Trace amounts of oil range hydrocarbons (C6 – C30+) can be extracted from soils and analyzed using the Synchronous Scanned Fluorescence (SSF) method. The spectra show relative amounts of aromatic hydrocarbons yield both quantitative and compositional information that can be fingerprinted. Since the aromatics degrade last in oil, and many of the aromatics are higher molecular weight compounds, they are retained more efficiently in the surface soils.

Soils around productive wells at the Jonah Gas Field in the Green River Basin of Wyoming show an overall increase in the fluorescence intensity for both short and long wavelength aromatic compounds compared with soils around non-economic wells. This example demonstrates how the fluorescence analysis of soils can help to distinguish between productive and non-productive areas of a basin-centered gas accumulation.

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