Posted on 05/21/2014 6:41:36 PM PDT by Praxeologue
Federal energy authorities have slashed by 96% the estimated amount of recoverable oil buried in California's vast Monterey Shale deposits, deflating its potential as a national "black gold mine" of petroleum.
Just 600 million barrels of oil can be extracted with existing technology, far below the 13.7 billion barrels once thought recoverable from the jumbled layers of subterranean rock spread across much of Central California, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said.
The new estimate, expected to be released publicly next month, is a blow to the nation's oil future and to projections that an oil boom would bring as many as 2.8 million new jobs to California and boost tax revenue by $24.6 billion annually.
The Monterey Shale formation contains about two-thirds of the nation's shale oil reserves. It had been seen as an enormous bonanza, reducing the nation's need for foreign oil imports through the use of the latest in extraction techniques, including acid treatments, horizontal drilling and fracking.
The energy agency said the earlier estimate of recoverable oil, issued in 2011 by an independent firm under contract with the government, broadly assumed that deposits in the Monterey Shale formation were as easily recoverable as those found in shale formations elsewhere.
The estimate touched off a speculation boom among oil companies. The new findings seem certain to dampen that enthusiasm.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
I refuse to drill there.
Unless she’s a really hot chick.
This area has a lot of curvy plays...
Just saying...
Those are the droids I am looking for.
Is there any geological similarity between the Monterey Shale and the Tuscaloosa Marine Shale, or is Monterey a one-off? From what basin do you think that technical unconventional expertise would be most useful for application to the Monterey Shale?
Unless she’s a really hot chick.
Some outcrop connoisseurs highly recommend it.
Each to their own, I guess.
Hey Thackney, I saw this YouTube vid where this guy was ranting about how all the talk about the great hiring up in the Bakken is now dated and overblown.
He was driving along, showing Williston downtown screaming about how you NOW need xxxx years of experience in oil already to scrape along in even your first oil job.
Is that true, or is that B.S.?
I did have one lab position with an independant in Bakersfield awhile ago, so I was thinking about it.
Is the hiring up there still going gangbusters?
Sounds like BS to me. I understand the hiring is so strong place like McDonalds are paying high wages just to keep folks around.
Smokin’ Joe could speak more directly to it since he is there.
New campaign looks to fill 25,000 North Dakota job openings
http://www.wday.com/content/new-campaign-looks-fill-25000-north-dakota-job-openings
The only thing worse is a guy who brags about how good he is and then blames everyone/everything else when he fails (sometimes spectacularly) to deliver.
Basically, as far as hiring goes, it depends on the job. A lot depends on what you do and whether or not you are willing to learn something new (and start at the bottom if need be--which still pays pretty well as a rule. This is definitely not the oil patch of 10 to 20 years ago. That much has changed.
The rig count is slowly increasing again, as the shift to pad rigs ('walking' rigs) continues.
Spin-off (non-oil) jobs continue to be brisk in some sectors, and probably the best guide to who is hiring is The Shopper in and around Williston (Help wanted ads start on Page 46).
If you don't see anything there, paging through the earlier pages could give you contact info for companies which may or may not be hiring--sooner or later they likely will be.
I'd also check Watford City, Dickinson, Minot, and Sidney, Montana for want ads.
It is true that even fast food workers here are making good money, but rent is astronomical here (2000+ for a 1 bedroom, 2800+ for a two-bedroom apartment).
THANKS!!! Incredibly clear report, thank you!
^_^
We are getting better at getting more oil out of the formations, and every well is an opportunity to learn more.
The only way to find out is to drill and complete wells, and if that doesn't happen, all else is speculation either way.
This article speaks of pure politics. Like the monkeying around with the Census data, the unemployment numbers, jobless benefits, Obamacare enrollments, etc., the administration has no integrity and will use, what should be impartial federal agencies, for their political ends. I see this as cover for the green lobby for when a Republican occupies the White House and begins pushing California to expand production in the Monterey fields. About 8 years ago, in about the only good thing he did, Senator Dorgan of North Dakota went toe-to-toe with the Geological Survey agency to get them to release a study by a geologist who died years before the release of the study. Of course the study has the Bakken at a recoverable oil potential many times higher than the Geological Survey. For some reason they resisted for years releasing the study. The CEO of Continental Oil kept claiming the Bakken had over 200 billion barrels of recoverable oil and he was busy buying up leases and drilling. In my mind the Geological Survey held on to the study to suppress development of the oil and only released it in response to Walter Hamm’s claims and efforts of Senator Dorgan.
Those wells had lots of hole problems and rarely paid out.
It was almost impossible to get any oil company to drill stem test (open hole) in the Bakken (there were solid engineering considerations, even in a vertical well).
Fifteen years ago the idea of drilling horizontal wells in the Middle Bakken (not the Shale itself, but a layer between the shales where both the upper and lower shale are developed was a radical idea.
Fourteen years ago, I worked my first one of those wells as a wellsite geologist, one of the early wells in the Elm Coulee Field, which, when developed, doubled Montana's oil production--and before that development was even done, we were drilling wells in North Dakota, in the Bakken, and then Three Forks formation in the deeper parts of the Williston Basin.
Now, the drilling part is fairly commonplace, even though it, too, is being refined constantly (multiwell pads, walking rigs), and the production and completion end of things are being subjected to the greatest scrutiny to make completions yield better results.
It is a never-ending chain of refinements and adaptation.
When Californians decide the revenue is more important than dogma, when the AGW debunking finally reaches the halls of Government and cooler heads prevail, then the Monterey will be drilled, techniques developed and refined, just as they have been elsewhere.
It will also make the leases cheaper to pick up when the cronies gather, just before someone decides it is OK to drill there...
Prices crashed. The upstream (drilling) end of the industry sat idle for a year.
Oopsie.
The EIA had forgotten to include the demand for petroleum in Asia. There was no glut.
It took a year for oil prices to recover (sweet crude was down to $6.50 a barrel). There went my second retirement fund, keeping kids fed.
Trust the EIA? Nope.
If they told me the sky is blue and water is wet, I'd have to double check.
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