Michel T. Halbouty is recognized as one of the world’s foremost geologists and petroleum engineers and is acclaimed for his scientific expertise. He is considered an outstanding authority on the geological and engineering problems relative to explorations and production of petroleum.

   He is a graduate of Texas A&M University, having received his Bachelor of Science Degree and his Master of Science Degree from that institution in both geology and petroleum engineering. He also earned the Professional Degree in Geological Engineering from Texas A&M University. The Degree of Doctor of Engineering (hc), was conferred upon him by the Montana College of Mineral Science and Technology. In May, 1990, he was awarded the degree of Doctor of Geoscience (hc) by the USSR Academy of Sciences for his many contributions in and to the science of geology, the only such honor bestowed to a scientist outside the Soviet Union.

   Halbouty has received numerous awards, honors and special recognition from both national and international scientific and engineering societies. In addition, he has served in official capacities in many of those organizations. In particular, he was President of The American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG), the world’s largest organization of earth scientists.

   He has received the highest awards bestowed by AAPG and has also received the highest honors conveyed by the American Institute of Mining, Metallurgical and Petroleum Engineers. He is the only earth scientist-engineer to have achieved the distinction of being so singularly honored by these two great scientific and professional societies.
Widely sought as a speaker by scientific and lay groups all over the U.S. and the world, Halbouty has made speeches and lectures on subjects pertinent to geology and/or engineering, including delivery of the keynote address at the International Geological Congress in Moscow in 1984. He has been invited to lecture by numerous governments and their respective ministries and agencies and has spoken to groups in countries of every continent in the world, except Antarctica. Halbouty has served as a Distinguished Lecturer for the Society of Petroleum Engineers of AIME, as well as a Distinguished Lecturer for The American Association of Petroleum Geologists and was named the First Distinguished Lecturer Emeritus for the Society of Petroleum Engineers of AIME.

   He has written and published over 300 papers, mainly on petroleum geology and engineering and several books, among which are Petrographic and Physical Characteristics of Sands from Seven Gulf Coast Producing Horizons; Salt Domes- Gulf Region, United States and Mexico, (Gulf Publishing Co., 1^st ed., 1967, revised and enlarged ed.,1979)- the only such single volume on this subject in the world’s scientific literature. He co-authored the historical Spindletop (Random House, 1952, reprinted by Gulf Publishing Co., 1980); the equally historic one on the East Texas giant oilfield titled The Last Boom (Random House, 1972, Shearer, 1984), and Grady Barr,, a fictionalized account of the oil industry in Venezuela (Arbor House, 1981).

   Halbouty has edited or has been Special Editor of numerous scientific publications, including Geology of Giant Petroleum Fields, AAPG Memoir 14 (1970); Giant Oil and Gas Fields of the Decade 1968-1978, AAPG Memoir 30 (1981, for which he received AAPG President’s Award for Best Publication); Energy Resources of the Pacific Region, AAPG Memoir 32 (1982); Proceedings of the Wallace E. Pratt Memorial Conference on Future Petroleum Provinces in the World, AAPG Memoir 40 (1986); and Giant Oil and Gas Fields of the Decade 1978-1988; AAPG Memoir 54 (1992).

   He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering, as well as many worldwide professional and technical societies, including The American Association of Petroleum Geologists; a Fellow of the Geological Society of America ;the American Institute of Mining, Metallurgical and Petroleum Engineers; the Society of Petroleum Engineers; the Society of Petroleum Engineers of AIME; The American Association for the Advance of Science; the Society of Economic Paleontologists and Mineralogists of America; the Society of Exploration Geophysicists the Seismological Society of America; a Fellow of the Institute of Petroleum (London, England); International Association of Sedimentologists ; and the Association Mexicana de Geologos Petroleros.

   Halbouty is also a past member of the National Energy Study Committee and of the Executive Committee of the division of Earth Sciences, national Academy of Science, national Research Council. He served on the Board of Earth Sciences of the National Research Council.

   Halbouty was the first independent to explore and wildcat in Alaska. He discovered the West Fork Gas Field on the Kenai Peninsula in 1959, a first discovery by an independent in Alaska.

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