South Cuyama Oil Field

Of the top forty onshore oil fields in California, it is the most recent to be discovered, but by the end of 2008 only 87 wells remained in production.

[2] The climate is semi-arid, with occasional marine influence, as the Cuyama Valley is open to the sea, although through a narrow gap.

Summers are hot with temperatures commonly exceeding 100 °F (38 °C); winters are cool, with the mean freeze-free period being about 250 days.

Average annual rainfall is about 12 inches, almost all of it falling in the winter in the form of rain, although occasional snowfall has occurred.

The area is prone to brushfires in the summer and fall; indeed a fire in 1994 caused a loss of $76,000 to the operators, and in July 2006 an accident on the oil field involving a metal plate crossing power lines started the Perkins Fire, which burned 15,000 acres (61 km2) on the north side of the Sierra Madre Mountains.

[6] The source rock for the South Cuyama oil is most likely the Soda Lake Shale member of the Vaqueros Formation.

A small pool in the Dibblee Sand in the now-abandoned Southeast Area of the field had oil of even higher gravity and lower viscosity; a well drilled there in 1975 was abandoned in 1978 after producing 42,000 barrels (6,700 m3).

[9] This single well initially produced 525 barrels per day (83.5 m3/d), a large find for a region previously written off as being without petroleum potential.

[11][12] Peak production for the field was in 1951, shortly after discovery, during which over 14 million barrels (2,200,000 m3) of oil were pumped from the Dibblee and Colgrove pools.

The South Cuyama Oil Field in Santa Barbara County, California. Other oil fields are shown in gray.
South Cuyama Oil Field, on a 2005 aerial photograph base. Los Padres National Forest lands are indicated by green polygons; the light-shaded area is the rough extent of the productive area of the oil field, although wells have been drilled outside of it, especially to the north and northwest. The town of New Cuyama is just off the map to the northeast, and the crest of the Sierra Madre Mountains is off the map to the south.