Sunburst Consulting was founded by John Gillespie in 1981 with the goal of providing quality well site geology services in the Great Plains and Rocky Mountain regions. The company was originally based in Denver, CO. Initially John worked as a stand-alone well site geologist.

Wayne Freisatz, staff geologist at Jerry Chambers - Oil Producers / Axem Resources, Inc. was an early client and John and Wayne found common purpose over dinner at the Roughrider in Medora, ND where Bernice Erickson came onto the scene. Wayne joined forces with John and Bernice in the mid 1980s while Wayne completed his Masters thesis on the Bakken at UND.

In 1996, the company evolved from a partnership of John, Bernice and Wayne to a Billings, MT based corporation. The Sunburst Consulting, Inc. partnership expanded in 2006 with the addition of Jim Suydam and Layaka Mann. In 2008 the staff expanded to include Expeditor/Geo-tech, Willie Thomas, and in 2009, Appalachian District Manager, Robert R. McCue III “Bo”. At the end of 2009, John and Bernice retired leaving the company to Wayne (president), Jim (vice president operations) and Layaka (vice president field operations).

Sunburst Consulting, Inc. has provided geologic supervision on more than 1000 wells. These include more than 750 horizontal wells targeting the Parkman, Sussex, Nugget, Twin Creek, Minnelusa, Tensleep, Phosphoria, Charles, Ratcliffe, Midale, Mission Canyon, Bakken (shale, silt, sand and dolomite), Three Forks, Nisku, Duperow, Dawson Bay, Winnipegosis, Interlake, Salisbury, Red River and Winnipeg. Through December 1, 2008, the company has provided well site geology and geo-steering on more than 185 horizontal middle Bakken wells.

As we look to the future our goal is to build a team of consultant geologists who remain current with the evolving technologies and have easy access to current geological data. Sunburst Consulting's well site geology teams work directly for their client and represent the oil company's interests, supplying regular reports, logs and information updates. The geologist's primary function on horizontal wells is geo-steering. In this effort, steel drill pipe is effectively bent from 0 degrees of inclination at kickoff point to ~90 degrees at landing. Often the target lies 2 miles down, is 4' thick and is drilled for a 2-mile length.

The traditional skills of the well site geologist (sample examination, gas detection, picking test points and evaluating cores and electric logs) provide a basis for the current heavy focus on horizontal drilling. As a key member of the onsite directional team, the well site geologist is empowered to predict the true vertical depth of the target and to propose (and win consensus for) geological/geometric solutions to land there. The idea is to establish the correct trajectory to land the drill bit in the ideal target and then to maximize exposure to the chosen reservoir.