AlGore has also warned that drilling in North or South Dakota will increase Global Warming:-()
Posted on 04/13/2008 8:58:51 AM PDT by billorites
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.
A U.S. Geological Survey assessment, released April 10, 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.
Technically recoverable oil resources are those producible using currently available technology and industry practices. USGS is the only provider of publicly available estimates of undiscovered technically recoverable oil and gas resources.
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.
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 U.S. is in the Austin Chalk of Texas and Louisiana, with an undiscovered estimate of 1.0 billions of barrels of technically recoverable oil.
"It is clear that the Bakken formation contains a significant amount of oil - the question is how much of that oil is recoverable using today's technology?" said Senator Byron Dorgan, of North Dakota. "To get an answer to this important question, I requested that the U.S. Geological Survey complete this study, which will provide an up-to-date estimate on the amount of technically recoverable oil resources in the Bakken Shale formation."
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.
Results of the assessment can be found at http://energy.usgs.gov.
This was posted a few days ago.
Just waiting for Congress to halt this drilling.
Oh please and interupt the mating cycle of the Yellow-headed Troupials.... Halt the drilling now.... /s
AlGore has also warned that drilling in North or South Dakota will increase Global Warming:-()
bttt
It may have a total of 500B - just, only about 1% is recoverable (now).
“The next largest “continuous” oil accumulation in the U.S. is in the Austin Chalk of Texas and Louisiana,” The Barnett Shale, Woodford Shale and Fayettville Shale will be bigger.
Soon to be constructed in Montana... The World’s Tallest Barn!
A far cry from the 500 billion they were talking about.
Yes quite a huge difference. Was the 500 billion something you’ve seen recently? I wonder if that wasn’t a mistype as the article refers to a twenty five fold increase over projections from the past of millions.... In any case it is good to see a reservoir this size in the US.
It’s too early for any real solid estimates yet. This formation in the region has only been drilled seriously for the last 8 years and the drilling is slow and difficult, as well as very expensive.
Those earlier (200 to 500 Billion) estimates are way out of proportion to reality. The outlook is promising, but the actual statistics are still very limited.
Man, if we could get all that oil out of there it would be one big Bakkennalia....yeeehawwww!
Isn’t this the same area that is slated to become the next National Park?
“Save the Chalks! Save the Shales! Stop drilling now!”
As I understand it, the Bakken is a different animal. Free thermally mature oil, still in the source formation [or at least the sandy dolomitic layer between the thicker shale layers. Add in [hopefully for those drilling the well] some natural fracturing, and a gigantic assist from massive lateral(s) and likewise massive slick water frac jobs and you end up with some potentially very significant fields.
The key word is “recoverable”. If 4-5 billion barrels are recoverable, more is down there. Perhaps the earlier estimates of hundreds of billions of barrels is wildly optimistic, but there is certainly more than 4-5 billion. Recoverable oil is based on existing technologies as well as the economic feasibility. Technologies have advanced dramatically since the mid 1990s, so it would be expected that the recoverable amount would increase. Also, the price makes it more feasible. Sometimes the technology exists but it’s too expensive. Imagine that some technology existed that could extract 30 billion barrels from this field, but it cost $150 per barrel to extract it. No one would bother drilling at the present time because they’d lose a fortune. When oil was $15 per barrel in 1995, they knew there was oil down there but it wasn’t feasible to extract. Over time, expect this field’s recoverable barrels to rise and fall as the price of oil fluctuates and technologies improve.
The lawsuits haven’t even started yet, but I’m sure they’re in the works.
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