Posted on 08/29/2014 8:02:29 PM PDT by Lorianne
In a clearing in a cornfield in the Eagle Ford region of south Texas, the rig drilling the Sisti A3 well for ConocoPhillips looks very similar to the ones that have been working in the state’s shale reserves for more than a decade. But a mile or two below the surface, the way the wells operate has changed radically. Since 2012, Conoco has doubled the volume of ceramic proppant – a sand-like material – it uses for hydraulic fracturing. Mixed with water and pumped into wells at high pressure, the proppant forces open the cracks in the rocks where oil and gas is trapped. Using more proppant has increased the output of each well by 30% – giving a healthy boost to Conoco’s bottom line. Now its engineers are examining ways to double the amount of proppant again. This kind of experimentation has made Eagle Ford and other shale formations, including Bakken in North Dakota and Permian Basin in west Texas, the oil industry’s equivalents of Silicon Valley.
Yet prices have fallen, with internationally traded Brent crude dropping from about $108 per barrel at the start of the year to about $102 today. In large part, that has been a result of booming US production. Between 2011 and 2013, the US raised its output by 2.2m b/d, more than the entire increase in global demand. While the immediate outlook for global oil supplies is benign, longer-term prospects are more troubling. If emerging economies – above all China – continue to grow, their demand for oil will rise as well. A few countries, including Canada, Brazil and Mexico, have realistic prospects of increasing their production to meet that demand. But there is still a great burden of expectation riding on the US.
(Excerpt) Read more at ft.com ...
And guess who just took”Credit”for Record US Oil and Gas Production??????Do I REALLY have to tell you???????????
Bfl
Hate to sound like a lib but I'm beginning to smell a rat more and more here.
They won't bring down the price for the American consumer, but "big oil" is going to make out like a bandit on OUR mineral reserves.
THese reserves belong to the people of America but only oil companies are going to benefit from them.
Prices at the pump haven’t come down much even with this production. Its all a rigged game, we should be under 3 dollars a gal.
I consider the price of fuel to be a part of the consumer price index and if that is the case, guess what the real inflation rate would be?
Prices vary widely across the country. It is ultimately a refinery issue. Our dear liberals are keeping refineries what they claimed they wanted to keep abortion, i.e. safe and rare.
Exactly. Everyday I read or hear that we’re sitting on an ocean of oil. Yet gasoline prices don’t seem to reflect this at all. It’s all completely rigged by the thugs in Washington.
Oil must be refined. The number of refineries is shockingly small. They are environmental political hot potatoes. Baksheesh must be paid.
Wrong country! The big shale plays in North Dakota and Texas are on private Property. “We” don’t “own” it.
The folks that do own it are benefiting greatly.... as they should! Like, ... er... IT IS THEIRS. They drag somewhere between 12.5% - 18.75% of the oil/gas money at no expense.
I wouldn’t have it any other way. God bless America.
You are thinking of Venezuala or Mexico or Saudi Arabia or some other place run by Control Junkies.
Oh, and about the “pump price”? What do you think you’d be paying without 2 million exta barrels on the market?
“THese reserves belong to the people of America ...”
Bullshit.
They belong to whomever owns the land or the mineral rights on that land.
If you don’t believe in private property rights perhaps you stumbled into the wrong little corner of the web.
Good post. The federal government has locked down drilling on public lands to appease the enviro-nazis. Thanks to the private land owners and the oil companies, Obama couldn’t raise your gas price to that of Europe, around$6/gal.
1- government regs for 50 different formulations is designed to drive up the cost of gasoline
2- the Fed and zero interest rates is driving up the cost of commodities, gotta get returns somewhere. Not everyone wants uber junk bonds at a measly 6%.
3- has refining capacity increased to handle the extra production? that I don’t know. But I keep reading how the cost of moving crude by rail adds a nice premium to a barrel of oil thanks to the Luddites and no pipelines.
4- ethanol raises the cost of retail gasoline while reducing your mileage, thanks for nothing. People in and out of government ought to be in leg irons for running the ethanol scam on us. Lot of palms getting greased with money taken out of your pockets.
I definitely agree with you. Though there’s still something about the romance of going into the ground and recovering industry’s lifeblood.
Sometimes I think trying to find the romantic aspect of what you can keeps me sane, at least. The rough edges are there and you know it. But every now and then, the structure is crystalline, and a little order at the macroscopic level that you wonder if evil seems as ageless.
“...THese reserves belong to the people of America but only oil companies are going to benefit from them.”
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You sound like a “su casa es mi casa” type of guy. Fortunately, at least for the time being, your attitude hasn’t become the law of the land and private property still exists.
The state of California has.
All government has done is hassle producers through ridiculous epa regs and high corporate taxes and other negativities. In short, the government is a vampire sucking the life blood from producers...in all industries.
Talk to the people in China and India. They are the cause for the rise in prices.
Increased oil and gas production and silicon valley innovation are the two drivers of the economy likely to lead to another “American Century”, if we vote in less liberal politicians. A big if.
As for participating, buy some RYE for example, an equal weighted energy exchange traded fund. Equal weighted so that Exxon-Chevron-BP etc. don’t over influence its value.
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