The Monterey and Antelope Shales in California make the Bakken look like a small resource....when we run out of oil in the other states we will invade Cailifornistan and drill it....
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I’m not so certain they’ll ever be able to extract oil from those shales because earthquakes have totally fractured the oil formations.
What that means is say they go down 5k feet. Then they go lateral. They won’t be able to go more than 50 feet or so before they hit a spot where the earth has moved so the oil bearing formation has been jerked up or down by 50-200 feet.
I don’t think the current technology is good enough for the kind of fractured formations that are typical of the moneterey shales.
There are already plenty of assets deployed in california and the drillers have already have very good pictures of the ground.
But we’ll see here in the next year or two if the Monterrey shales can yield their oil. Volumes from California will likely spike.
Right now it looks like the woodford, niobrara and Permian shales are going to see some pretty sharp production spikes in the next 24 months—but not the Monterrey shales.