Posted on 06/01/2015 8:58:38 AM PDT by Hojczyk
The nimblest and smartest competitors have worked relentlessly to increase their productivity. Leading-edge operators report that they can produce more profitably today at a price of $65 a barrel than they could at $95 a barrel three years ago. Where can they be profitable three years hence—$40 a barrel? $30? The oil patch today is afire with the same technological imperative and competitive mission that has powered the U.S. electronics revolution—think Moore’s Law—to dash headlong down the learning curve, crushing costs and prices and making up for it in volume.
Today’s surge in production is coming predominantly from wells that are horizontally drilled and hydraulically fractured from drill pads with multiple wells. Because such wells exhaust quickly, many more of them must be drilled. The conventional wisdom is that fracking is therefore less amenable to the economies of scale exploited by traditional methods. But for today’s shale operators, that’s a feature, not a bug.
For one thing, the increase in the number of wells—which, necessarily, entails a great diversity of geologies and formations—means a commensurate increase in learning about a galaxy of processes that can be tweaked, combined and recombined to increase production and reduce costs. It’s simple: When you get more at-bats, you become a better batter.
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
So far, much less regulatory burden is being put on the natural gas and petroleum production from “fracking” than has been applied to older typical “gusher” wells and pumped wells drawing from an underground reservoir. It is only a matter of time before the gnomes over in EPA can come up with some sort of pseudo-scientific excuse for applying restrictions to “fracking”, but until then, the procedure may be used under “Generally Regarded As Safe” (GRAS) standards.
If you couple this with the report from Reuters that OPEC is crying uncle and giving up on trying to bankrupt shale hydrocarbons with low prices, it demonstrates the power of American ingenuity....especially in hydrocarbon energy.
I had read that the initial depleted frack only retrieves less than 10% of the available hydrocarbons. So I am not surprised that they are ramping this number in already drilled pathways. Marginal costs must be much lower.
Keeps out guys working, and OPEC fretting. It’s only a matter of time China learns this technology and exploits their hydrocarbons and others. The balance of power shifts.
This makes me so proud to be an American. Free enterprise is so powerful it has totally knocked obama out of the way. All the lies about available oil and gas are now exposed as lies. This is so great!!
This is fantastic news. Maybe I’ll move my little solo legal practice from California to North Dakota?
Does China have big shale deposits? I didn’t know that. I thought it was mostly an American thing.
it demonstrates the power of American ingenuity.
Fresh out of Norway, some fun stuff!
Drag a pile of cash through the oil patch...
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http://www.fishbones.as/
Amimations of how it works at the link
4 posted on 5/27/2015, 6:50:49 AM by thackney
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3293856/posts?page=1
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