in Japan.
14.-27.09.2019 TwinTraining: Prof. Soussi and Sonia ben Alaya from Tunis at KIT
As part of the TwinTraining project, Tina and Chris welcome our colleagues Mohamed Soussi from the University of El Manar Tunis and Sonia ben Alaya from ETAP Tunis to KIT.
12.09.2019 Chris at Meggen Raw Materials Day
Chris is invited to the 5th Meggen Raw Materials Day to give a lecture on "Georesources for Germany".
06.08.-06.09.2019 TwinTraining Students in Germany
For about one month, our Tunisian students from El Manar University, supervised by Prof. Mohamed Soussi, will complete part of their Master's thesis in Germany. A student at Schlumberger is developing a 3D PetroMod model of an offshore area with Panoro Energy London. Another student develops with us a diagenesis and chemical stratigraphy model of drill cores in cooperation with ETAP.
02.-04.09.2019 DGMK/KIT Reservoir Days
We are hosting the first KIT Reservoir Days on the topic of Clastic Resevoir Quality at Leinsweiler Hof, an informal platform for companies active in exploration and production in Germany. We would like to thank Thomas Kolb from DGMK Oberrhein for the greetings and Rob Lander, Linda Bonnell and Reinhard Gaupp for the keynote speeches.
26.08.-07.09.2019 Great excursion Iceland
Together with her colleagues from Geothermics, Prof. Dr. Agnes Kontny leads the large excursion to Iceland.
19.08.2019 Retirement Symposium Prof. Hirt (ETH Zürich)
Prof. Dr. Agnes Kontny participated in the Retirement Symposium for Professor Ann Hirt at the ETH Zurich (Earth and Planetary Magnetism Group) on 19.08., where she gave a lecture within the framework of the program.
12.07.2019 Holcim award to Dr. Ivy Becker
Today Dr. Becker’s receives the Holcim prize, in commemoration of Rudolf Rohrbach for excellent research on geological raw materials. The Holcim AG the world’s second largest producer of cement.
10.07.2019 Visiting Ruhrkohle AG in Herne
Today Dr. Becker and Chris visited Ruhrkohle AG together with our partners from the Geological Survey NRW and DMT, in order to present and discuss or positively evaluated BMBF-project.
01.07.2019 TwinTraining Workshop with Doctors from Fez in Munich
During our workshop with eight doctors from the university of Fez Christina Schmidt, Abdel Kassem and Christoph Hilgers developed important aspects for a successful project closure and -outlook. We had excellent discussions to develop a road map for the sustainability of the TwinTraining project. Afterwards, the doctors continued with their one-week shortcourse at the Technical University Hospital Munich Rechts der Isar.
29.06.2019 Mining Forum conference Berlin
The Mining Forum, a meeting of experts in the mining- and raw materials sector, allowed insight on ground control, exploration of natural resources, post mining and risk management. We hope ot contribute with our positively evaluated BMBF-project to a better process-oriented coupling of geodesy, geology, geophysics and geomechanics.
28.06.2019 German-Arab Business Forum by Ghorfa in Berlin
Under the patronage of HE the minister of economic affairs Peter Altmaier the 22. Economic Forum was hosted in Berlin. Topics such as energy, know-how transfer and digitalization were major topics of the conference on German-Arabic economic affairs.
27.06.2019 MERID Status meeting at KIT in Karlsruhe
In today’s status meeting of all our project partners from WintershallDEA, DGMK, RWTH Aachen and Hochschule Karlsruhe we further constrained our joined efforts. The rock characterization using petrophysics, computer tomography and 2-phase flow are almost completed. The reservoir geometry and upscaling process recommended by the industry partner was constrained.
21.-23.06.2019 Field seminar Ardennes
Alex, Ola and Chris are in the field with our students 4. semester BSc Applied Geosciences. Besides a geological cross section across the Stavelot-Venn massif and sedimentary structures, we highlighted the utilization and post-mining using practical examples. This includes lignite mining, hard coal mining, lead zinc mineralization as well as mass-raw materials sand, gravel and limestone.
17.06.2019 Wintershall DEA at KIT
We are happy to welcome Dr. Adelmann. We reported on our joint project and discussed topics on digitalization.
11 & 12.06.2019 DRT conference in Tubingen
Chris, Ivy and Franziska present their research on joint in fractured carbonates (Muschekalk) at the DRT – Deformation.Rheology.Tectonics conference. Chris and colleagues also run a pre-field trip to the black forest on day one, which includes a visit to the city of Staufen. The city was moving upwards by several decimeters due to a false completing of geothermal wells, resulting in massive construction failures in the historical old city. Groundwater migrated upwards from fracture carbonate Muschelkalk into the Gipskeuper, a sandy facies containing anhydrite. Due to the volume increase of the anhydrite-gypsum transformation, the city moved upwards several decimeters. Such failure wouldn’t have been occurred using the technical guidelines well established over decades and thousands of wells penetrating evaporites such as anhydrite. With great delight Chris could give a laudatio on Janos Urai, who was recognized by DRT for his lifetime achievements.
01.06 & 08.06.2019 Visiting an exploration well
We are happy to visit a deep exploration well in the Rhine graben with our students. As Applied Geosciences@KIT the sustainable utilization of the subsurface and its resources is the major responsibility of our discipline.
20.05.2019 clicKIT article about mud volcanoes in Azerbaijan
Campus magazine clicKIT published an article in German about our research on mud volcanoes in Azerbaijan. There, exciting images on such erupting gas chimneys, and Lena was also successful to map one of them before and after explusion. Mud volcanoes are natural seeps of oil and gas being carried to the surface and air.
29.04.2019 clicKIT article about the field trip to Oman
Campus magazine clicKIT published an article in German about our field trip to Oman in fall 2018. There, exciting insights into the geology, land and culture of this diverse country on the Persian Gulf are provided.
25.04.2019 Dr. Ivy Becker receives Georg-Hunaeus award
Dr. Ivy Becker received the Georg-Hunaeus-Prize at the annual meeting of the DGMK in Celle on 25.4.2019, the highest award in the field of geosciences and engineering sciences in Germany with industrial application for exploration, deep drilling technology, extraction and storage of energy raw materials.
The DGMK awards the DGMK Prize for Young Scientists for outstanding scientific work by young German scientists. The award in the fields of exploration, deep drilling technology, extraction and storage of crude oil and natural gas is supplemented by the "Georg-Hunaeus-Prize". The DGMK e.V. is a network of experts from industry and research. As non-profit association the DGMK offers a neutral platform for the technical-scientific exchange between science and practice.
25./26.04.2019 DGMK/ÖGEW Spring Conference, Celle
Alex presents his results on "Integrating Geology and Petrophysics into Numerical Models - A Step Towards the Digitalization of Rocks", co-authors Benjamin Busch, Amol Subhedar, Britta Nestler and Christoph Hilgers, at the DGMK Celle.
Ivy presents in her Georg-Hunaeus presentation her results on "Structural and Diagenetic Controls on Reservoir Quality of Tight Formations", co-authors Benjamin Busch, Bastian Koehrer and Christoph Hilgers at the DGMK Celle, and also presents "Incorporation of New Technologies for Sustainable and Economical Mining Solutions" (co-authors Jochen Kolb and Christoph Hilgers).
Lena presents her results on "Hydrocarbon Reservoirs in Azerbaijan in Relation to Faulting and Mud
Volcanism", co-authors Ayten Huseynova, Elbay Babayev and Christoph Hilgers, and "Faults and Fracture Networks in Upper Muschelkalk Outcrop Analogues Detected by Photogrammetry, Upper Rhine Graben (URG), Germany", co-authors Uwe Baier and Christoph Hilgers, at the DGMK Celle.
Tina presents her results on "Lateral Heterogeneity of Reservoir Properties in an Homogenous Lower Triassic Sandstone, Southern Germany", co-authors Benjamin Busch and Christoph Hilgers, at the DGMK Celle.
24.04.2019 Chairing EAGE-DGMK Joint Workshop on Underground Storage of Hydrogen
Dr. Christian Buecker, DEA, and Chris chair an international workshop on hydrogen-storage in the subsurface. With an increased amount of renewable energy from wind and PV, and eventually the generation of hydrogen from natural gas, hydrogen may play an important role in the European gas supply. This provides a number of challenges and opportunities to use the gas infrastructure. We ask for contributions on hydrognen infrastructure, storage in the subsurface, storage management, numerical simulations and best practices. We invite scientists, researchers and industry experts to outline the progress and state of the art on subsurface hydrogen storage. The one-day EAGE/DGMK joint workshop on Underground Storage of Hydrogen aims to exchange knowhow, case studies, technologies and work flows on all aspects of subsurface storage of hydrogen. Further information can be obtained here .
23.-27.4.2019 OGV Conference in Koblenz
The 140th conference of the Geological Society Upper Rhine OGV e.V. will be held from 23.-27.5.2019 in Koblenz on the Geology and Raw Material in the Eifel and Westerwald. Many field trips on various topics offer insights to the regional geology. The OGV e.V. is the oldest and largest society focused on regional geology in Germany. It was founded 1871 near Karlsruhe in Rothenfels by Chris predecessor Adolph Knop with colleagues from Heidelberg and Freiburg, and scholars from Achern/Baden and Mannheim. Chris is happy to contribute to OGV’s management board.
7.3.2019 Chris' talk in Oman
Chris plans a talk at the German University of Technology GUtech on "Reservoir quality in siliciclastics and carbonates".
28.2.2019 Alex and Alex in England
Today Alex M. and Alex S. drive to the UK to sample rocks in quarries and mines. The dune sediments are expected to be excellent analogues for the reservoir we are working on in our MERID project with DEA.
27.2.2019 Chris' keynote in Cairo, Egypt
Today Chris presents a keynote on "Effect of structure and diagenesis on reservoir quality in siliciclastics" at the 22ten International Conference on Petroleum Mineral Resources and Development, organized by the Egyptian Petroleum Research Institute EPRI. Besides Exploration and Production sessions were delivered on Applied Chemistry, Biotechnology, Renewable Energy, Catalysis, Corrosion, Nanotechnology and Petrochemistry.
15.2.2019 Geotherm fair in Offenburg
We visited known and new companies dealing with exploration and production at the Geotherm fair, and presented our services on reservoir-characterization and odeling at our KIT booth.
14.2.2019 guest Steffen Goebbles
Today we brainstorm with our colleague Prof. Dr. Steffen Goebbels about pattern recognition, AI and other items.
5.2.2019 guest Klaus Reicherter
We are happy to meet our former colleague Prof. Dr. Klaus Reicherter from RWTH Aachen University, with whom we discussed potential joint projects after his talk on Recent Neotectonics in the Karlsruhe area.
22./23.1.2019 Benni and Alex visited DEA
Benni and Alex presented their preliminary results of the MERID project together with partners from RWTH Aachen and HS Karlsruhe to their industrial partner, DEA Deutsche Erdoel AG in Hamburg and Wietze.
11.1.2019 Lena's and Agnes paper published in Tectonophysics
Lena's and Agnes' Paper on Magnetic fabric development in the Lower Seve thrust from the COSC-1 drilling, Swedish Caledonides has been published in Tectonophysics, Vol., 751, 2019, 212-228.
9.1.2019 Ivy's paper on Ca2 fractures successfully passed review
Our paper on the correlation of fractures from outcrops and horizontal wells successfully passed the review process of Marine & Petroleum Geology.
7.1.2019 Ivy's paper on Ca2 carbonate corrleation accepted
Ivy's paper is now in print in ZdGG.
2018
News 2018
24.12.2018 Merry Christmas
We wish you merry xmas, season's greeting and a happy and peaceful 2019.
10.12.2018 Ivy's PhD printed
Really cool, I got a hard copy of Ivy's PhD thesis, it is #3 at KIT, which you can get here .
4.-8.12.2018 Chris and Lena in Azerbaijan
Chris and Lena are in Baku, Azerbaijan, and studying mud volcanoes and groundwater for our MudRisk project. Lena presented her research at an international SPE conference in Baku with young researchers from Azerbaijan, Russia, Ukraine, Kazachstan and others. Besides, we met people at the Azerbaijan ministry, AHK, DAAD, the German Embassy, GIZ, Higher Technology Park, National Academy of Science and the Oil and Gas Institute in Baku. It would be a pleasure to strengthen ties and extent joint research efforts.
2./3.12.2018 BMBF visit to Bonn
Chris, Adel Meguid and Tina have some meetings in Bonn to present and discuss achieviements and potentials of our TwinTraining project with colleagues and industry partners in North Arfrica.
28.-29.11.2018 Benni presents MERID at status meeting in Berlin
Benni presents our first results at the annual status meeting of GeoN in Berlin, together with Amol and Sven. Alex and Chris did the backup work. It seems we got a better understanding of chemical compaction, and we also successfully tansferred and calibrated digital rocks and natual rocks for two-phase flow in digital rocks.
27.11.2018 Invited talk by Chris at BAM, Berlin
Chris presents first results of "MERID - Microstructural influence on the reservoir integrity" at the Bundesanstalt fuer Materialfporschung und -prüfung in Berlin, in the Cluster Symposium "CO2 and H2 Technologies for the Energy Transition".
25.11.2018 Benni paper out in Marine and Petroleum Geology
Our paper "Porosity evolution of two Upper Carboniferous tight-gas-fluvial sandstone reservoirs: Impact of fractures and total cement volumes on reservoir quality" on Tight Gas reservoirs is now online in Marine and Petroleum Geology (link doi ). The fluvial siliciclastics show different pore cementation in two wells, which can simply be linked to the difference inversion tectonics and associated temperature variations.
22.11.2018 Ivy's PhD thesis is online
Here you get her research covering subsalt tight reservoirs integrating diagenesis, petrophysics and fracturing.
16.11.2018 TwinTraining Student Iman Mansir at KIT
We welcome Iman from Agadir University at KIT. During her stay she will learn about our analytics and workflows, before she moves on to our partners in Bingen and Aachen.
12.11.2018 Researcher Ayten at KIT
We welcome Dr. Ayten Khasayeva-Huseynova from the National Academy of Science in Baku, Azerbaijan. Funded by our project MudRisk, she studies the methane degassing and the seepage of orgnics from mud volcanoes in Azerbaijan.
8.11.2018 Workshop Modeling
Today Janos Urai from RWTH Aachen visits KIT to discuss with Britta Nestler and coworkers the modeling of fracture cements.
5.11.2018 Workshop Digital Oil Fields
Today Chris and Nishant from Britta Nestler's research group participate in the DGMK Workshop in Hannover.
30.10.-2.11.2018 Trip to Cairo
Chris meets our partner Prof. Abdel Kassem and representatives from industry, ministries and academia in the frame of our TwinTraining project.
18.10.2018 Resources efficiency congress, Karlsruhe
Today Dr. Ivy Becker and Chris take part in the frame of the ThinkTank Innovative Resource Strategies.
29.9.-10.10.2018 Excursion Oman
Now we are the beautiful sultanate of Oman together with our KIT students and experts from the service- and oil industry.
24.-28.9.2018 Field methods Geology
Our frist year field methods in the bachelor are held in Germany and France. We focus on rock identification and basic mapping skills with maps and compass.
16-21.9.2018 Field course Reservoir-Geology, S-England
Reservoirs are porous or fractured rock volumes in the subsurface. We study sedimentary and structural heterogeneities of rock bodies along the the coast in S-England, to generate better models of transport of fluids in the subsurface. Geofluids are ground water e.g. drinking- and process water, formation water e.g. deep geothermal brines, storage of oil gas or CO2, and fossil energy- and carbon resources oil and gas as energy dense fluids for transportation and the chemical industry.
14.9.2018 Field course for exploration company
Today Ivy and Chris run a field trip for an exploration company and discuss the benefit of reservoir analogs for subsurface predition.
11-13.9.2018 Diagenesis - course with Dr. Marita Felder
We are happy to run our applied diagenesis course with Dr. Marita Felder from PanTerra BV at KIT, as in the previous years. Diagenesis describes the alteration and of minerals and the change of pore volume in rocks by thin section analysis.
5.9.2018 Chris at workshop Future Energy- and Raw Materials Supply
Chris participates on workshop Future Energy- and Raw Materials Supply: Visions, Chances and Boundary Conditions, organized by the DGMK.
5.9.2018 Lena presents on mud volcanoes in Azeri at DGGV conference Bonn
Lena Merz presents her first results on mud volcanoes in Aserbaijan. We study the mass transport of mud and its effect on ground water in relation to structural geology, in cooperation with the National Academy of Sciences in Baku.
4.9.2018 Lena gives a talk on drones and lidar at DGGV conference Bonn
Lena Merz presents her results on drones and terrestrial laser scanning of fractured carbonates. Fractured carbonates host most of the world-wide hydrocarbon resources.
1.9.2018 DAAD scholar Alena Veresovich aus Moskauom Moscow, Gubkin University at KIT
We welcome Alena at KIT, who will carry out the seismic interpretation of a reservoir.
3.8.2018 Chris visits Gubkin University in Moscow
Today Chris presents recent ouctomes on tight reservoirs in the frame of the one-week shortcourse "Technology for Efficient and Safe Arctic Development" (30.7-3.8.2018). Following we exchanged a MoU with Gubkin's rector Viktor Martynov. The impressive Institute with then presented by the dean of geosciences.
1.8.2018 Ivy Diss defense
August 1st is scheduled for Ivy's diss defense at KIT, reviewed by an examination committee and external reviewers Reinhard Gaupp, Jena, and Stephen Laubach, University of Texas, Austin. Congratulations to Dr. Ivy for her successful defense.
23.7.2018 Agnes in Moscow
Agnes presents her research on rock magentics at a conference in Russia and discusses the application of rock magnetics for oil stained mudstones.
19.7.2018 KIT Talks: Potential of Raw Materials - Why prospection and exploration are indispensable
Today Prof. Christoph Hilgers and Prof. Jochen Kolb talk on "Potential raw materials - why prospection and exploration are indispensable", starting 18.30h in room 145 bldg 50.41. The presentations start after a welcome by the dean with a talk on "Energy and Mineral Raw Materials: Pores, fractures and cements" by Christoph Hilgers. Followed by a talk of our colleague Jochen Kolb on "Mineral and Metallic Raw Materials: Research and formation processes". After the 45 min talks the two speakers invite the audience for a snack and drink. The two talks are the kick-off of the Walchner lectures at Applied Geosciences KIT. The geologist Friedrich August Walchner was member of the founding team of KIT in 1825 and KITs second president.
19.7.2018 Invited talk by Dr. Sandra Amann
Today Dr. Alexandra Amann-Hildenbrand from RWTH Aachen talks in the Petrotherm Seminar 12h on "Effective gas permeability of tight sandstones & shales at different water saturations and effective stress conditions". Dr. Amann-Hildenbrand is a highly reputed researcher on experimental characterization of fluid migration in rocks. She works in a petrophysical lab which is one of the few labs worldwide able to measure the variation of permeability in tight rocks.
10.7.2018 LookIT Sustainable Resources Managment online
KIT's Special Issue LookKIT 02/2018 on Sustainable Resources Management has been published and covers an article by Chris on Rock as Raw Material, p.28-30. The volume can be downloaded for free here .
3.7.2018 Chris knocked out
An optimization of air intake was required which in turn optimizes cumbustion to get up the mountains quicker.
11.-14.6.2018 Presentations by Benni, Ivy and Tina at EAGE Copenhagen
We present at this year's EAGE annual conference in Copenhagen on
We P4 07 11.20h - Coupling Diagenesis and Petrophysics in Red Bed Siliciclastics to Infer Fluid Flow Anisotropies – Analog Studies From SW Germany - C. Schmidt, B. Busch, C. Hilgers
We G 09 13.30h - Reservoir Quality Modelling in Deeply-Buried Permian Rotliegendes Sandstones, N-Germany: Impact of Illite Textures - B. Busch, C. Hilgers, D. Adelmann*, *Wintershall Holding GmbH
We G 13 15.30h - Developing an Exploration Strategy for Upper Carboniferous Tight Gas Sandstone Reservoirs - I. Becker, P. Wüstefeld, B. Koehrer*, B. Busch, C. Hilgers, *Wintershall Holding
GmbH
7.6.2018 Invited talk by Chris at Raw Material Day, Eisenberg, Rhineland-Palantina
This afternoon Chris presents the group's research on contact-free quality measurements at the outcrop wall. The state's raw materials is a get together of the mining industry in southwest Germany. Rhineland Palantina produces approximately 35 Mio tons of raw materials per annum.
5.6.2018 Professor Reinhard Gaupp, Jena University gives guest lecture at KIT
Our guest and colleague professor Reinhard Gaupp will give a lecture on Buntsandsone diagenesis in and around the Rhine graben in the Petrotherm Seminar. We will meet at building 50.41, room 007 at 12h.
30.5.2018 SPE Award for KIT student Valentin Goldberg
GSSPE awards Valentin Goldberg with the Chapter / HSG Student Award. Valentin's exceptional committment for the KIT SPE group and his public relations to widen the network between students and industry will be honored during the SPE meeting on June 21st.
25.5.2018 Nishant's paper accepted in Geothermal Energy
Our paper Modeling fracture cementation processes in calcite limestone: A phase-field study by Nishant Prajapati, Michael Selzer, Britta Nestler, Benjamin Busch, Christoph Hilgers will be published in Geothermal Energy.
20.5.2018 Ivy's paper online in Marine and Petroleum Geology
Our paper entitled Comparing fracture statistics from outcrop and reservoir data using conventional manual and t-LiDAR derived scanlines in Ca2 carbonates from the Southern Permian Basin, Germany by Ivy Becker, Bastian Koehrer, Marius Waldvogel, Wolgang Jelinek and Christoph Hilgers is now available online and will be printed in volume 95, pp 228-245.
15.5.2018 Partners and Chris founded RawMaterial Knowledge Society in Berlin
Associations of domestic raw material industries, company representatives and universities are involved in shaping RohstoffWissen.org for some time, and founded today the regisitered society RohstoffWissen (raw materal knowledge) in Berlin. Objective of the society is the comprehensible presentation of raw material chains and the importance of the domestic exploration industry for the industrial site Germany. Christoph Hilgers and his colleague Jochen Kolb support and promote the establishment of the society.
11.5.2018 Chris' KIT-tour for citizens from Bretten at KIT
Citizens from Diedelsheim and Bretten visited us on the afternoon to get some insight on a applied geosciences. After a short campus south tour by Chris with informations on the progress of KIT, one of the world's oldest universities of technology, Dr. Steeger from the Chair of Engineering Geology at KIT Applied Geosciences presented ongoing research on shallow geothermal energy projects in the lab and on the campus test site. Afterwards, Chris presented the challanges of raw material chains exemplified by a wind power plant. Challenges in raw material scarcity and more importantly raw material trade were demonstrated by sand (for solar panels, glass and fiber optics etc.), cobalt (for steel hardening, lithium batteries etc.) and phosphate (as fertilizer etc.). Finally, the importance of domestic raw material exploration was highlighted by the produced volumes from sedimentary mines.
22.-26.04.2018 TwinTraining with University Tunis El Manar, Tunisia
Christina and Chris jointly with Pr Soussi from UTM and team had their first TwinTraining on Reservoir Sedimentology at UTM. TwinTraining is funded by BMBF. Together with L’Entreprise Tunisienne d’Activités Pétrolières (ETAP), Sen. Eng. Sonia Benalaya, the practical training covered classroom exercises (half day), lab exercises (half day), field exercises in the Atlas mountains (one day) and two days in the company's core shed. Christina also introduced the machines for field plugging and reservoir analysis under the microscope.
TwinTraining is a concept we developed jointly with our partners in Tunisia and Morocco. Twins from local faculty and Germany, integrating professionals and faculty on campus, provides twin hands-on training to increase the mutual exchange of experience and knowledge and increase employability.
23.-27.04.2018 TwinTraining with University Hospital, Fez, Morocco
The first TwinTraining on Clinical Studies is carried out jointly between PD Dr. Michael Quante and team from University hospital Munich Rechts der Isar in Fez. The module, deisgned and managed by our partner Prof Meguid Kassem from Cairo University also involves industry partners from Roche and SpringerNature. Jointly with our partners Prof Mohammed el Azami el Idrissi, Vice-Dean, Dr. Mohcine Zouk from the International Cancer Research Center and teams
16.-19.04.2018 TwinTraining with University Ibn Zohr, Agadir, Morocco
Georg Meiners, formerly AHU AG, and Marc Dohmen from Dohmen Herzog & Partner GmbH had their first TwinTraining courses in Agadir on water and mining, respectively. Together with colleagues Prof. Dr. Lhoussaine Bouchaou, Dr. Said Boutaleb from hydrogeology and Prof. Moha Ikenne from minerals and mining we had twin courses on hard- and softskills including training on AutoCad based AutoPLAN. TwinTraining covers more than ten companies and six universities and is managed by Christina Schmidt.
18.04.2018 Ivy Becker presents at DGMK conference, Celle
Today Ivy Becker gives a talk at DGMK's annual meeting in Celle on "Outcrop to Well – Transferability of Zechstein Ca2 Carbonates from the Eichsfeld-Altmark Swell to the North German Subsurface", coauthored by Bastian Koehrer*, Wolfgang Jelinek* and Christoph Hilgers (*Wintershall Holding GmbH, Barnstorf)
18.04.2018 Christina Schmidt presents at DGMK conference, Celle
Today Christina presents her results at DGMK Celle on "Sediment Structures Affecting Flow in Eolian Rotliegend Sandstones", coauthored by Benjamin Busch and Christoph Hilgers. She also presents our TwinTraining program "Industry – University Collaboration: TwinTraining of Energy-, Mineral- and Water Resources in the MENA Region" which is sponsored by BMBF.
18.04.2018 Lena Merz presents at DGMK conference, Celle
Lena presents her results on "Automated Fracture Analysis in Middle Triassic Muschelkalk, Upper Rhine Graben" coauthored by Yasar Manss and Christoph Hilgers at DGMK Celle.
09.04.2018 Visit of quarry and production
Today Chris visits a large carbonate quarry and cement factory in the state of Baden-Wuerttemberg. Carbonate rocks are in important raw material for construction, chemical industry and pharmacy, glass industry, food industry and agriculture.
08.04.2018 Presentations accepted for EAGE Kopenhagen, Denmark, 11.-14.6.2018
Our contributions were accepted as requested. We will give two talks on red bed diagenesis and fractured carbonates, and one poster on diagenesis.
04.-07.04.2018 OGV conference in Braunschweig
Again a wonderful and well organized annual meeting of Oberrheinischen Geologischen Vereins. Here it is not about better, bigger, faster, but to enjoy the beautiful outcrops of the region, this year around Braunschweig. Above the ground complex Mesozoic geology drien by extension, inversion and salt tectonics in Lower Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt. Belowground in mine Konrad located in the Gifhorner trough, Chris got info about this nuclear waste deposit, and sampled some beautiful, Upper Jurassic iron ore oolite.
27.-28.03.2018 Castle Windeck
Today we met on achievements and new challenges within the KIT Centre for Climate and Environment. KIT's Centers bundle major topics of KIT's faculties and Helmholtz research centers.
19-25.03.2018 Mapping course in Kirn
Agnes and Chris are back to the field with our students again. First at chilly conditions, finally spring came. Again we found beautiful new outcrops and now have a nice set to demonstrate the earth history in the this region.
15.03.2018 Our exploring companies in Baden-Wuerttemberg
Today Chris got some first-hand information visiting representatives of the state's mining sector. 100 million tons of rocks and sediments are mined every year in Baden-Wuerttemberg, driving the state's construction sector, chemical industry and other production.
14.03.2018 Helmholtz-evaluation
POF3 (project oriented research 3) is being evaluated at KIT the whole week. Today RU5 (research unit 5) presented its excellent results, the team headed by colleague Thomas Kohl.
02.03.2018 Geotherm in Offenburg
Today Chris visited the Geotherm fair nearby. I didn't make it to the presentations but was caught by the numerous exhibitors. Numerous faces but unexpected, whether from Halliburton, Geomecon or Geothermal Engineering, etc. old friends now at MGS Europe and geobit, and many new ones.
20.02.2018 Think Tank kick-off
Today we kick-off the Thnk Tank Innovative Resoures Strategies under auspices of HE the Minister of Environment, Climate Protection and the Energy Sector, followed by a reception with industry.
15.02.2018 E&P brainstorm
Today we welcomed guests from E&P companies to discuss the research potential of fractured carbontes. Fractured carbonates are among the largest hydrocarbon reservoirs worldwide. The prediction of fractures and fracture swarms at several kilometers depths remains is a wonderful challenge.
02.02.2018 NAGRA visit
Today we visited NAGRA in Switzerland and discussed the dating of structures in caves, its relation to the Black Forest uplift and the change of the draining system.
01.02.2018 Agnes and Boris visiting Manish at IIT Kharagpur
Today Agnes and Boris are going to visit our friend and Humboldt fellow Professor Manish Mamtani in India. We strive to deepen our collaboration and strengthen the exchange of students and researchers .
01.02.2018 Benni's AAPG Bulletin paper published
Our paper "Reservoir quality and burial model evaluation by kinetic quartz and illite cementation modeling: Case study of Rotliegendes, north Germany" on a novel approach of reservoir quality prediction modeling has been published in the current issue of AAPG Bulletin.
30.01.2018 Our Student Group online
Our SPE Student Group is now online and can be contacted via website and facebook . The objective of the group founded in summer 2016 is to broaden the network with industry and the exchange of information. Activities to date covered tunneling, water, geothermal, oil and gas, raw materials and mining, and subjects such as seismic acquisition, pump technologies and other applied aspects.
18.01.2018 Talk by Siegfried Muessig on "What the frac is going on"
Our KIT alumnus Dr Siegfried Muessig will present an overview of various production enhancement technologies including fracing is given. Al these technologies have been applied world-wide in the oil and gas Industry for many decades. Siegfried is currently Managing Director of MT Oil Consulting GmbH. He holds a Diploma and a PhD in Physics of the University Karlsruhe, Germany. Between 1982 and 2013 he worked for Shell and its affiliates in several technical and management positions in Germany, the Netherlands, Austria, Denmark, USA, Syria and Oman. Siegfried Muessig has published 36 technical papers and 6 patents, is a guest lecturer at the University of Leoben, Austria and an active SPE member. He served twice as Chairman of the German SPE section and was appointed “distinguished lecturer” 2014/15.
10.01.2018 Paper on t-LiDAR fracture statistics accepted by AAPG Bulletin
Our paper on "Evaluation of a workflow to derive t-LiDAR fracture statistics of a tight gas sandstone reservoir analog has been accepted by AAPG Bulletin. The manuscript by Patrick Wuestefeld, Maite de Medeiros and Bastian Koehrer, Dominik Sibbing, Leif Kobbelt and me outlines our new semi-automated workflow to detect and analyze fracture data from mined quarry walls in tight sandstones.
09.01.2018 Think Tank "Industrial Resources Strategy" agreed by Council of Ministers of the State of Baden-Wuerttemberg
The more efficient utilization and consumption of primary and secondary raw material will become an integral part of the industrial hub Germany, considering the decreasing global resources and an exponentially growing world population. Expertise in exploration, production and evaluation of primary raw materials, alternative resources and the usage of waste material will be geological contributions.
Geology as youngest of the four established natural sciences developed during the growing demand of natural resources since Gregor Agricola (1494-1555) towards a self-contained science, in order to better understand the complex processes of the earth and ensure the supply of the society by exploration and production of resources such as water, rocks, metals, mineral-, organic- and energy.
After intensive months of work headed by our vice president Hirth and together with collegues Kolb, Schultmann, Schulze and Stapf we are delighted that the Council of Ministers supports our joint initative with industry.
2017
News 2017
22.12.2017 Merry xmas and a happy new 2018
We wish you a peaceful christmas and a happy new year.
15.12.2017 Grosse Exkursion Oman 2018
Agnes, Benni and Chris offer a field trip to Oman in 2018. Planned start is September 29th 2018, planned return October 10th 2018. We cross the alpine orogen, besides withe beaches and black mantle rocks, Snowball earth, fossil and recent carbonates and salt, sand- and stone deserts won't stop us to set up our camp on the Indian Ocean.
5.12.2017 Talk by Dr. Carsten Reinhold, Managing Director Rheinpetroleum GmbH
Today our SPE Group welcomes our colleague Dr. Carsten Reinhold. Carsten presents for our students and other interested persons insights on the exploration of reservoirs in the Upper Rhine graben and job opportunities for geoscientists. The presentation starts at 19.30h in the AVG building, house 50.41.
4./5.12.2017 The German University of Technology GUtech 10th anniversary
Chris is invited to the 10th anniversary of GUtech, which he planned and put in operation with a great team from 2005 to 2009. Initially as CEO of a subunit at WZL RWTH Aachen dealing with contracts and project plans, he than moved to Muscat, Oman, to put the LLC in operation with Barbara Steauble and great staff. NOTE: The ceremonies were postponed due to the announcement of the National Day in Oman
27.11.2017 We are getting a new UAV
Lena will pick up her new tool in Munich, after successfully having passed her drone licence.
24.11.2017 State's ThinkTank industrial resources strategies announced
After several weeks of intense work with colleagues in the ThinkTank, and more to come, Chris is happy that all efforts proved success. The ThinkTank brings together industry, politics and science. Improved technologies for a sustainable provision of primary raw materials and by-products, secondary materials by urban mining, and sophisticated recycling and final storage are part of a process chain building innovative prodcuts for a developing society.
23.11.2017 DGMK meeting Oberrhein at MIRO, Karlsruhe
Chris went to MIRO Karlsruhe, one of the largest refineries in Europe, and attended talks on process engineering talks under the topic energy change.
20./21.11.2017 MERID kickoff at DEA, Hamburg
Now Benni and me are in Hamburg. After a meeting with DEA Deutsche Erdoel AG and DGMK in the morning on our digital rock project and how to link that to geomechanical reservoir scale, we spent the rest of the day with German scientists presenting their projects with the BMBF funded Geo:N initiative.
17.11.2017 Short trip to Baku
Today Lena and me met with our colleagues at the National Academy of Science of Azerbaijan in Baku to kick off our BMBF funded MudRisk project locally. We had additional talks at the TechnoPark Baku, and then split up for Lena's first fist to the Azeri mud volcanoes, and me talking about applied research with SOCAR.
9.-10.11.2017 SPE Annual conference
Our KIT students are going to present their work at the annual student technical conference SPE STC in Clausthal-Zellerfeld. The SPE Hochschulgruppe was founded in 2016 by our students and Chris. Our SPE students are proactive: They invite industry covering all relevant fields from petroleum, water, engineering and mining, arrange industry visits and social events.
20.10.2017 LGRB
We thank the LGRB Freiburg (State Office for Geology, Raw Materials and Mining), Prof. Dr. Eckhardt and colleagues, hosting us and sharing knowledge.
13.10.2017 SpringerNature at Frankurt bookfair
Chris had very constructive discussions with colleagues from SpringerNature to join our TwinTraining project.
05.10.2017 Ivy's talk at EAGE
Ivy presents her results at the EAGE workshop on Evaluating and Drilling of Carbonate Reservoirs, session Geomechanics and Rock Properties, entitled "Comparison of open fractures in Ca2 carbonates from outcrop and well, using laser scans, image logs, and 3D stress".
04.-06.10.2017 Diagenesis short course
We run a diagenesis course with Marita Felder from PanTerra BV, Netherlands. Panterra is a service company for the E&P industry worldwide, and we are happy to have their expertise shared with our students.
01.10.2017 TwinTraining project funded
We just received a feedback that our TwinTraining program will be funded by BMBF. Together with our partner Prof. Abel Meguid Kassem we set up a project of academic- and industry partners implementing applied teaching modules in North Africa. Our academic partners cover the geology-mining sector and the medical sector and involve the University of Tunis El Manar, the University at Fez and the University at Agadir. We also set up a team of industry representatives AHU AG, ETAP, Erbe Elektromedizin GmbH, GeoThermal Engineering GmbH, Dohmen Herzog & Partner GmbH, FiW e.V., Frimberger GmbH, Karl Storz GmbH & Co KG, Roche AG, Schlumberger GmbH, SpringerNature, and other partners, which are acknowledged to support the project. More national and international partners are welcomed to join the initiative to strengthen the ties between academia and business and make research more applied.
25.09.2017 Rohstoff Wissen initiative, raw materials initiative
We are happy to contribute to the raw material initiative, kicked off by NGOs, universities and companies to share how, why and raw materials drive our economy. More information here
25.-29.09.2017 Field methods lecture, French Rhine graben shoulder
We are in the field again. With our 1st year students we explore Mesozoic rocks around the French Rhine graben shoulder and introduce them to basic geology methods, together with our colleagues from Engineering Geology.
17-22.09.2017 Field trip Reservoir-Geology, S-England
Our field trip explores the cliffs along the Bristol channels and the Channel, covering the Mesozoic evolution, both sedimentary and structurally, of the most important reservoir rocks of NW-Europe.
12.09.2017 Geology and Medicine - TwinTeaching meeting in Munich
Today we meet the doctors from Morocco and Tunis at the University Hospital in Munich. It's part of a project we lead to exchange interdisciplinary and intercultural expertise on hands-on teaching at universities. We thought that geology and medicine are quite related, and indeed kidney stones and drilling holes = endoscopy is not much different. And most importantly, all academic partners and industry partners have a push to bring the project to success.
07.-08.9.2017 we are in the field again
Seems we like real rock. Chris joins Nico's trip to the Wutach-Valley, apparently exposing the full Mesozoic sequence around the Rhine Graben. Let's see.
04.09.2017 Agnes, Tina and students hitting rocks in the Pyrenees
Agnes, Tina and students are up on their way to the Pyrenees, Spain. It's not the sunshine driving them, but the stunning geology.
29.08.2017 we are in the field
Yasar and Chris detected some super structures in Muschelkalk carbonates near Karlsruhe. Rocks were extended, than squeezed together, and fractured. It seems the story becomes really cool.
23.08.2017 Presentation on carbonates
Chris and Ivy visited Wintershall where Ivy presented the result of her carbonate work, which improves the understanding of subsurface fractured reservoirs.
22.08.2017 it's deep, it's DEEP
Today we met our friend Baerbel from DEEP Underground Engineering GmbH. Deep is a global expert in subsurface constructions such as caverns.
27.07.2017 Rob and Linda from GeoCosm with us
Today we met our friends and colleagues from the US based company GeoCosm, Rob Lander and Linda Bonnell. Both are experts in reservoir quality prediction modelling and invented the modeling software TouchStone, which they kindly allow us to use for applied research projects on reservoir sandstones.
21.07.2017 Patrick's PhD defense
Today Patrick successfully defended his PhD work at KIT on the diagenesis and structural evolution of tight gas sandstones. Congratulations!
05.07.2017 Ivy's paper accepted in Journal of Petroleum Geology
Ivy's paper on tight gas reservoir analogs is accepted for publication in the Journal of Petroleum Geology.
13.06.2017 Coupled grain-reservoir scale project funded
Our joint BMBF GeoN proposal with Prof. Britta Nestler, Department of Computer Sciences, University of Applied Sciences Karlsruhe, and Prof. Peter Ziegler and Martin Feinendegen, RWTH Aachen, in collaboration with DGMK and DEA will be funded by BMBF starting July 2017. The three year research project couples grain to reservoir scale and couples pore scale two-phase flow anisotropies during reservoir depletion.
13.06.017 Humboldt fellow Prof. Mamtami with us
Our guest Prof. Mansih Mamtami from IIT Kharagpur, India, visits us for one month as Humboldt fellow. We are happy to welcome Manish, who will carry out rock magnetic measurements and work on vein microstructures.
12.06.2017 Mudvolcanoe project funded
Our joint proposal with Azerbaijan National Academy of Science on geohazards will be funded by BMBF, starting late summer 2017. We study the geohazards on soil, water and the subsurface induced by mud volcanoes. Using UAV and sophisticated detectors, we aim to map the expulsion of gases along fractures, an tie up with other local partners.
12.-15.6.2017 Talk on carbonate fracs at EAGE
Ivy will present at talk on carbonate fractures from reservoir analogs and well at the 79th EAGE conference in Paris.
11.06.2017 Scotland field course
After one week around Ben Nevis, Glen Coe, Ballachulish, Appin, Kerrera, Glenfinnan and mapping around Kinlochleven, students returned safely home. We studied the metamorphism and deformation of polyphase deformed rock and its overlying Paleozoic and the Z on Z, Z on S and S on Z, the S1,2, 3 issues will not further harm our understanding.
10.06.2017 Another paper accepted in Marine and Petroleum Geology
Our paper on Kilometer-scale fault-related thermal anomalies in tight gas sandstone by Patrick Wuestefeld, Ulrike Hilse, Bastian Koehrer, Dirk Adelmann and Chris has been accepted by the Journal of Marine and Petroleum Geology. Funding by Wintershall is greatly acknowledged.
07.06.2017 Paper accepted in Marine and Petroleum Geology
Our paper entitled Critical evaluation of an Upper Carbonifersou tight gas sandstone reservoir analog: Diagenesis and petrophysical aspects by Patrick Wuestefeld, Ulrike Hilse, Volker Lueders, Klaus Wemmer, Bastian Koehrer and Chris has been accepted by the Journal of Marine and Petroleum Geology. Funding by Wintershall is greatly acknowledged.
22.5.2017 Visit GeoData, Garbsen, Hannover
Benni and Chris visited E&P service provider GeoData in Garbsen to get a first-hand insight in the services offered, and the options for collaboration.
5.4.2017 Visit from Socar at KIT
We welcome two representatives from Socar, Azerbaijan's state oil company, to discuss future collaboration.
13.4.2017 Visit Bamberger Natursteinwerke
Tina and Chris visited red bed outcrops in southern Germany and thank Bamberger Natursteinwerke for their support of our ongoing study.
5.-6.4.2017 Carbonate fracs at DGMK
Our results on Fracture Network Relationships in Ca2 Carbonates from Outcrop and Well Data in the Southern Permian Basin, Germany will be presented at the DGMK conference by Ivy Becker*, Patrick Wüstefeld**, Bastian Koehrer***, Wolfgang Jelinek***, Christoph Hilgers*,** *Strukturgeologie & Tektonophysik, KIT Karlsruher Institut für Technologie, **TTE Reservoir-Geologie, KIT KCT Karlsruhe, ***Wintershall Holding GmbH, Barnstorf
27.3.-2.4.2017 Student mapping course
Our students and us are out to map the transition between the Saar-Nahe basin and the Variscan Hunsruck near Kirn. The mapping course trains our 2nd year Bachelor students to identify rocks in the field, produce a geological map and derive models on sedimentary, structural and magmatic models.
21.3.2017 Paper accepted in Journal of the Geological Society London
Our paper on Cementation and structural diagenesis of fluvio-eolian Rotliegend sandstones, North England by Benjamin Busch, Dirk Adelmann and Chris has been accepted by the Journal of the Geological Society for publication. Funding by Wintershall is greatly acknowledged.
14.3.2017 Paper accepted in AAPG Bulletin
Our paper on Diagenesis and TouchStone modeling of fluvio-eolian Rotliegend sandstones by Benjamin Busch, Rob Lander, Linda Bonnell, Dirk Adelmann and Chris has been accepted by AAPG Bulletin for publication. Funding by Wintershall is greatly acknowledged.
12.-16.3.2017 Tunisian partners visit Germany
Our partners from El Manar University Tunis, Etap and EcoResources Ltd visited us in Germany to discuss the set up of a TwinTraining program. The project aims to intensity cooperative training between academia and our industry partners. We thank our partners Dohmen Herzog & Partner GmbH, GeoThermal-Engineering GmbH and Schlumberger for stimulation discussions.
22.3.2017 Red bed rocks from Halle
We thank Professor Lempp, Halle University, to share experimentally deformed red beds with us. Our project idea settled, further details may be shared upon request.
11.2.2017 student visit 3D seismic acquisition
Today our students visited the 3D seismic survey around Landau in the Upper Rhine graben. The nondestructive method allows to look into the deeper earth's subsurface, similar to the doctor's medical ultrasonics. We thank Wintershall for the opportunity.
26.1.2017 presentation at Wintershall
Today Benni presented our results on predictive cementation of reservoirs at the company's opco in Barnstorf.
11.2.2017 student visit 3D seismic acquisition
Today our students visited the 3D seismic survey around Landau in the Upper Rhine graben. The nondestructive method allows to look into the deeper earth's subsurface, similar to the doctor's medical ultrasonics.
26.1.2017 presentation at Wintershall
Today Benni presented our results on predictive cementation of reservoirs at the company's opco in Barnstorf.
19.1.2017 Prof Bhattacharya visit
Today Prof Ashok Bhattacharya, emeriti from Lucknow University India and Humboldt fellow, visited us and gave a presentation on the geology of the Himalaya mountains.
2016
News 2016
22.12.2016 Benjamin's and Miriam's PhD defense
Today Benjamin Busch, supervised by Chris, co-supervised by Helge Stanjek, and Miriam Wiegand, supervised by R Greiling, co-supervised by A Kontny, will defend their PhD theses on the impact of grain coats on reservoir quality and the magnetic anisotropy of dykes in W-Africa.
15.12.2016 visting Nagra
Today Chris and Arnfried visited Nagra, Switzerland, to exchange ideas about the changing water table through recent earth history and new analytical techniques to visualize fracture and mineralogical heterogeneities in claystones.
9.12.2016 Dennis is a doctor
Today Dennis Laux, my former MSc student, defended his PhD work on terrestrial laser scanning at TU Darmstadt, his main supervisor being Andreas Henk.
24.-25.11.2016 presentation at Wintershall
We present our research on Upper Carboniferous tight gas and reservoir quality prediction modeling to a broader audience at Wintershall. Patrick's and Benni's research will be discussed in the framework of improved exploration and production outcomes.
17.-21.11.2016 guests from Agadir, Morocco
We are hosting two colleagues from Ibn Zhor University, Agadir, Morocco and meet various SMEs to discuss potential transnational collaboration.
8.11.2016 paper out highlight the strength of SEM microscopy
The paper by Boris and Agnes, B. Reznik, A Kontny, M. Uehara, J. Gattacceca, P. Solheid, M. Jackson entitled Magnetic domains and magnetic stability of cohenite from the Morasko iron meteorite is available online 8 November 2016 in the Journal of Magnetism and Magnetic Materials
7.11.2016 paper out by Boris and Agnes
The paper by Boris and Agnes, B. Reznik, A. Kontny, and J Fritz entitled Effect of moderate shock waves on magnetic susceptibility and microstructure of a magnetite-bearing ore has been pblished in Meteoritics & Plantery Science 1-10 (2016)
4.11.2016 visiting Total in Pau
Chris visited Total in Pau to discuss on some beautiful rocks which need some interpretation.
3.11.2016 attending SPE's Student Technical Conference and visiting DEA
Chris and his KIT students attend the SPE in Wietze and visit DEA for a first insight into E&P. We kindly thank SPE and DEA for their hospitality and looking forward to return next year.
13.10.2016 meeting in Berlin
Chris and Abdel present their results on selected twin training modules enhancing the employability in N-Africa in Berlin at the BMBF project. Results were appreciated and acknowledged by the project sponsors. We hope that funding continues to implement to suggested work program with selected partners in the field of natural resources and medicine.
8.-11.10.2016 Talk in China
Eide will present the paper Economic feasibility of compressed energy under market uncertainty by Eide Hammann, Reinhard Madlener and Chris at the ICAE2016 in Bejing, China.
4.-6.10.2016 interventional skills in Munich
Chris and Abdel visited TU Munich university hospital and associated SMEs to push the BMBF/DLR project on employability in N-Africa. Chris got a first hand intro to geological techniques applied to the human body, such as seismics (ultrasonic), drilling (endoscopy), coring (liver punctuation) and rocks (gall stones).
3.10.2016 AAPG paper accepted
Benni's paper "Reservoir quality and burial model evaluation by kinetic quartz and illite cementation modeling: Case study Rotliegend, N-Germany" by Benjamin Busch, Rob Lander, Christoph Hilgers and Dirk Adelmann was positively reviewed by AAPG and will be published soon.
25.-29.92016 Talk in Austria
Christina will give a talk about her work on bounding surfaces at the GeoTirol2016 in Innsbruck, Austria.
19.9.2016 Presentation on phase-field modeling in France
Nishant will present a poster at the Phase-Field Summer School in Peyresq, France, entitled Phase-field investigation of pore space cementation and permeability in quartz sandstone by Nishant Prajapati, Kumar Ankit, Michael Selzer, Britta Nestler, Christina Schmidt and Christoph Hilgers.
6.9.2016 paper in Tectonophysics online
Miriam's and Agnes' paper on An AMS study of magma transport and emplacement mechanisms in mafic dykes from the Etendeka Province, Namibia, is now available online.
9.8.2016 paper in Energy Procedia accepted
Eide's work entitled "Economic feasability of a Compressed Air Energy Storage system under market uncertainty: a real options approach" co-autored by Reinhard Madlener, FCN at EON-ERC, RWTH Aachen and Chris has been accepted for publication in Energy Procedia. Sotring renewable energy in the subsurface requires high investments, but alternative investment decision tools are required in fluctuating markets.
19.-21.7.2016 Tunisia, twin teaching
Tina and Chris visited our partner Prof Soussi in Tunis and partners at the state oil bureau ETAP to further elaborate the concept of twin teaching, funded by the German ministry of Education and Research. Similar discussions were held on twin teaching topcis headed by Prof Kassem, focusing on medicine. With our partner Dr Brik we discussed further support for applied higher education in the region.
12.7.2016 visit E&P well near KIT
We visited the E&P well at Graben-Neudorf close to KIT with our students aimed at 1800TVD. The Upper Rhine Graben is well known for its hydrocarbon potential, which started to be commercially used since 1735. The Rhine Graben province also marks the foundation of Schlumberger. We kindly thank Rheinpetroleum giving insight on the deeper subsurface.
2.6.2016 paper in Tectonophysics accepted
Miriam's and Agnes' paper was accepted for publication by Tectonophysics. Congratulations!
26.5.2016 Distinguished lecture program at PanTerra
Jointly with Bastian Koehrer's (Wintershall) distinguished EAGE talk on tight gas reservoirs Ivy and Chris (KIT) presented our applied research at PanTerra, The Netherlands. Focus was the diagentically and structurally induced poro-perm variations to reduce exploration risks.
23.5.2016 Engie, Lingen
Having moved to the Rhine Graben fields Chris visits one of the operators Engie, formerly Gaz de France, in Lingen, to exchange ideas about reservoirs in the wider region.
19.5.2016 paper in 3G
Boris' and Agnes' paper on shock-induced deformation phenomena is now in press.
18.5.2016 paper in Nature Scientific Report published
Boris' and Agnes' paper on a high-pressure polymorph at mineral interfaces with Amar Agawal, Stefan Heissler and Frank Schilling is now online at Scientific Reports.
17.5.2016 Gesteinslabor, Heiligenstadt
Today we visit Dr Eberhard Jahn's Geolab to learn about different precision machineries on rock mechanics and poro-perm
13.5.2016 Rheinpetroleum, Heidelberg
Today we visit Rheinpetroleum, Heidelberg, to learn about the stuctural complexity of the Rhine graben area.
4.5.2016 Fels AG, Harz
Chris and Ivy present results of our project on fractured carbonates and we thank Fels AG for granting access to their quarries.
29.3.-2.4.2016 OGV Konferenz in Aachen
Wir freuen uns die 137te Jahrestreffen des Oberrheinischen Gologischen Vereins OGV in Aachen ausrichten zu dürfen.
24.8.-9.4.2015 Island Exkursion
Vom AGW wurde eine Exkursion nach Island mit geothermischen, strukturgeologischen und ingenieurgeologischen Fragestellungen unternommen. Besichtigt wurden u.a. eine Bohranlage, Geothermalfelder und geothermische Kraftwerke, Wasserfälle, eine Lavahöhle und Geysire.
Older news (from Chris RWTH time):
OGV Konferenz Aachen, 29.3 - 2.4.2016
Wir freuen uns das 137te Jahrestreffen des Oberrheinischen Geologischen Vereins OGV in Aachen ausrichten zu dürfen.
16. & 23.1.2016 Blockcourse ERM Energy Trading
We are happy to announce the shortcourse of our former student Christoph Budny, GRM, now Trianel, on energy trading aspects. We will highlight that exploration and production is just one side of the story, but share with our students how the market and demand side works.
6.2. & 7.2.2016 Fieldtrip Eifel
We are happy o guide our students in a transect from the Quaternary and Teritary Lower Rhine Embayment sediments to the coal measures, and highly deformed rocks around the Rurlake in a two day fieldtrip.
2015
News 2015
27.11.2015 Paper Georesources published
Our paper by Yasar Manss, Chris Hilgers, Tobias Vraetz, Thomas Bartnitzki, Karl Nienhaus and Henning Buddenbaum on Combined hyperspectral and Lidar-technology to optimize the location of drilling grids during mining (in German) has been published in Georesrouces 03/2015, 35-39.
20.11.2015 BMBF-DLR project N-Africa
Our new project focusses on the dissemination of applied higher education in northern Africa. We look forward to collaborate with universities in the region to develop a module which integrates national and international industries in applied teaching and research. Several years of successful and collaborative teaching with industry at our department enabled our students to be better prepared for their future carreer.
13.10.2015 Paper ZdGG positively reviewed
Our paper Facies delineation by using a multivariate statistical model from onshore wells in the Nile Delta by Dieter Krott, Christoph Hilgers and Christian Buecker is on track in Zeitschrift der deutschen Geologischen Gesellschaft ZdGG.
30.9.2015 Paper Geol Soc Lond Spec Pub in press
Benni's paper is now in press in Reservoir Quality of Clastic and Carbonate Rocks: Analysis, Modelling and Prediction, in the Geological Society, London, Special Publications series, 435
28.9.2015 Paper Georesources accepted
Yasar's paper on combined hypersectral and Lidar technology to optimize well placement in mining (Kombinierte hyperspektrale und Lidar-Technik zur Optimierung der Platzierung von Bohrrastern im Abbau) has been accepted for publication and well be published in the following German issue. The English version will be published soon in the same journal. It is based on joint work with Tobias Vraetz (IME), Henning Buddenbaum (Trier), Bartnitzki (IME), Karl Nienhaus (IME) and me, who kicked off the idea.
24.-25.9.2015 Fieldtrip for Wintershall
We organized a two-day fieldtrip jointly with Bastian Koehrer und Wolfgang Jelinek for geologists and engineers from Wintershall discussing Marius' and Simon's preliminary results on fractured Zechstein carbonates near the Harz mountains, Germany. The structure and diagenesis of Ca2 carbonate rocks enhosted in deformed anhydrites were explored in the field, evening discussions and exercises outlined the exploration strategies to reduce risk.
14.-18.9.2015 Field trip S-England
Our annual field trip to S-England covered the Permian to Cretaceous of S-England. Starting at Kilve, we covered sicliclastic source and reservoir rocks as well as fractrued carbonates. As always the weather was full of sunshine during the long days. We were happy to have Otto with us, who contributed with his experience of his long lasting industrial carreer in E&P. Everybody returned home safely, just one minibus gave up on the home.
9.-11.9.2015 International DRT conference in Aachen
Together with Janos Urai, Klaus Reicherter and Florian Wellmann, Chris organized the DRT conference. International speakers from Asia, Australia, Europe, UK and US presented their innovative research on deformation, rheology and tectonics of rocks. Ivy presented a talk on fractures and faults in tight gas sandstones. Chris chaired the session on "Structural Diagenesis, Fluid flow, HTMC processes" and published a special issue in Geotectonic Research, Vol 97, edited by Christoph v. Hagke, Janos Urai, Klaus Reicherter, Florian Wellmann, Christoph Hilgers.
13.-14.6.2015 Field trip around Aachen
This weekend we offer a field trip for our students to study the geology around Aachen. First, we start with our bicycles in Aachen's Paleozoic city center, climb the steep Cretaceous Lousberg and continue north crossing the Wurm syncline, Aachen's former hardcoal area. On the second day we cycle from Cambrian Roetgen to Devonian Walheim and continue via Kornelimunster to Aachen.
31.5.2015 Field trip to Scotland
Our field trip to Scotland returned home safely. After one week with Devonian clastics and Dalradian metamorphic rock being squeezed and cooked, and a lot of snow and rain, we are happy to be back home in the beautiful hot and dry Aachen region.
24.4.2015 Energy Storage paper in press
Our paper "Economic Feasibility of Pipeline and Underground Reservoir Storage Options for Power-to-Gas Load Balancing" by Christoph Budny, Reinhard Madlner and Christoph Hilgers has been positively reviewed by Energy Conversion and Management. It is a follow up of our Energy Procedia paper.
17.4.2015 Ankit's paper accepted
Ankit's paper entitled Phase-Field Modeling of Fracture Cementation Processes in 3-D by Kumar Ankit, Michael Selzer, Christoph Hilgers, Britta Nestler, submitted to the Journal of Petroleum Science Research (JPSR) has been accepted and will be out soon.
13.4.2015 Fracman Software at RPR
We are thankful to explore the potentials of Fracman in our future research on structures and diagenesis and are thankful to Golder for the provision of a licence. Fractured reservoirs are are primary importance both for energy exploration and energy storage.
8.4.2015 RPR-Course highlighted at company newsletter
Wintershall's April 2015 Newsletter published an article on the Reservoir-Modeling Course taught by Annett Hufe (WINZ) and Bastian Koehrer (WIDE) together with RWTH Reservoir-Petrology on campus, entitled "Reservoir modeling course at RWTH Aachen - the collaboration continued". This hands-on best practice course received an excellent feedback from our Master students in their final year, giving them a first-hand insight into excellent subsurface data and future work. We were happy to host Annett and Bastian and hope to see them back at RPR in March 2016.
25.-27.3.2015 Reservoir modeling course 2015
Annett Hufe and Bastian Koehrer from Wintershall are running a short course on reservoir modeling with Petrel. Emphasis is the geological hard data from cores and analogs, which enables geologists to develop 3D reservoir models of the subsurface. The course is integrated in the module's first part on core description of siliciclastics being integrated in WellCad, followed by an microscope course on diagenesis. In this final course of the module reservoir geology, students are requested to integrate such data in a Petrel model. Starting with a structural- and facies model, they finally come up with a poro-perm and saturation model. We thank our lecturers Annett and Bastian for delivering such a well designed state-of the art course to our students.
9.3.2015 First field trips 2015
This and coming week we start our first field season, which covers tight gas sandstone analogs (Ivy), red bed reservoir analogs (Tina), and fractured carbonates (Marius, Simon). Reservoir analogs well constrain the conditions of reservoirs in the subsurface. However, careful studies are required to indentify aspects which are not reflected at depth.
19.6.2015 Geotag 2015 in Aachen
Friday, 19.06.2015
Location:
Super C, Ford-Saal & Foyer (6.OG), RWTH Aachen University, Templergraben 57
Der Aachener Tag der Geowissenschaften ist ein Tag von der Fachgruppe Geowissenschaften und Geographie (GuG) für und mit Studierenden und Alumni. Der Aachener Geotag mit thematisch jährlich wechselnden Themen gibt dabei Einblicke in aktuelle Forschungsarbeiten und Anwendungen. Alle Studierenden und Alumni der Fachgruppe GuG, wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiter/-innen, nichtwissenschaftliche Mitarbeiter/-innen, Professoren und Professorinnen herzlich eingeladen, damit auch der diesjährige Geotag mit dem Rahmenthema ‚Energie-Reservoire Untertage‘ wieder zu einem interessanten Austausch führt.
Convenors: Reservoir-Petrologie, Prof. Dr. Christoph Hilgers & SPE RWTH Aachen Student Chapter
09:00 – 09:15 Eröffnung und Begrüßung
09:15 – 09:45 Dieter Kaufmann, Wintershall
Re-development alter Ölfelder
09:45 – 10:00 Johannes Böcker, RWTH, Geologie,
Geochemie und Lagerstätten des Erdöls und der Kohle Kohlenwasserstoffsysteme im zentralen Oberrheingraben
10:00 – 10:15 Jan Niederau, RWTH, Angewandte Geophysik & geothermische Energie
Untersuchung des thermischen Regimes in Sedimentbecken: Einfluss von Unsicherheiten und freier Konvektion
10:15 – 10:30 Bianca Biehl, RWTH, Geologisches Institut
Reservoir-Eigenschaften des Zechstein 2 Karbonates im Niedersächsischen Becken
10:30 – 11:00 Kaffeepause
11:00 – 11:30 Dr. Christian Bücker, DEA Deutsche Erdöl AG
Gashydrate als zukünftige Energieversorgung?
11:30 – 12:00 Dr. Axel Gillhaus, RWE Gasspeicher GmbH
Die Rolle von Druckluft-, Gas- und Wasserstoffspeichern für konventionelle und grüne Energie
12:00 – 12:15 Song Jie, RWTH, Ingenieurgeologie und Hydrogeologie
Hydromechanik beim Betrieb von Pumpspeicherkraftwerken
12:15 – 12:30 Benjamin Busch, RWTH, Reservoir-Petrologie
Reservoir-Heterogenitäten und deren Modellierungen zur RQ-Vorhersage
12:30 – 14:00 Mittagspause
14:00 – 14:30 Dr. Georg Bresser, Wintershall
Exploration Portfolio-Management und Decision Making im E&P Geschäft
14:30 – 15:00 Timo Anders, Trianel
Kommunale Energieversorgung: Marktnahe Bewirtschaftung von Erdgasspeichern
15:00 – 15:30 Verleihung Lehrpreises der Fachschaft
15:30 – 16:30 Posterpräsentation & SPE Tombola
sowie Abstimmung der Besucher über den Posterpreis
16:30 – 17:00 Verleihung des Posterpreises der VAG e.V.
17:00 – 18:00 VAG e.V. Festvortrag
Prof. Dr. Martin Melles, Universität zu Köln
Das El´gygytgyn-Tiefbohrprojekt: 3,6 Millionen Jahre Klimageschichte der Arktis
18:00 – 20:00 VAG e.V. Mitgliederversammlung *
Ab 20:00 Fest der Fachschaft Geowissenschaften & Ressourcenmanagement
Parkplatz Wüllnerstr. 2
__________________________________________________________________
Samstag, 20.6.2015
ab 10:00 VAG e.V. Exkursion
Geologischer Spaziergang bei Mützenich durch das Brack-Venn zu Kaiser Karls Bettstatt (Führung: Prof. em. Dr. Roland Walter)
Treffpunkt: wird über das VAG e.V. Sekretariat Fr Jennissen mitgeteilt.
__________________________________________________________________
* Veranstaltung der Studierenden während der Mitgliederversammlung am Freitag, 19.6.2015
18:00 – 19:30 Meet and Greet – Georessourcenmanager – Raum Be326
Studierende treffen Alumni
Programmleitung durch GRM Studierende: Lisa Gödde, Martin Reith,
Fabian Stamm, Moriz Trautmann
18:00 – 19:30 Meet and Greet – Geowissenschaftler – Raum Be318
Studierende treffen Alumni
Programmleitung durch SPE Student Chapter: Daniel Bücken
2.3.2015 Fluid inclusion facility running
We are happy to have the fluid inclusion facility running. With our new Leica microscope the fluid inclusion stage of the neighboring department of mineralogy is back to operation and we hope to contribute to further innovation in our the joint investment.
18.-26.2.2015 BMBF fact finding mission
Together with Professors Edda Pulst and Abdel Kassem Chris filled the academic part of a two-week trip to Tunesia and Morocco, jointly with representatives from the ministry and industry. The fact finding mission funded be the German ministry of Higher Education (BMBF) explored the potential of academic-industry collaboration, resulting in better employability of young local graduates. The pleasant welcome and fruitful discussions with local representitives of any sector in both countries ended with a heartly welcome by the Moroccan minister of higher education, HE Lahcen Daoudi.
15.2.2015 DGMK 2015 conference
We will present a poster on Upper Carboniferous tight gas and a presentation on reservoir quality prediction of red bed sediments at the annual DGMK conference in Celle, April 22nd to 23rd.
16.1.2015 Geotag 2015
The Geotag 2015 hosted by the School of Geosciences at RWTH on June 19th 2015 is entitled "Energy reservoirs subsurface - exploration, storage, economics" ("Energiereservoir untertage - Exploration, Speicher, Ökonomie").
14.1.2015 Paper on energy storage out
Our paper on the "Economic feasabilty of pipe storage and underground reservoir storage options for power-to-gas load balancing by Christoph Budny, Reinhard Madlener and Christoph Hilgers is now published in Energy Procedia, 61, 2201-2205.
2014
News 2014
24.12.2014 Season's Greeting
The RPR-Team wishes merry christmas and all the best for 2015.
12.12.2014 Heitfeld Prize
Today Nadja will be awarded the Heitfeld prize at RWTH main campus. Nadja's Master thesis at RPR jointly with BBK I delt with the risk analysis of a new machine from Caterpillar to be installed in an Indian hard coal mine. Congratulations! Since her work was for DMT and Caterpillar, Nadja was not able to present detailed results. The work was co-supervised by BBK I at RWTH Aachen.
7.12.2014 Presentation on ongoing research
Today Chris presented RPR's onging applied research at the German University of Tecchnology in Muscat, Oman.
3.12.2014 Rotliegend reservoir heterogeneity
Today Chris, Benni and Tina visited red bed outcrops jointly with representatives from a German E&P company to kick-off joint research. Exposures and sampling strategy enables to better quanitify reseroivr heterogeneity in Rotliegend rocks.
13.11.2014 Azerbaijan visit
Today Chris and Jan Schwarzbauer (EMR-LEK) received guest from Socar Azerbaijan and discussed the onset of collaboration in reserach related to oil recovery and analyses.
13.11.2014 Permian Fractured Carbonates
Today Chris, Marius, Ivy jointly with Bastian and Wolf-Dieter visited some quarries for a fracture network study on Permian carbonate rocks in the Harz region. Numerous active and dismantled quarries will provide valuable data on fracture pattern, lateral heterogeneties and cementation patterns. The project carried out by Marius Waldvogel will integrated reservoir engineering- and geological aspects and enhance the understanding of fractured carbonate reservoirs.
5.11.2014 Presentation at Geological Society Oman
Today Chris gives a presentation at the Geologial Society, Muscat, Oman on "Approaches on reservoir heterogeneities in conventional and tight gas sandstones". The exploration of unconventional rocks will be of prime importance for future exploration of energy resources in the Gulf region. The talk takes place at the Oil & as Exhibition near PDO at 5 pm.
30.10.2014 Fracturing of rocks, study work of Julia
Together with Tobias Vraetz, IME and coworkers Julia Schneider will establish the conditions of rocks when fracturing. Selected samples from Upper Carboniferous rocks will serve as base parameters, and fundamental rock mechanical parameters will be established for rock mechanical calculations.
24.10.2014 Visit of Rheinkalk quarry, Wuelfrath
Today we visited the Rheinkalk quarry to quality check the results of our joint research focusing on igitally derived data versus real rocks exposed in the quarry. The limestones and shales exposed in the quarry may act as good analogs for reservoirs.
23.10.2014 Presentation Upper Carboniferous Kuelpmann at Geological Survvey NRW
Today Chris, Jan and Patrick visited the Geological Survey NRW. Here, Jan Melchert presented the results of his BSc work on the quarry Kuelpmann to the Geological Survey, NRW, which involved diagenetic and structural aspects. It was followed by a discussion on the importance of the quarry as a natural heritage site, and a discussion of the Lidar technology.
16-17.10.2014 SPE Student Technical Conference (STC) in Wietze
Chris together with our Master students from RWTH's Applied Geoscience attended the SPE STC Annual Meeting in Wietze. The conference invites a selected group of students to present the research performed during their Master study in front of a audience with mainly industry background. Dieter Krott (RPR) presented the results of research performed with Christian Buecker, RWE DEA on Facies Delineation by using a Statistical Model with Downhole and Core Data from Onshore Wells in the Nile Delta. Yasar Manss (RPR) presented his research on porosity variations in tight gas rocks, a reserach project performed with Bastian Koehrer, Wintershall.
15.10.2014 Zoltan's PhD defense
Today Zoltan Komoroczi, supervised by Janos Urai, defended his PhD thesis in front a a plenum. Zoltan is now with Baker, Abederdeen.
9.10.2014 Welcome trip for MSc Applied Geophysics Students
Chrisoph Clasuer, Florian Welmann, Jan van der Kruk and Chris welcomed our MSc Applied Geophysics students in Aachen. With their previous semsters in Delft and Zurich, they now study their final semester at RWTH before completing their Master thesis. Chris guided the group to some exposures around Stolberg-Vicht, some of them analogs for source- and reservoir rocks.
2.-3.10.2014 Annual Meeting Tight and Conventional Gas, Barnstorf
Benjmin, Patrick and Yasar presented their research on the meeting and discussed future research with representatives from Germany, Netherland and the UK. Palynology data established by Duncan and David provided important information for the correlation of the Upper Carboniferous in the region. The meeting was followed by a visit of exposures along the Osning inversion structure.
22.-24.9.2014 GeoFrankfurt Conference, Frankfurt
Ulrike, Garri Gaus, Max Hallenberger and Chris will present their results on unconformities and hiatal surfaces from the Buntsandstein, Germany and Upper Carboniferous, Ireland, Co Clare at the GeoFrankfurt Conference from 21.-24.9.2014.
14.-17.9.2014 AAPG Conference, Istanbul
Patrick will give an oral presentation on tight gas rocks at the AAPG International Conference & Exhibition 2014.
16.-19.9.2014 7th Mid-European Clay Conference, Dresden
Yasar and Patrick will present their results on Upper Carboniferous Tight Gas Sandstone in NW-Germany at the MECC14 conference in Dresden, Germany.
4.7.2014 VAG Student Award to Ivy, Aachen
This year's VAG Student Prize for the best student performance was awarded to Ivy Becker. Ivy did her Bachelor on the geology of county Clare, Ireland, entitled Geological mapping of an Upper Carboniferous delta area. Congratulations!
4.7.2014 VAG Best Poster Award to Markus and Simon, Aachen
This year's first prize VAG Best Poster Award was granted to Simon Schreur and Markus Koenig for their poster on „Geological mapping and diagenesis of unconventional Upper Carboniferous tight gas rocks, Germany“, a Bachelor thesis unravelling the tight gas reservoirs.
4.7.2014 VAG Geotag, Aachen
This year's VAG Geotag will be on „GeoMaterials in Industry and Reserach“, held at RWTH's Super C. The program (in German) organised by the institutes of crystallography and mineralogy is as follows:
09:15 – 14:15 Uhr Vorträge zu GeoMaterialien in Industrie und Forschung Ford-Saal, 6.OG
14:30 – 15:00 Uhr Verleihung des Lehrpreises der Fachschaft GeoRes Ford-Saal, 6.OG
15:00 – 17:00 Uhr Posterpräsentation mit Abstimmung durch die Besucher und Preisverleihung, Generali-Saal, 6.OG
17:00 Uhr Festvortrag der VAG, Prof. Clauser Ford-Saal, 6.OG
18:00 Uhr Mitgliederversammlung der VAG Ford-Saal, 6.OG
anschließend Sommerfest der Fachschaft. Wir freuen uns, auch in diesem Jahr wieder den Posterpreis der Vereinigung Aachener Geowissenschaftler (VAG e. V.) verleihen zu können. Alle Studierenden der Fachgruppe werden ermutigt, ihre Ergebnisse aus aktuellen Forschungsarbeiten in Postern zu präsentieren.
27.6.2014 SPE Student Award to Yasar
We congratulate Yasar Manss who today was awarded SPE's student prize by the SPE's German Section President Ingo Forstner. Yasar is currently completing his Master project on Variations in Reservoir Quality of an Upper Carboniferous Tight Gas Sandstone in NW-Germany.
26-27.6.2014 SPE German Section Annual Meeting
We are happy to host the Society of Petroleum of Engineers Annual Meeting at RWTH Aachen, organized by the newly established SPE RWTH Aachen Student Chapter. SPE representatives and students from our SPE chapters in Clausthal, Freiberg and started with a barbeque Thursday evening, followed by the annual meeting Friday morning. SPE Student prizes for Master students will be awarded after lunchbreack on Friday at 14.30h at room LIH504. The event includes a overview of RWTH's E&P related institutes within the School of Applied Geosciences and will end with a field trip on the geology of Aachen Friday evening.
26-27.6.2014 Flyer of current MSc courses on Geosciences
Our School of Geosciences currently runs three internationally re-accredited MSc courses in Geosciences. Applied Geophysics is a joint MSc with TU Delft and ETH Zurich. Students enroll at TU Delft and study one semester in Delft, Zurich and Aachen before completing their 6 months Master thesis. Language of instruction is English. The MSc in Applied Geosciences offers different streams, one in Energy & Mineral Resources (language of instruction is English), one in Geophysik-Ingenieurgeologie-Hydrogeologie (language of instruction is mainly German), and one in GeoMaterials. Our MSc in GeoresourcesMangement offers two different streams in Resources Management and Evironmental Management (language of instruction is English and German). Further details can be obtained here.
25.6.2014 Brainstorm about MENA region
Today we brainstormed in Bonn with several stakeholders from governmental and industry representatives about a joint project in the MENA region, focusing on tertiary higher education. The initiative headed by Prof. Edda Pulst discussed options of knowledge transfer of mutual interest.
6.-15.5.2014 Field Seminar in Scotland
We returned home safely from our one week field seminar around Glen Coe, Scotland. Despite midges factor 4 to 5 on a scale of 1 to 5, all students coped well with harsh conditions. Physically and mentally strong, we climbed some mountains even when within clouds. As always, temperature dropped upon arrival but 15 deg C and slight showers showed to be excellent conditions for field work. Dalradian rocks along the Great Glen strike slip faults were intensly deformed during Caledonian orogenesis, metamorphosed during subduction and penetrated by plutons and covered by Devonian volcanics. Old Red sediments in W-Scotland were compared to the Devonian Aachen rocks, and the location of paleo-continents were discussed.
28.-30.5.2014 Presentation at Burlington House, London
Benni gave a talk on his research of flow heterogeneities Rotliegend sandstones. The conference on Reservoir Quality of Clastic and Carbonate Rocks: Analysis, Modelling and Prediction at the Geological Society, Burlington House, London. The conference seeks to address the factors and processes controlling rock properties of clastic and carbonate rocks as well as showcase novel analytical techniques and demonstrate diagenetic modelling capability. He is invited to submit a peer reviewed paper.
9.4.2014 our students on WDR TV
Today we were on air with our students on WDR TV, promoting the Lehmjoeres hike around Stolberg-Vicht. The village Vicht is located 2 km south of Stolberg and 5 km ESE Aachen and stretches along the river Vicht. It not only displays the strong relation of geology and industrial development, but is the origin of Germany’s industrial culture, which from the Aachen-Stolberg region later moved to the Rur area and established the Ruhr district, Europe’s largest industrial center. A brief overview of the geology and industrial devlopment can be found here .
1.4.2014 New Senior Researcher Ulrike Hilse at RPR
We welcome Ulrike as our new senior researcher at Reservoir-Petrology. Ulrike obtained her profound knowledge on variious analytical technqiues of siliciclastic rocks at Jena University. We are happy to have her on board and look forward on her contributions to structural diagenesis.
24.3-27.3.2014 Touchstone Shortcourse
Rob Lander and Linda Bonnell from Geocosm, Colorado, run a Basic- and Advanced Course in Resevoir Quality Prediction Modeling at our department for our students doing a petrography based final thesis and industry representatives. Knowing the mineralogical compositon of rocks, their thermal exposure and facies distribution, the software predicts scenarios of reservoir quality based on the kinetics of reaction rates. We are happy that Geocosm provides licenses to carry out research at Reservoir-Petrology.
10.3-21.3.2014 Rotliegend Convential Reservoir Analog, England
Benni is out with two Bachelor students to study Rotliegend sandstones in the UK. We study the variation of sedimentary units deposited in an eolian setting and the impact of grain coats on pore space cemenation and implement data in reservoir-quality prediction modeling.
4.3-21.3.2014 Upper Carboniferous Tight Gas Rocks
Patrick is out with three Bachelor students to study Upper Carboniferous sandstones near Albringhausen and Piesberg, northwest Germany. We study the variation of sedimentary units deposited in a river system, pore space cemenation, the spatial fracture distribution and the cementation of of fractures and faults.
25.-27.2.2014 Presentation at SPE meeting, Vienna
Patrick presented his first results at the SPE/EAGE European Unconventional Conference and Exhibition held in Vienna, Austria. His associated 10-pages paper number SPE 167793 by Wuestefeld et al. is entitled "Reservoir Heterogeneity in Upper Carboniferous Tight Gas Sandstones: Lessons Learned From an Analog Study".
3.2.2014 GoEast DAAD scholarships for Azerbaijan
Please note that the DAAD Go East program will fund 10 scholarships for German students attending the winter oil summerschool in Baku, Azerbaijan. The winter oil school will be held in Baku from March 3-15, 2014. Application deadline is Februrary 10, 2014. Please check the DAAD website and www.daadwss.com for further details.
28.1.2014 SPE - Society of Petroleum Engineers Student Chapter kicked-off
Today our EMR-Students kicked off their RWTH SPE-student chapter, supported by SPE's German Section and our faculty, and submitted their proposal to SPE's headquarter. SPE with it's app 100,000 members provides a worldwide network with peers and industry professionals and supports student chapters at Universities with Upstream-related Master courses. Our MSc Applied Geosciences - Energy & Mineral Resources Stream and our joint MSc Applied Geophysics with TU Delft and ETH Zurich fullfill the requirements and we are looking forward for the RWTH chapter to be accrediated by SPE's headquarter. Christoph Hilgers initated the establishment of a student chapter at RWTH when he took EMR-MSc students to the SPE-STC 2013 meeting.
25.1.2014 Mudlogging student interns needed
A deep well planned for April & May 2014 needs mudloggers, that is you, our MSc students with microscopy skills. The deep well is drilled into a salt dome in Northern Germany. Such drilling is required for either energy exploration or energy storage, both key aspects driving the country's economy. On-site shifts allow you to validate the lithologies drilled and test the subsurface model. If you are interested in some hands-on experience, please contact us at RPR or get in touch with our SPE student chapter.
8.-11.1.2014 Kick-off meeting in Azerbaijan
We recently were awarded a grant by the VolkswagenStiftung to further discuss our interdisciplinary transnational project with Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, which is hosted under the scheme "Environment, natural resources and renewable energies - Interdisciplinary transboundary research on human-envirnmental interactions". Our proposal entitled "Geological and geochemical aspects of natural hydrocarbon seepage from mud volcanoes and its socio-economic impact on anthropogenic spills" addresses the full sequence from natural sciences to socio-economic reserach. Christoph Hilgers had very fruitfrul discussions with our partners from ADA University and Kazakhstan in beautiful Baku, Azerbaijan, an old city next to the Caspian Sea and located on the silk way.
2013
News 2013
29.11.2013 Panel discussion at the EME Research Area, School of Business and Economics
Today Chris attends a panel discussion at EON ERC, RWTH Aachen University. Together with Prof. de Donker, Prof. Schüttrumpf, OI Randaxhe and Dr. Vogt, chaired by Prof. Madlener, selected real world ultra-long infrastructure investments are exposed from an electrical-engineering, civil-engineering, mining-engineering, geophysical and geological perspective, and discussed with the audience.
07.11.2013 Our RWTH Applied Geoscience students on air
Today our students will be on air at WDR TV, entitled Excursions to the crater rim of Stromboli, talking about their field trip exploring Italy's active volcanoes and studying rocks and slabbed see-through rock sections under the microscope. "Die Exkursionen mit Professor Hilgers, die sind nichts für Unsportliche, denn es geht immer ganz hoch hinaus .. so wie bei der letzten Exkursion, da kletterten sie auf die kleinen Vulkaninseln oberhalb von Sizilien - ein Ort an dem die Erde Feuer spuckt (from WDR TV)". Earth's life wouldn't been there without volcanoes, whose gas eruptions provided the water of the sea as well as sulphur- and carbon dioxide protecting earth from cooling. The evolution of plants consumed CO2 and provides oxygen we breathe. Although sometimes devasting, the movement of plate tectonics causing earthquakes and volcanic eruptions is an integral part to enable life on earth. A long-lasting global gas cycle of temporarilly increased CO2 expulsion causes a change of climate and leads to increased rock weathering, which in turn ties more CO2 into the sediment. The eruption frequency of our intracontinental Eifel volcanoes, generally dormant for 10s of thousands of years before the next devasting eruption, luckily this is much longer than the hourly erupting Stromboli and decade erupting Etna volcanoes in southern Italy (Link to TV Website ).
30.10.2013 presentation at TU Delft
Today Chris gave a presentation on oinging RPR research at the SPARKS colloqium at Petroleum Engineering and Geosciences at TU Delft on "Subseismic to microscale poro-perm reservoir heterogeneities from field- and experimental studies", followed by disucssions on future collaborations. Collaboration between TU Delft and RWTH Aachen has been established via the joint MSc Applied Geophysics between TU Delft, ETH Zurich and RWTH Aachen, to which RPR contributes.
24.-25.10.2013 SPE conference
We will join the two-day SPE Society of Petroleum Engineers conference held in Germany. Besides an overview of ongoing applied research of different institutions, three of our Master students will explore the potential job opportunities in the E&P industry.
17.10.2013 Upper Carboniferous Quarry, Rhenish Massif
We will meet with the Geological Survey GD and representatives of the University of Bochum in the field to study a quarry of Upper Carboniferous unconventional reservoir rocks and discuss further collaborative research.
30.9.2013 Kick-off meeting at Wintershall
Today we kick-off two long-term research projects with our colleages at Winterhsall, focusing on the tighs reservoir rocks and the implications of coating on reservoir quality. The projects are settled in a bundle of projects on integrated low perm systems (ilops). Further projects by the EMR group will contribute to a better understanding of future reservoir rocks.
28.9.2013 Active Volcanoes field Trip
Today we returned from our one-week field trip climbing the volcanoes of the Aeolian Islands Vulcano, Lipari and Stromboli and Mt. Etna. We measured the temperatures and gas emissions of CO2, H2S and SO2 in the field, and discussed the formation of of volcanoes related to plate tectonics and geochemistry, as well as mineral dissolutions and precipitations.
19.9.2013 Visit of CEMEX quarry
We are delighted to present our results on rock alterations and rock parameters at CEMEX near Osnabrueck. Data can be used for the improvement of reservoir exploarations, as well as mining aspects. We are looking forward for continuing collaboration.
18.9.2013 Presentation at Geofluids Conference
Today Reservoir-Petrology RPR contributed with two oral presentations and one poster to the Geologische Vereinigung GV & Deutsche Mineralogische Gesellschaft DMG Annual Meeting "Geofluids: Lubricants of the Earth" in Tuebingen. Patrick Wuestefeld (RPR) presented ongoing work on "Structural Diagenesis in an Upper Carboniferous Tight Gas Sands Reservoir Analogue, Piesberg Quarry, NW-Germany", with co-authors M. Höhne, P. Steindorf, B. Koehrer, P. Bertier, K. Schurk, C. Hilgers. Stephan Becker (RPR) followed with research on "Reservoir Quality in the A2C-Stringer interval of the late Neoproterozoic Ara-Group of the South Oman Salt Basin: Diagenetic relationships in space and time" with co-authors Lars Reuning, Peter A. Kukla, Steffen Abe, Shiyuan Li, Janos L. Urai, Suleiman Farqani, Gideon Lopes Cardozo, Zuwena Rawahi. Benjamin Busch (RPR) presented the poster by Annett Hufe (now with Wintershall), Benjamin Busch, Helge Stanjek, Christoph Hilgers on "Diffusion-controlled cementation experiments of salts in porous rock analogs using transparent microreactors".
14.9.2013 SW-England Reservoir-Geology Field Seminar
Today all students returned home from our Reservoir-Geology field seminar in SW-England. Starting eastwards along the Bristol Channel, and crossing England westwards along the Bristish Channel, we studied and correlated siliciclastic Rotliegend and fractured carbonate reservoir rocks, Kimmeridge and other oil shales, as well as Cretaceous at Lulworth. Oil sands and and oil dripping from the cliffs were sampled for further analyses of our Organic Geochemistry course with Prof. Jan Schwarzbauer. Many thanks to Benni and Gunnar for bringing students home safely and the continuous support during the field classes.
16.7.2013 15. Aachener Altlasten- und Berschadenkundliches Kolloqium ABK
A colloqium will be presented on July 16th 2013 at RWTH Aachen University on "Fracking and no end" in the frame of the 15. Aachener Altlasten- und Berschadenkundliches Kolloqium ABK. Various experts from different disciplines will present aspects such as: authorities view, different techniques, legal challenges, dialog process, and implications for research. Registration until 1.7.2013 per fax at GDMB Gesellschaft für Metallurgen und Bergleute e.V., more informations at www.abk.gdmb.de Reservoir-Petrology contributes with colleagues on the Directions of future research on fracking
Am 16. Juli 2013 findet das 15. Aachener Altlasten- und Berschadenkundliches Kolloqium ABK zum Thema "Fracking und kein Ende" an der RWTH Aachen statt. Dabei werden von Referenten unterschiedlichster Fachdisziplinen folgende Aspekte präsentiert: Behördliche Sicht, die unterschiedlichen Verfahren, rechtliche Herausforderungen, der Dialogprozess und Implikationen für die Forschung. Die Anmeldung erfolgt per Fax bei der GDMB Gesellschaft für Metallurgen und Bergleute e.V. bis zum 1.7.2013 entgegen genommen, weitere Informationen unter www.abk.gdmb.de. Die Reservoir-Petrologie trägt mit dem Thema Beitrag zukünftiger Forschung zum Thema Fracking bei.
5.7.2013 Faculty's teaching award to Christoph Hilgers
Today the faculty's teaching award was granted to Christoph Hilgers for his excellence of his lectures and field seminars. In his laudatio, the Dean educ. Prof. Dr. Christoph Schneider cited from the student council's recommendation letter and students comments on the evaluation sheets: "... he puts a high workload on us and expects a lot ... due to the integrated approach, I had to apply all what I learned before ... I never learned more in such short time .. he thinks that there's only Reservoir-Geology .... when we repeated the course content in the field, I understood ... field trips are quite different compared to others, visiting not more than 3 exposures a day, students are splitted up in teams and guided to discover and explore ...". Chris likes to thank the nomination committee of the Faculty for Georesrouces and Materials Engineering for being granted the award, and the students for their support.
6.6.2013 Geological Survey NRW
Today we discuss and exchange ideas on Upper Carboniferous rocks with the state's geological survey in Krefeld, NRW. Siliciclastic Upper Carboniferous rocks comprise hard coal and organic rich shales, as well as tight sandstones, and thus a huge potential of unconventional reservoirs. The Aachen-Wurm Revier is one of the world's oldest subsurface coal mine areas, with first records dated more than 900 years ago.
27.5.2013 visit of Harun at RPR
Today Harun Cekir, currently at Wintershall, visited RPR, comparing with Mareen the alteration and diagenesis of Upper Carboniferous siliciclastic rocks from surface exposures near Osnabrück and subsurface well data. Exposed rocks a generally alterated and expose a higher porosity than those located at depth. Thus, core data from wells are required to better predict subsurface processes.
19.-25.5.2013 Scotland 2013
Our 2nd year EMR BSc students went on their compulsory field trip to Scotland. After a short introduction to the Glen Coe Caldera, fault intrusion and volcanism, Ballachulish pluton and contact metamorphism, as well as Kerrera Island's Dalaradian rocks, we mapped the area around Kinlochleven. Our trip started with a stormy night in Glen Coe, followed by sunshine at 15 deg C and a first sunstroke. Overnight the munros (3000 ft = 914 m) and the smaller mountains in the regions were covered with snow, and camping was frosty. However, we climbed up and down the mountains, followed by late evenings of follow-up lectures and discussions. After some hail and horizontal rain conditions became better and everyone returned home safely a tan and nice geological map. Luckily, there were hardly any midgies this year.
1.-3.5.2013 Visiting Azerbaijan
Following Azerbaijan's state oil company visiting our EMR group at RWTH Aachen University, Chris visited Azerbaijan's capital Baku and gave a presentation at the National Academy of Sciences, followed by talks with representatives of the National Academy, as well as the Azerbaijan Diplomatic Academy and the oil industry. Located on the silk way, the thriving country on the Caspian sea is the oldest place of hydrocarbon usage, where Zoroastrians worshipped fire and used gas seeps as sacred places. Active mudvolcanoes form impressive hills and produce enormous volumes of liquified muds from depth.
16.4.2013 EERA
We kindly thank Kris Piessens, Belgian Geological Survey in Brussels,for his invitation and discussions on joint research in the Euregio on shale gas. Shales are quite complex rocks and their structural diagenesis is yet poorly understood. By joining up expertise we aim to better understand these interesting rocks.
22.3.2013Presentation on Structural Diagenesis
Chris presented the outcome of Mareen's and Philipp's excellent work today at Wintershall. Upper Carboniferous siliciclastic rocks expose a significant heterogeneity of the pore space in fluvial sedimentary bodies, which were studied in detail from pore- to reservoir scale.
11.3.2013Presentation on flow barriers in reservoir rocks
We presented our first results on sedimentary and structural flow barriers in Mesozoic eolian sandstones in Hamburg today. Fluid flow in sedimentary rocks might be affected by sedimentary settings and structural phenomena, leading to sealing of the rock fabric. Thanks to Rebecca's and Benni's excellent work and presentation we contribute to the predictibility of reservoir compartments.
19.3.2013 lecture on pump storage plants - PSPs
Today at 7pm Prof. Dr. Holger Schüttrumpf, RWTH Aachen University - Institut für Wasserbau und Wasserwirtschaft will give a presentation on pump storage plants PSP “Pumpspeicherwerke in der Region Niederrhein - Grundlagen, Stand, Potentiale” within the lecture series of Energy Hills e.V.. The interim storage of "green" energy is among the main issues to be addressed in the near future.
21.2.2013 upcoming DRT conference in Leuven, Belgium
Please note the 18th DRT conference Deformation, Rheology, Tectonics in Leuven, Belgium from September 16th-18th 2013 in Leuven, Belgium, and the relating website here . We are happy to support the conference manager Manuel Sintubin.
Abstract submission – 31 May 2013, Early bird registration – 30 June 2013, conference - 16-18 September 2013
7.2.2013 RPR at DGMK conference 2013
RPR contributions were accepted as oral and poster presentations at the annual DGMK conference (Deutsche Wissenschaftliche Gesellschaft für Erdöl, Erdgas und Kohle e.V.) in Celle in April 2013. The conference's topic is on Best Practices - Erwartungen an neue E&P Technologien .
20.2.2013 Invited talk in Bochum on Oman
Chris presented some insight on beautiful Oman, entitled "Weihrauch, Wüste, Wadis - Oman: Ein geologisches Wunderland auf dem Weg in die Neuzeit" at the Gesellschaft für Geographie und Geologie in Bochum e.V.. Cultural as well as geological aspects were addressed, exposing the beauty of the country. Oman exposes the Jabal Akdhar anticline and Jabal Shams mountains, an almost 3000m peak formed during Alpine orogeny and closure of the Thetys ocean. Carbonate reservoirs in Meszoic rocks, carbonate stringers, piercing salt domes, the Wahiba Sands desert and the obducted Semail ophilithe are just a few of many geological wonders of the Sultante.
21.1.2013 We now have WLan
We now can provide WLan to our students on the 5th floor with kind support of the Center for Computing and Communication of RWTH Aachen University.
2012
News 2012
23.12.2012 Merry Christmas
The EMR-Group wishes a merry christmas to our partners, colleagues and friends, and a happy and successful 2013.
23.12.2012 Merry Christmas
The RPR team thanks our partners, colleagues and friends for our excellent and fruitful collaboration and wishes a merry xmas, and a happy and successful 2013.
18.-19.12.2012 Workshop Hydrocarbon Resevoirs
The EMR-Group is running a workshop on the "Petrophysics and Geochemistry of Unconventional Hydrocarbon Reservoirs", organized by Yves Gensterblum from the Institute of Geology and Geochemistry of Petroleum and Coal. We host guests from Australia, Netherlands and the UK here in Aachen, both from academia and industry. Chris gives a presentation on Structural Diagenesis – some insights from field analogs and see-through experiments.
08.12.2012 First Graduation Ceremony at GUtech in Muscat, Oman
Today the first graduation ceremony was held at the new campus of German University of Technology in Halban near Muscat, Oman. Professor Burkhard Rauhut, Rector of GUtech since 2008, and Dr. Dorothea Rüland, Secretary General of the German Academic Exchange Service DAAD gave the words of greetings. The graduates were addressed RWTH Aachen's Rector Professor Ernst Schmachtenberg. 30 Bachelor graduates dressed in an black academic gown, among them five geoscientists, received their final certificate. GUtech is a limited liable establishment owned by local investors (see interview in Spiegel Special 5/2008 with Prof. Rauhut), and was designed in 2006 and put into operation by Barbara Stäuble and Christoph Hilgers in 2007. We are happy to see the first graduates in Urban Planning, IT, Sustainable Tourism and Geosciences leaving the university and wish them all success.
28.11.2012 Stephan Becker's PhD defended
Today Stephan Becker successfully defended his PhD in front of a committee by Prof. Peter Kukla, Prof. Janos Urai and chaired by Prof. Klaus Reicherter. We congratulate Dr. Becker and are happy to keep him at RWTH!
28.11.2012 Lecture honoured
Today our lecture Reservoir-Petrology II (12ss-33528) was honoured among the top faculty's courses, based on student evaluation. We have to admit that we were surprised, since student's workload is quite high. RPR thanks our students for the positive evaluation.
16.11.2012 Foot unscrewed
After a nasty graben-like fracture of Chris' foot and its rearrangement with bolts and a plate last year, diagenesis cemented the fractures well. Today the metal pieces were taken out, and this unwanted and hopefully first and last self-study on structural diagenesis came to an end. Thanks to the hospital's expertise back home the same day, many thanks!
13.11.2012 Professor awarded
Today Christoph Hilgers, Institute of Reservoir-Petrology, received the apl. professor certificate from the faculty's dean Professor Ralf Littke. In a small ceremony in the deanery, Chris' academic contributions were acknowledged. Chris expressed his gratitude to the faculty, the student board and all others who supported the award.
13.11.2012 Klaus Vogel presents his MSc GRM to businessmen
Klaus Vogel, MSc, presented his Master Project at the Energy Center in Willich to local businessmen, municipality and local energy suppliers. After a short introduction by Willich's major Josef Heyes, Klaus outlined the questionary he developed for the business park in Willich. He described the needs, economic potential and requirements for the local industry to move towards geothemal energy. After his presentation, the stimulating discussion urged the need for further projects.
4.-7.11.2012 Stephen Laubach, Christoph Hilgers and Mark Evans organize a GSA Special Session on Structural Diagenesis
Stephen Laubach, Christoph Hilgers and Mark Evans organized a GSA Special Session on Structural Diagenesis at the Geological Society of America Annual Meeting in Charlotte, North Carolina, Nov 4th – 7th 2012, 4.-7.11.2012. Their session T171 The Role of Structure and Diagenesis in Governing Fluid Storage and Flow in Deep Sedimentary Basins with Applications to Unconventional Oil and Gas Reservoirs (GSA Structural Geology and Tectonics Division; GSA Sedimentary Geology Division; GSA Hydrogeology Division; GSA Geophysics Division) on Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday had a very good response, with Peter Hennings from ConocoPhillips Subsurface Technology addressing the keynote.
18.10.2012 Rob and Linda visit RPR
We welcome Rob Lander and Linda Bonnell at RPR for an exchange of ideas and extended collaboration. Rob and Linda develop the Reservoir Quality Prediction software Touchstone and the crystal growth program Prism2D, which will complement our current and future research. More can be found on their company's website http://geocosm.net/
17.-22.9.2012 Field trip: Climb active volcanoes
This week we are off to Sicily and the Eolian Islands with our Bachelor students. We will study some of the active Mediterranean volcanoes and get a better insight into our dynamic planet and its underlying processes. We will climb the active volcanoes Vulcano, Stromboli and Etna and study the rocks of Lipari island.
16.9.2012 Farewell Omani students
Today our Omani geology students from GUtech in Muscat are heading home. We wish a save journey, a warm welcome at home and hope to see you soon back in Germany or in Oman.
10.-15.9.2012 Field Seminar S-England
This week we run our field seminar for Master Students in S-England. We will study cliff exposures of Triassic and Jurassic porous siliciclastic reservoirs, Jurassic fractured carbonate reservoirs and source rocks of the Blue Lias and Kimmeridigian along the Bristol Channel and British Channel. We will analyze and discuss depositional environments, facies, diagenesis and structures, and will take rocks samples for organic geochemistry analyses (MSc course Organic Geochemistry by Jan Schwarzbauer).
27.8.-9.9.2012 Omani students at RPR
We welcome Omani students from the German University of Technology in Aachen, who will stay with us for a language course and geology classes on petrography. Our continuous exchange of Omani students to RWTH Aachen and RWTH students to Oman is now in its 3rd year.
21.8.2012 GSA Session accepted
We are happy to announce that our GSA session T171. The Role of Structure and Diagenesis in Governing Fluid Storage and Flow in Deep Sedimentary Basins with Applications to Unconventional Oil and Gas Reservoirs was accepted by the Geological Society of America GSAat Charlotte, North Carolina, Nov 4th – 7th 2012, 4.-7.11.2012
23.7.2012 Subseismic flow barriers
We will now start a funded project on flow barriers in the Rotliegend. The German Rotliegend is an important hydrocarbon reservoir in sandstone, whose structural diagenesis is not yet fully resolved. We'll try to contribute, addressing different cementation patterns and the flow behavior.
15.7.2012 Field trip for Industry
We will guide a field trip to an unconventional tight gas reservoir analogue for geologists and reservoir engineers from industry on Sunday. Rock exposures similar to those explored in the deep subsurface - thus neither accessible nor visible unless using wells and seismics - are important to understand the reservoir's complexity.
9.7.2012 New Paper out
A new paper on "A Procedure for Integrating Geologic Concepts into History Matching" in Society of Petroleum Engineers, SPE 159885-PP has been published by Sofie and co-authors.
27-28.6.2012 Unconventionals
We examined some phantastic outcrops on Mesozoic Posidonienschiefer and Paleozoic Alaunschiefer across Germany, and checked whether and how these unconventional reservoir rocks can be studied in more detail.
22.06.2012 Poster Award Geotag
Congratulation to our Master Students Rabea Viße and Annett Hufe who won a poster award at the Geotag 2012 conference. Master projects at RPR cover coupled field- and thin section work, experimental work and reservoir-related outreach.
22.06.2012 Geotag 2012
Please note our annual Geotag meeting, which brings together Industry and students with interesting presentations from Geoscientists working in different applied fields. Our RPR-students Annett, Klaus, Philipp and Rabea will present their first poster on their ongoing projects. This year's Geotag will start at 9.30 am at RWTH Aachen, Couvenhalle (opposite RWTH's central building). Please have a look at the LIH website for further details.
03.06.2012 Scotland field seminar retuned home safely
Today all eighteen Bachelor students returned home safely from the one-week field seminar in Scotland. Starting with 25+ weather conditions, some snow on the munroes and beautiful sceneries, we studied some world-class exposures in Glen Coe, Ballachulish, Appin and on Kerrera island. Unconformities, volcanoes, plutons, regional and contact metamorphism, sedimentary and deformation structures in sedimentary and crystalline rocks are not anymore nice textbook pictures but real. A drop in temperatures to +12 kicked-off the standard Scottish weather period with some drizzle and wind. Some could even experience horizontal rain. Midges were a bit nasty this year. We started to work on indivudual areas in the Mamore mountain ridge, and successfully created a map of our field area. Combined with theory sessions we developed a good understanding of the underlying processes, and after some physical training everyone returned home safely and well tanned. Click on Galleries for some photos.
Our young Geoscientists (geosciences being the youngest of the natural science subjects) are guided to well exposed world-class case studies to get a profound understanding of earth system processes in space and time.
26.05.2012 Scotland field class
Our education in the field start end of May, running a field seminar in the Scottish Highlands. Weather conditions are as usual, don't forget warm clothing and a good sleeping bag.
10.-11.05.2012 Unconventional Shale Gas
Chris participates in AAPG's Unconvential Shale Gas Conference in Warsaw, Poland. Shale gas offers a huge additional energy resource.
5.5.2012 Field Seminar
Please note today's Wurmtal field seminar, starting 8.30h in front of the Bergbaugebäude / miners building. Expected return 18h. Please bring your bicycle.
4.5.2012 Development of image analysis tools
Today we discuss the potentials of modern image analyses with the Deparment of Life Science Informatics at the Fraunhofer Institute at Bonn Sankt Augustin, since automated analyses of of digitized rock data contains huge potentials.
24.4.2012 Cemex
Today we visited Cemex and are happy that we can carry out some geological studies in their Upper Carboniferous quarry.
19.-20.4.2012 Energy conference
Chris and Prof. Kukla attend the DGMK conference in Celle on primary energy resources and energy storage.
17.4.2012 Press article
Newspaper release: "Den Geopfad punktuell reaktivieren, Egon Keller traf sich mit Wissenschaftlern und Erich Schell in Blankenheim" in Kölnische Rundschau, Nr. 90, p. 35 highlights the need of geological awareness in public, which was initiated in the Eifel region by Prof Werner Kasig, who visited the lovely village of Blankenheim together with Chris
16.4.2012 McKinsey at Department of Geosciences
Chris welcomes McKinsey at the School of Geoscience to present the company's profile and discuss career opportunities.
12.4.2012 Contact-free geochemical visualisation tool
Chris explores the potential of new contact-free image tool used in biology on the chemical alteration and porosity of rocks and outcrops at another university... successfully!
30.3.2012 RPR at TSK conference
Francesco presents his research on fractures and fracture cements of carbonate reservoir rocks at the TSK14 conference in Kiel in an oral presentation. Dennis and Stefan have a poster presentation on their laser scan of a carbonate reservoir analogue and Upper Carboniferous unconventional rocks, respectively.
21.3.2012 Geopfad Blankenheim
We explore the status quo of the Geopfad in Blankenheim and work out if and how we may contribute to improve the quality of this geology-hike.
3.3.2012 Paper online
Sofie's paper on Localization patterns in sandbox-scale numerical experiments above a normal fault in basement is now in press with th