[Smokin' Joe]

The shale Jimmy Carter was talking about is the Green River Shale. It was mined and had to be baked to get the oil out of it. Expensive, in a word, and the major project ended when the price of oil went down. In today's environmentalist beleaguered world, that development would likely not have happened (especially in Western Colorado) at all. Unocal To Suspend Production At Parachute Creek Shale Oil Project and Colony oil shale project

SAnother attempt at extraction, Project Rulison was also deemed to be a failure.

But that was oil shale, not 'shale oil'.

Most of the current projects involve oil generated in shale source rock, but the Bakken, for example, has the oil trapped in the low porosity dolomite, sandstone, limestone, and siltstone in between the source shales, and the Three Forks gets its oil from the lower Bakken Shale.

If you buried the Green River Shales under a few thousand feet of rock and squeezed the oil into tight reservoir formations next to it, it would be similar to what is going on, geologically, with the Bakken.

The Green River Formation, however is at or near the surface, and does not lend itself to the same production methods.

Instead, attempts have been made to bake the oil out of the shale near the surface and drive it into other wells, but the results have been mixed and generally not economically feasible.

[cicero2k]

As a former Colorado resident, Parachute Creek was controversial to say the least.

I did not know the difference between oil shale and shale oil. I doubt many others do.

From what I read, the Bakken shale is so tight, that it could pass for construction purpose rock. I would expect it to ooze, but apparently it is dry to the touch. Is that how you understand it?