Oil & Gas – 30+ Years Oil and Gas Exploration, new oilfields discovered. Experience with exploration, title, leasing, drilling and completion supervision and general oil and gas operations. Associated with over 2000 wells, mostly vertical wells in the Eastern Shelf of the Permian Basin and the Rio Grande Rift of far West Texas.
Carbon Capture & Sequestration – (Carbon Capture Utilization & Storage) CCUS – Currently participating in a 100 square mile saline aquifer CCUS project for Point Source and Direct Air Capture. CO2 to be converted to Supercritical CO2 fluid and pumped into the saline aquifers underneath a permanent seal. Also working with landowners on Carbon Capture and Storage in Soils for CO2 Direct Air Capture (DAC) through vegetation and stored in soils.
Rare Earth Elements & Helium – Exploration and Testing for REE and Helium - Rare Earth Elements form in Earth’s interior then brought to shallower depth through volcanics. Subsequently they can be chemically and mechanically weathered to alter and redistribute the elements. Helium - Formed in earth’s interior from the breakdown of uranium and its daughter products by the formation of alpha particles then surfaces through buoyancy.
Geophysics & Geothermal – Deep seismic has been around for a long time but there are better and better processing and interpretation methods always being developed. Primarily this is conventional seismic, Gravity and Magnetics. Near Surface Geophysics has come a long way recently. Mostly this is the application of oil and gas downhole tools that we have been using for 30+ years to the surface. It is working quite well. This works from locating shallow caves to shallow faults and mineralogy to stratigraphy under future skyscrapers. Geothermal is moving to "Geothermal Anywhere' which means if you drill deep enough you will get the heat and energy that you need. This is correct but both the deep heat sources and the conductivity of the overlying strata will affect the temperature gradient and the cost to develop the geothermal resource.
Sand & Gravel – Concrete has been around more than 5000 years. It is commonly a mix of lime (or near lime) and sand and gravel. It is an excellent building material. It is quite possible in today's world to crush stone to make sand and gravel but it is much more economic to find near sources of natural deposits of sand and gravel. Most people think of rivers and streams, but remember that there are also many paleo deposits of sand and gravel that can be mined. It is good to consider all opportunities.
Agriculture & Sustainability – The use of natural and evolutionary processes to approach sustainability. In the 1990’s Mr. Johnson developed a Livestock Rotation program for the family ranch based on Co-Evolution of Bison and Grasses. Retaining the same appropriate stocking rate while increasing forage, and decreasing operations costs by 80% and being nearly totally sustainable. The method was proven productive for over 20 years. Evolutionary processes are natures “Artificial Intelligence” formed through great extents of time and trial and error, what we see, is what has succeeded, survived.
Hydrology & Statistical Rainfall Estimator – For Mr. Johnson, hydrology began at 10 years old. With his father's assistance, he successfully “witched” his first productive water well, a 150 gallon per minute irrigation well. After a degree in geology, Mr. Johnson understood why his father chose the area to look for water - it was on the correct trend (along a Permian aged aquifer) and was very unlikely to miss. Water witching, dowsing or divining has its merits, both geophysical and otherwise, but it is far more successful if you start in an area that has water and understand the geology of the water. Early in Mr. Johnson's career he mapped the recharge zone, primary aquifer development (dissolution of evaporites interbedded with the sandy dolomites) downdip pinchout (shale out) of the carbonate and identified the spill point. Rainfall Estimator - The combination of Statistics, Probability and new technology of day to day rainfall can be used to estimate or project future rainfall. It certainly is not a perfect science, nothing is but it has been used successfully to project rainfall into the coming year. These projection trends can be critical to industry and agriculture.
Water Testing and Rock and Soils Testing – The water testing includes both inorganic and organic tests to evaluate for such things as metals to PFAS (forever chemicals) to herbicides and pesticides. Understanding the progression from bedrock mineralogy to soils is very insightful into both the potential productivity and erodibility of those soils. Nothing is static, including the soils. Testing and evaluation of those parent bedrocks and soils is instrumental to that history and understanding.
Pedology, Satellite Imagery and Drones – Pedology is best described as "The Geology of Soils" meaning things like the history, development and mineralogy of a soil or maybe understood as the evolution, usage and destruction of a soil. Edaphology has more to do with the life that forms from the soil more closely related to agronomy, which is soil management and crop production. Remember that soil is just a small part of the erosional cycle of mountains to ocean basins. Satellite Imagery and drones are increasingly used to understand soils from slopes to moisture to height of the crops growing on them. These technologies will only improve in the future.
Desalinization, Climate and Climatology – With changing climatic conditions evaporation, precipitation and water resources in general will change; some locations better, some worse. Fortunately our technology to understand deeper water systems is greatly improved as well as our technology to drill, produce and desalinate when needed. Understanding precipitation and evaporation patterns along with both shallow and deep aquifers will be important to the continued development of land resources.
Experience and Background
Over 50 years on a farm and ranch. Mr. Johnson's parents purchased 473 acres on the Colorado River in West Central Texas in 1973 with a small down payment. First as a child, then with his parents and ultimately on his own, Mr. Johnson grew the ranch from the original 473 acres north of San Angelo to a 9000 acre ranch in the Front Range of Colorado, west of Pikes Peak and Colorado Springs. Mr. Johnson's youth included soil judging and livestock judging in 4-H to captain of the football team and president of student council to being in charge of the first "foundation cow" on the ranch which arrived with "shipping fever;" daily life on the farm included investigating the rock outcrops and landforms along the Colorado River to regular hunting ventures with three dogs. University began with engineering but quickly turned to geology to answer those fundamental land questions as a kid on the river; everything from physical geology to thermodynamic geochemistry. Besides geology, college included abundant chemistry, engineering, livestock production classes, plant and soil science, atmospheric science, estate planning, economics, contract law, farm and ranch appraisal and numerous others.
Post college included serving as a director of both the local soil and water conservation district and the underground water conservation districts, each in the range of 15 years. In the 1990's Mr. Johnson developed a novel livestock rotation program based on his vision of the co-evolution of bison and grasses during the Pleistocene Epoch on the plains of the United States. This led to a successful cattle plan that cut ranch operations costs by 80% and was almost completely sustainable with no hay purchased from the late 1990's to 2020. Additionally, Mr. Johnson developed the geology, ran title, leased, sold to an operator and drilled his first oil well in 1991, discovering a beautiful buried reef but without oil, a geologic success but economic failure. This was followed fairly soon by the discovery of two new small oil fields north of San Angelo, Texas, both of which continue to produce oil many years later. During his 30's and 40's Mr. Johnson developed an oil and gas service company from geological exploration to landmen and leasing to drilling and completion supervision; over 2000 wells drilled or serviced in some form or another.
Mr. Johnson currently provides consulting services as needed. Agriculture and land testing from bedrock, soils, water to rare earth element investigations. A statistical approach and climate related rainfall projection for any location in the US. Also oil and gas consulting from Mississippi to the Eastern Shelf of the Permian Basin to the Rio Grande Rift of far West Texas. Additionally, carbon capture and storage projects (CCUS) are currently being developed.
If you need any assistance, please do not hesitate to call or email.
