The Houston Geological Society will host the 65th Gulf Coast Association of Geological Societies (GCAGS) Convention at the George R. Brown Convention Center, September 19-22, 2015. The GCAGS is also known as the AAPG Gulf Coast Section. All current members of the HGS, South Texas Geological Society, NOGS (New Orleans Geological Society), Austin Geological Society, Lafayette Geological Society and Corpus Christi Geological Society, and a few other societies, are members of GCAGS. Learn more at www.gcags.org! GCAGS does not charge any member dues. Dues to AAPG, and to the local Gulf Coast societies, are your invitation to participate in upcoming GCAGS conventions and social events. The Gulf Coast Section of SEPM (GCSSEPM) plans to co-host the GCAGS 2015 convention. GCSSEPM will be organizing oral talks, posters, judging and the SEPM awards program.
The 65th Annual GCAGS convention will feature Gulf Coast area oil, gas and environmental topics, with the intent that Gulf Coast geoscientists will expand their technical training, knowledge and networking during the convention. The General Chair of the convention is Larry Bartell (Legends Exploration, email ldbartell@legendsexpl.com). GCAGS President for the 2015 convention is Charles Sternbach (Star Creek Energy, carbodude@gmail.com). GCAGS Non-Technical Chair is Deborah Sacrey, HGS President-Elect. The Technical Program is coordinated by Linda Sternbach (Star Creek Energy) Dianna Phu (dianna@exabyte.org) is both Secretary for the convention and publicity, website and social media chair. Mike Erpenbeck is convention Treasurer. The last GCAGS convention held in Houston was in 2008; Ken Nemeth was GCAGS President and Dave Rensink was General Chair. Larry Bartell was also the General Chair for the 2000 Houston GCAGS convention.
The pre-convention activities will start on Saturday, September 19, 2015. The opening weekend will kick off with one and two-day field trips, leaving from the George R. Brown Convention Center. These will be open to professionals and university students.There will also be one day technical short courses on the weekend of Sept 19-20, 2015.
The talks and poster sessions will occupy two full days and will be held on the third level of the George R. Brown Convention Center from September 21-22, 2015 (Monday and Tuesday). 100 or more talks, in concurrent sessions, are anticipated to be included in the technical program.
The Houston 2015 GCAGS convention is opening up a “Call for Papers”, and inviting geoscientists to submit a short 250 word abstract with title and authors by December 13 2014. Submit a short word document (300 words) to Technical Program chair Linda Sternbach at linda.sternbach@gmail.com, or check the convention web page and blog hosted by GCAGS Secretary Dianna Phu at www.gcagshouston.com.
The 2015 session themes are: New Oil and Gas Discoveries, Unconventional Plays, Development Field Studies, GOM Shelf and Onshore plays, Salt Tectonics and Traps, Mexico and Caribbean Plays, Geophysical Technology, Gulf of Mexico Deepwater, Environmental Geology, Coastal Geology and Surface Impact, Geology-Geophysics-Engineering, Business Portfolio Management, and Climate/ Public Awareness Issues.
The 65th Annual GCAGS convention has a specially designed logo created by Charles Sternbach and HGS Bulletin design editor, Lisa Krueger. The round logo has the words: “Discovery, Technology, Leadership and Education” around the outside ring. The center features graphics of an onshore rig, offshore rig and shale strata and offshore salt basin. The committee suggested this combination of images for the 2015 GCAGS logo because the convention will be incorporating technical topics on both onshore and offshore Gulf of Mexico, and also the Mexico/Caribbean areas, with the goal of bringing together experienced professionals with young professionals and geoscience students.There are other projects initiated by GCAGS that deserve mention. There will be a GCAGS Transactions publication of all the talks and posters at the 2015 convention. This editor of the 2015 Transactions is past HGS President, Steve Levine (stephenlevine@sk.com).
In addition, GCAGS has a peer-reviewed technical publication called GCAGS Journal that publishes full length geoscience-related papers each year in hard copy and online as pdfs.The GCAGS Journal started in 2012.Past papers can be found online at http://www.gcags.org/Journal/GCAGS.Journal.Archives.html.The 2015 GCAGS Journal Editor is HGS Past-President and former HGS Bulletin Editor, Barry Katz. Geoscientists will need to submit a 600 word abstract explaining their submission by December 2, 2014. Contact Barry Katz at barrykatz@chevron.com for more information. GCSSEPM Editor will be Patricia Santogrossi, past HGS Bulletin editor.Check the convention website www.gcagshouston.com for more information on contacting all the volunteers and log on for the latest news as the convention planning continues from now till mid-2015. Convention registration will open in August 2015.
"Good communication is particularly important to GCAGS, its approximately 10,000 members, and its 13 affiliated member societies."
Read the open letter from the GCAGS President, Charles Sternbach.
