Largest U.S. onshore oil discovery in 30 years announced: 1.2B barrels in Alaska

Washington Times ^ | March 10, 2017 | By Douglas Ernst

[Brad from Tennessee]

Energy giant Repsol has found the largest onshore U.S. oil find in 30 years.

Oil exploration that started in 2008 has paid off for Spanish oil company Repsol and its U.S. partner, Armstrong Energy. Roughly 1.2 billion barrels of light crude are available in Alaska’s North Slope and ready to come up in 2021.

“The successive [exploration] campaigns in the area have added significant new potential to what was previously viewed as a mature basin,” the company said in a statement posted to its website on Friday. “Additionally Alaska has significant infrastructure which allows new resources to be developed more efficiently. […] Preliminary development concepts for Pikka anticipate first production there from 2021, with a potential rate approaching 120,000 barrels of oil per day.”

Denver-based Armstrong is said to own 75 percent of the oil in a well called Horseshoe. It has a 51 percent stake in another unit called Pikka. . .

[Kickass Conservative]

I think the Democrats were saying Ten Years to develop the Oilfields when they were fighting Oil Exploration in Alaska.

In other words don’t bother, it will take too long, like developing a Cure for Cancer.

I hate Liberals a little bit more every day.

[Rembrandt]

Seward’s Folly was a pretty good deal for the US of A.

[Deplorable American1776]

I still want to see how much oil is of the US Atlantic Coast. Obama made it into a marine park...

[Falconspeed]

True. And new oil fields are discovered regularly, since the Lord of the Universe provides. Oil is a natural non-organic renewal substance discovered by Edward L. Doheny on Patton Street in Los Angeles on April 20, 1893. He regularly “prayed to the Lord for a flowing well.” He went on to build USC, UCLA and St. John’s in Camarillo.

Weak is the theory that oil is a non-renewal, limited fossil fuel.

Weak are the billionaires of today, like the Google guys and the Facebook guy, who do not build universities and libraries with their money.

[Falconspeed]

It is funny how there is a Chevron station near the first oil well in So Cal: the gas station is 501 Glendale Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90026.

[trebb]

The enviros have something new to shut down.

You mean like the pipeline they have been removed from?

[Paul R.]

From US EIA:

Only a small amount of crude oil is directly consumed in the United States. Nearly all of the crude oil that is produced in or imported into the United States is refined into petroleum products such as gasoline, diesel fuel, heating oil, and jet fuel, which are then consumed. Liquids produced from natural gas processing are also consumed as petroleum products. Renewable biofuels, such as ethanol and biodiesel, are used as substitutes for or as additives to refined petroleum products. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) includes biofuels in consumption of petroleum products.1

In 2015, the United States consumed a total of 7.08 billion barrels of petroleum products, an average of about 19.4 million barrels per day.2

Note the mention of petro from natural gas & renewables. If I am reading the data correctly, natural gas processing alone supplies about 1/4 of US petroleum products:

https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/pet_sum_snd_d_nus_mbbl_m_cur.htm

So, in effect, the 1.2 billion barrels of oil discovered gets stretched out a little. And, more importantly, the new discoveries keep coming in.

Further, consumption is fairly stable, and the contribution of oil shale / tight oil is expected to resume its upward trend:

https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=27612

Oil from shale in the trillions of barrels is out there: Assuming a supportive gov't (yeah, I know, that's a BIG assumption), lack of a societal collapse, etc., even the harder to recover deposits WILL eventually be tapped. It is (or should be) just a matter of technology and competition from other sources. If more tight oil is not tapped, that just means other sources turned out to be sufficient.

[bert]

Where oh where is our FReeper engineer friend that reported from Alaska where he designed the drilling pads?

I just realized recently he no longer blessed us with his knowledge and wisdom from his Texas retirement

[Paul R.]

As was pointed out in that thread, this is not the largest onshore discovery in the last 30 years:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3534006/posts?page=67#67

[Paul R.]

Incidentally, Wikipedia has a very interesting article on “History of the oil shale industry in the United States”, except that the article is a complete “fail” regarding the last several years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_oil_shale_industry_in_the_United_States#Oil_shale_in_the_21st_century

[Kickass Conservative]

If I remember correctly, there were people saying that we would have exhausted the World’s Petroleum supply by now.

I believe they also said the Arctic Ice Sheet would completely disappear and Florida would be under ten feet of Water.

Recently, those same people said Donald J. Trump would never be Elected President.

WRONG
WRONg
WROng
WRong
Wrong
wrong
wron
wro
wr
w

Never mind. LOL

[itsahoot]

Great for the US!! FYI-Venezuela was 300 Billion Barrels. And the people are still starving.