Producing Natural Gas from Shale - Opportunities and Challenges of a Major New Energy Source

Speaker: Mark D. Zoback is the Benjamin M. Page Professor of Geophysics at Stanford University. Mark conducts research on in situ stress, fault mechanics and reservoir geomechanics. He was one of the principal investigators of the SAFOD project in which a scientific research well was successfully drilled through the San Andreas Fault at seismogenic depth. He is the author of the textbook Reservoir Geomechanics published in 2007 by Cambridge University Press. He is the author/co-author of 300 technical papers and holds five patents. Mark has received a number of awards and honors, including the 2006 Emil Wiechert Medal of the German Geophysical Society and the 2008 Walter H. Bucher Medal from the American Geophysical Union. In 2011, he was elected to the National Academy of Engineering. He currently serves on the National Academy of Energy committee investigating the Deepwater Horizon accident and the Secretary of Energy's committee on shale gas development and environmental protection.