Susan Morrice is a geologist, explorer, and entrepreneur. She was born and raised in Belfast, Northern Ireland, and received a MoD degree in geology from Trinity College Dublin. As a child she remembers “always loving rocks” and when she learned geology was a profession she recalls thinking “I’m going to do that”. She studied Natural Sciences and graduated in 1976, at a time when, as she points out, “geology was really evolving. Morrice has two daughters, Hannah and Clare. Susan Morrice was based in Denver. In the words of Susan Morrice, "My attraction to geology was nature. As a young girl in Ireland, dashing about the rocks, playing in the waves... I was just fascinated."
Career
After graduating from Trinity College, Morrice began working for American-Canadian Stratigraphic where she was given the opportunity to travel the world surveying and networking with other geologists in the industry. When talking about this time of her life, she recalls how “the concept of plate tectonics was just taking hold, is a science where you can keep asking questions, and I loved being a part of the process”. She joined Knight Royalty as a frontier specialist. This job included mapping and more community-based interactions. In the early 1990s, the American Association of Petroleum Geologists asked her and Roger Slatt to head the international convention of the AAPG. This led to the birth of the International Pavilion which gives a platform for oil companies to access new contracts in different countries. She founded Belize Natural Energy with Mike Usher and located their first oil well in a sandstone reservoir. She is currently the chairwoman of BNE.
Belize Natural Energy (BNE)
As a young geologist, Morrice was invited to go to Belize to look into the oil potential. Although she was seeking for new job opportunities, she enjoyed working with everyone in Belize and knew there was a good chance in finding oil in Belize. She and a Belizean man, Mike Usher, explored for many years shooting seismic and by drilling but were unsuccessful. Morrice spent four years researching and found a university seminar that she felt could help her learn more. She attended a 12-day Educo seminar in 2002. Immediately after that, she went to Belize to set up BNE. Soon after trying to start this in Belize, she realized that it was a difficult sell as there were 50 dry holes. Together, Usher and Morrice went to Ireland to talk to others who took the Educo course and were willing to help in Belize. At this time, they only had enough income for two wells; the first well was a success and they named it "Mike Usher #1". After the success of the first well, they drilled five more wells which were all successful and carried on to build BNE. Susan Morrice was the first woman to ever receive the Norman Foster Outstanding Explorer award by the AAPG.
