July 28 - August 12, 2025

Three semester credits

Application Deadline: Dec. 31, 2024

Cost: $3995.00 undergraduate and $4,395.00 graduate.  Cost includes tuition, fees, food, lodging and daily transportation to the sites.  Three or four night of camping. Bring tent and sleeping arrangement. Cost does not include airfare to Rapid City. Each session limited to 20 students. $300 required upon registration.

• Important Dates: July 27- Check into SDSM&T Dormitory. July 28, 8:00 AM - Meet in Mineral Industries Building, SDSM&T.

• August 12;  Students leave. There will be service to the airport in the morning

Petroleum Field camp is a three credit field course that provides students with an intense oilfield applications experience.  The course is designed to enhance education and training for science and engineering students with career interests in oil and gas industry. It is an introductory level field course designed for all science and engineering  majors.

This course will cover geologic and geophysical description of basins, geologic maps, isopach maps, geologic cross sections, and geophysical parameters of oil basins including well logs and modeling software such as Petrel. We will also cover reservoir types / descriptions, fracking techniques and fracture types, fractured reservoirs and porosity and permeability.

Students will visit drill sites in Williston and /or Denver Basins to observe site preparation, drilling, fracking and well competion. They will also experience production practices which include types of hydrocarbons; pumping, transporting and storing oil and gas; water and produced water use, treatment and disposal; separating oil and water; environmental problems associated with drilling; and oil and gas economics.

Field Equipment: Geologic rock hammer and hammer holder, Hand lens (10x), Mechanical and colored pencils (#2 lead (or harder) and variety of colors), (2) Pilot extra fine (0.5) black RT pens, Field notebook(s), Daypack and/or field vest for carrying field supplies, H₂O bottles, Clip/map board, Protractor and straight edge, Pocket knife (good for a lot of things as well as a scratch test tool), Grain-size chart, Dilute HCl ,Safety glasses, Calculator, Good quality digital camera (with downloading capabilities), Laptop computer, Sunscreen, Lip balm, Sunglasses

Field clothing: Sturdy hiking boots (mandatory), Rain jacket, Fleece jacket (idea is to dress in thin, light, and breathable layers that can be added or subtracted according to conditions),  Field hat (full brim), Swimsuit

Lodging will be SDSM&T dormitory while  in Rapid City area. Bring camping gear (tent, sleeping bag, pillow etc.), bedding sheets for single bed, pillowcase, towels, blanket etc. Four to five nights of camping in Colorado, Wyoming or North Dakota).