USGS Assesses Bakken Formation to Hold 3 to 4.3 Billion Barrels...25 Times More Than 1995 Estimate

www.greencarcongress.com ^ | 04/11/2008 | Staff

[Red Badger]

Map showing Williston Basin Province boundary (in red), Bakken-Lodgepole Total Petroleum System (TPS) (in blue), and major structural features in Montana, North Dakota, and South Dakota

North Dakota and Montana have an estimated 3.0 to 4.3 billion barrels of undiscovered, technically recoverable oil in an area known as the Bakken Formation of the Williston Basin, according to a just-released assessment by the US Geological Survey (USGS). This latest assessment shows a 25-fold increase in the amount of oil that can be recovered compared to the agency’s 1995 estimate of 151 million barrels of oil.

The assessment also identified 1.85 trillion cubic feet of associated/dissolved natural gas, and 148 million barrels of natural gas liquids.

New geologic models applied to the Bakken Formation, advances in drilling and production technologies, and recent oil discoveries have resulted in these substantially larger technically recoverable oil volumes. About 105 million barrels of oil were produced from the Bakken Formation by the end of 2007.

Technically recoverable oil resources are those producible using currently available technology and industry practices. The USGS Bakken study was undertaken as part of a nationwide project assessing domestic petroleum basins using standardized methodology and protocol as required by the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 2000.

The Bakken Formation estimate is larger than all other current USGS oil assessments of the lower 48 states and is the largest continuous oil accumulation ever assessed by the USGS. A continuous oil accumulation means that the oil resource is dispersed throughout a geologic formation rather than existing as discrete, localized occurrences. The next largest continuous oil accumulation in the US is in the Austin Chalk of Texas and Louisiana, with an undiscovered estimate of 1.0 billions of barrels of technically recoverable oil.

The USGS estimate of 3.0 to 4.3 billion barrels of technically recoverable oil has a mean value of 3.65 billion barrels. Scientists conducted detailed studies in stratigraphy and structural geology and the modeling of petroleum geochemistry. They also combined their findings with historical exploration and production analyses to determine the undiscovered, technically recoverable oil estimates.

USGS worked with the North Dakota Geological Survey, a number of petroleum industry companies and independents, universities and other experts to develop a geological understanding of the Bakken Formation. These groups provided critical information and feedback on geological and engineering concepts important to building the geologic and production models used in the assessment.

Five continuous assessment units (AU) were identified and assessed in the Bakken Formation of North Dakota and Montana: the Elm Coulee-Billings Nose AU, the Central Basin-Poplar Dome AU, the Nesson-Little Knife Structural AU, the Eastern Expulsion Threshold AU, and the Northwest Expulsion Threshold AU.

At the time of the assessment, a limited number of wells have produced oil from three of the assessments units in Central Basin-Poplar Dome, Eastern Expulsion Threshold, and Northwest Expulsion Threshold. The Elm Coulee oil field in Montana, discovered in 2000, has produced about 65 million barrels of the 105 million barrels of oil recovered from the Bakken Formation.

Resources

*

Pollastro, R.M., Cook, T.A., Roberts, L.N.R., Schenk, C.J., Lewan, M.D., Anna, L.O., Gaswirth, S.B., Lillis, P.G., Klett, T.R., and Charpentier, R.R., 2008, Assessment of undiscovered oil resources in the Devonian-Mississippian Bakken Formation, Williston Basin Province, Montana and North Dakota, 2008: U.S. Geological Survey Fact Sheet 2008–3021 *

Technology-Based Oil and Natural Gas Plays: Shale Shock! Could There Be Billions in the Bakken? (US EIA)

[RightWhale]

The oil business news is not mainstream newsworthy. The price of gasoline is newsworthy sometimes but the business itself not except when O’Bama or some other mouth notes the obscene profits.

[longtermmemmory]

BUMP

does anyone know if we have any FNC or CNN lurkers still?

[avacado]

"Where did hear estimates of “500 billion barrels”? "

There have been research papers presented over the years with those types of estimates. Just Google: "bakken formation"

"And why is 4 to 5 billion barrels “sad”?"

4 billion divide by 500 billion times 100 = 0.8%
That not even 1% recovery of a potential 500 billion barrels. That's sad, or at least very unfortunate.

"Would a trillion barrels be sad just because someone thought there should be a thousand times that? Really don’t see any reason for “sad”."

Let's not get off into outer space and let's stick to the Bakken Formation as the discussion. Less than 1% recovery is not much.

[RightWhale]

Sure, but the data must be acquired. Absence of data does not imply presence of oil.

[sam_paine]

For scale:

4 Billion bbls here

6 Billion bbls used in US per YEAR

[Piquaboy]

Probably because it is good news.

[avacado]

"Sure, but the data must be acquired. Absence of data does not imply presence of oil."

Huh? Not sure what you are trying to say. Which data? The 1980s seismic data or seismic data from today? The 1980s unprocessed raw data would be quite inferior to today's data.

[CPT Clay]

At the time of the assessment, a limited number of wells have produced oil from three of the assessments units in Central Basin-Poplar Dome, Eastern Expulsion Threshold, and Northwest Expulsion Threshold. The Elm Coulee oil field in Montana, discovered in 2000, has produced about 65 million barrels of the 105 million barrels of oil recovered from the Bakken Formation.

[Captain Rhino]

Yes, I had read articles with similar high numbers for oil as well. Not sure if this was a factor in those high numbers, but it may have to do with gas to liquid technology and the fact there is 1.85 trillion cubic feet of natural gas in the formation.

Here is a link to a short article in Wikipedia on the gas to liquid technology:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_to_liquids

Click the process word hotlinks to see the chemistry involved. Futher information is available through the links as the foot of the article.

What I would like to know is how many cubic feet of natural gas is required to produce a gallon of gasoline.

(For example, if it takes 100 cuft of NG to produce a gallon of fuel, then 1.85 trillion cuft = 18.5 billion gallons of gasoline. (BTW 3.65 billion barrels of oil at the standard cracking ratio of 22 gallons of gasoline per 40 gallon barrel of oil stock = 80.3 billion gallons of gasoline.))

The process word hotlinks provide the chemical formulas but it’s been forty years since I took chemistry in high school. (For God’s sakes, Jim! I’m a history major, not a chemist!)

[dearolddad]

Good luck getting past the damn socialists who will declare the whole area an endagered habitat for the purple speckled warble whacker.....

Or.... the lavender knob gobbler.

[BOBTHENAILER]

USGS is always conservative. Last time I checked, Prudhoe Bay recovery has been somewhere north of 3-4 times what the USGS initially forecasted, and its still going strong.

I suspect the same will happen here, but we have a long way to go before we'll really know.

[ConservaTexan]

Hopefully, someday the eco-nut will be an endangered species.

[CedarDave]

Only nine? I’m sure the enviro-nazis will come up with a few more.

[doc30]

Didn’t Obama promise if elected, to put a moratorium on drilling in this environmentally sensitive area?

[Red Badger]

He most likely wants to NATIONALIZE the petroleum industry, like his buddies Chavez in Venezuela and Mugabe in Zimbabwe.....

[Smokin' Joe]

Well, some of us have known about it for a while (I worked some of the very first Bakken horizontal wells in Elm Coulee Field).

Getting the media to say something good about the oil industry is about the same as getting them to say something good about the military. If it is good news, they usually won't report it.

Doing so would really interfere with the whole "Evil BIG Oil not producing oil so it can rape consumers" gig.

[lesser_satan]

So this report is only counting the recoverable oil? Also, it said this was “undiscovered”, so how much was discovered previously and not included?

[PSYCHO-FREEP]

You are correct, we have only just begun to explore the region’s potential.

We were sent on one well in the Keene area, and it turned out so huge, that we will be there for years to come. There are also 40 new rigs coming into the basin this year. Drilling is not cheap here, but the potential will offset the higher drilling costs.

Refining capability is the next obstacle that will determine the drilling effort for the future.

[WayneS]

What? Did he have leprosy or something?

Oh, you said “penniless”...

[CedarDave]

Don’t know about the MSM, but it hasn’t been news here; there have been sixteen articles posted on FR the past couple of weeks:

http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/bakken/index