In his free time, Richard Ball has always gravitated toward getting out of the city to enjoy nature. Ball, vice president of geology at Detring Energy Advisors, took camping trips with the Boy Scouts in his hometown of Dallas during his youth. When he moved to Lafayette, La., to pursue his master’s degree, he took full advantage of “being in Louisiana—they call it a hunter’s paradise for a reason. You’re always outside doing something."

His affinity for rocks came part and parcel with his love of nature, but he didn’t discover it until he took a geology course during the summer between freshman and sophomore years of college “on a lark.” Ball was instantly hooked.

After graduating from Stephen F. Austin State University with a bachelor’s degree in geology and University of Lafayette with a master’s in geology, he briefly interned and worked as a contractor for Chevron in Lafayette. He soon relocated to Houston to work for Chevron full-time, working both conventional and unconventional reservoirs over his 10-year career at the company. His experience there spanned studying regions from the western half of the U.S. and San Juan Basin to the shelf and deepwater Gulf of Mexico all the way to West Africa. Ball recently sat down with Oil and Gas Investor to discuss his passion for the industry.
Richard Ball

Investor What initially attracted you to the oil and gas industry?

Ball I’ve always had a passion for geology and business, and the oil and gas industry allowed me to pursue both within the same career. When I was at Stephen F. Austin, I was a volunteer with the student chapter of the AAPG [American Association of Petro-leum Geologists], and one year I was selected to go to an AAPG convention in Utah. My mind was blown. There were people who had spent their entire careers combining their passion of geoscience with business. They made healthy careers out of it, and they loved their jobs.

Investor You’ve worked in many regions. Is there a particular one that stands out?

Ball I always look fondly back on my San Juan Basin experience—partly because I was in the onshore market, but it’s also where I cut my teeth as a development geologist. Understanding how to read well logs and how to think about science in a very business-driven fashion was a great way to start my career. It’s also just a really fast-paced learning environment, so there’s not a lot of time to cool your jets. You’re always trying to figure out what is next.

Investor What was the most interesting component of your career at Chevron?

Ball The breadth of projects I was exposed to at such a young age and over such a short period of time. I was fortunate enough to plan and drill development wells both domestically and internationally, and I came away with a lot of experience in workovers, full-cycle economics, geosteering, 3-D modeling and sub-salt interpretation. Every day was different.

Investor Do you think there will be a lack of young petroleum geologists to enter the industry?

Ball Yes. I make it a habit to visit a number of universities with AAPG and give talks on leadership. I try to impart this message to students, because it’s one I appreciated hearing: If you’re in this industry for the right reason—meaning you’re passionate about the science—everything will work itself out.

Investor What inspired you to transition from working at an E&P to joining an advisory firm?

Ball After I left my position working the San Juan Basin I kept looking back at the U.S. onshore A&D market. It was so exciting to watch, and it struck me as something I enjoyed as a subset of geology. I knew I would be able to use my skills as a geologist and combine them with business acumen. So, I started looking for the perfect fit and found this group, Detring Energy Advisors.

Investor What’s a recent impressive technological advancement in the oil patch?

Ball I think GPUs [graphics processing units] and their integration with big data and software. I’m interested in how they plug in and speed up computing. I know a lot of oil companies are looking at those to make big data mining and seismic interpretation more efficient and a lot faster.

Investor Which upcoming projects excite you?

Ball The advisory business has been super-fast-paced and exciting, but I’m also excited about our new venture with Drillinginfo. We’re going across every major U.S. basin over the next 18 months and tearing each down from both an economic and a geologic standpoint, to produce incredibly in-depth reports. It’s an exciting part of my job to have a data set like that to really dig into with people around me who are all data-hungry. We want to try to figure out these basins, produce materials that are going to be eye-opening to a number of operators and investors in these regions.

Investor Where do you see yourself in 10 years?

Ball In 10 years, I believe my goal would be to be director of geology for Detring. We’re focused on building something over the long-term. I feel that putting the groundwork in now will pay dividends as the company grows over the next 10 years. I’m looking forward to taking a peek back at this interview to see how far we have come personally and professionally.

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