The Core Research Center is a facility run by the
United States Geological Survey
The United States Geological Survey (USGS), formerly simply known as the Geological Survey, is a scientific agency of the United States government. The scientists of the USGS study the landscape of the United States, its natural resources, ...
, located in "F" bay in building 810 on the
Denver Federal Center
The Denver Federal Center, in Lakewood, Colorado, is part of the General Services Administration and is home to about 6,200 employees of agencies of the federal government of the United States. The Center encompasses an area of about and has 9 ...
campus. It is maintained by the USGS to preserve valuable rock cores, well cuttings and various other geologic samples for use by scientists and educators from government, industry and academia. The CRC is open to the general public for core viewings or tours of the facility by appointment only. The CRC houses the largest collection of rock cores and well cuttings in the nation.
History
Established in 1974 by the USGS, in cooperation with the Rocky Mountain Association of Geologists, the CRC was designed as a permanent free-access core repository. Its goal was to rescue rock cores threatened with disposal or destruction, which continues today with the recent rescue of the Denver Basin drill core from Castle Pines North, Colorado. During the 1990s the CRC staff provided onsite core processing services to active scientific drilling programs.
Collections
Archived Core
Archived Cores have been slabbed, which means that it has been cut lengthwise, with a rock saw, which exposes a fresh flat surface to enhance the core viewing process. This also enables the cores to boxed and stored like books on a shelf, which allows for quick access to specific depth intervals.
Unprocessed Core
The CRC unprocessed core collection contains 1.1 million feet of drilled core, from 31 states. This general collection contains materials from petroleum exploration and energy development holes. Unprocessed cores are in their original boxes and are stored on pallets in the CRC warehouse.
Cuttings
The CRC curates a large collection of well cuttings (rock chips) brought to the surface during drilling operations. This unique collection of cuttings represents 235 million feet of drilling. The USGS estimates that the replacement cost for this collection is around 10 billion dollars.
Special Core Collections
Aside from the general petroleum core collection, there are various sub-collections, including
Eniwetok Atoll,
Cajon Pass
Cajon Pass (; Spanish: ''Puerto del Cajón'' or ''Paso del Cajón'') is a mountain pass between the San Bernardino Mountains to the east and the San Gabriel Mountains to the west in Southern California. Created by the movements of the San Andre ...
,
USGS Yellowstone Drilling Program,
Manson Impact Structure, plus more.
Thin sections, photos, analysis
In addition to the core and cuttings collections, the CRC also houses a collection of over 18,000
thin section
In optical mineralogy and petrography, a thin section (or petrographic thin section) is a thin slice of a rock or mineral sample, prepared in a laboratory, for use with a polarizing petrographic microscope, electron microscope and electron ...
s of core and cuttings that are viewed through microscopes by researchers. Photographs of archived cores are also available to researchers. Files are maintained for many wells that contain chemical and physical analyses, core descriptions, stratigraphic charts, and other analyses performed by daily users.
Oil Shale Collection
The Core Research Center has a large collection of drilled materials from the
Green River Formation
The Green River Formation is an Eocene geologic formation that records the sedimentation in a group of intermountain lakes in three basins along the present-day Green River in Colorado, Wyoming, and Utah. The sediments are deposited in very f ...
of
Western Colorado,
Eastern Utah, and
Southwestern Wyoming. The collection contains cores from over 400 holes, along with associated thin sections and analytical data.
Sampling
The CRC does allow scientists to remove samples of material stored at the facility. There are special requirements and procedures in place to protect the material from oversampling. Contact the CRC for current procedures.
National Ice Core Laboratory
The CRC shares a common facility with the
National Ice Core Laboratory.
External links
Official Core Research Center Website
References
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United States Geological Survey