Posted on 05/22/2014 5:46:52 AM PDT by thackney
The great hype surrounding the advent of a shale gas bonanza in California may turn out to be just that: hype. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) - the statistical arm of the Department of Energy - has downgraded its estimate of the total amount of recoverable oil in the Monterey Shale by a whopping 96 percent. Its previous estimate pegged the recoverable resource in California's shale formation at 13.7 billion barrels but it now only thinks that there are 600 million barrels available.
The estimate is expected to be made public in June.
The sharply downgraded numbers come amid a heated debate in California over whether or not the state should permit oil and gas companies to use hydraulic fracturing ("fracking") - the process in which a combination of water, chemicals and sand are injected underground at high pressure in order to break apart shale rock and access trapped natural gas.
Fracking involves enormous quantities of water; an average of 127,127 gallons of water were required to frack a single California well in 2013, according to the Western States Petroleum Association. That's equivalent to 87 percent of the water a family of four uses in an entire year.
California is home to an enormous agricultural industry, and with the Monterey Shale located beneath the fertile Central Valley, fracking is going to compete with agriculture, ranching and other commercial and residential users for water use. With 100 percent of California now in a state of "severe" drought, critics of fracking have gained traction in the debate over the extent to which the government should allow oil and gas companies to move in.
On March 20, Santa Cruz became the first county in California to ban fracking, the biggest win by environmental activists thus far in their campaign to rid the state of the practice. The move may have been symbolic though, since there isn't much of a presence by the industry in that locality; it was more aimed at putting pressure on Governor Jerry Brown to stop fracking in the water-starved state. That follows a unanimous February vote by the city of Los Angeles to ban the practice, the largest city to do so in the country.
Indeed, activists are pushing for a statewide ban on fracking, and a bill to do just that is working its way through the state senate. It passed a committee vote in April, but faces an uncertain future. Brown supports fracking and has trumpeted its potential for state revenues. The state has projected that fracking could bring up to 2.8 million new jobs and boost state coffers by $24.6 billion each year. He signed a bill last year that tightened regulations on the industry but also set up a permitting regime that could allow the industry to move forward.
Although the topic has been highly controversial, the ramifications may not be as significant as previously believed, now that the federal government believes only a small fraction of the Monterey Shale's reserves are accessible. The main reason for the downgrade was that the original 2011 estimate mistakenly assumed that California's shale oil and gas could be recovered with as much ease as it is elsewhere in the country.
But the geology of the Monterey Shale is much more complex than in the Marcellus, Bakken, or Eagle Ford Shales - the three formations principally responsible for the surge in oil and gas production in the United States. The layers of shale in the Monterey are folded in such a way that drilling is difficult, and test wells thus far have come up disappointing.
The Los Angeles Times quoted a downbeat assessment from an official with the EIA. "From the information we've been able to gather, we've not seen evidence that oil extraction in this area is very productive using techniques like fracking," said John Staub, a petroleum analyst with the EIA. "Our oil production estimates, combined with a dearth of knowledge about geological differences among the oil fields, led to erroneous predictions and estimates," he added.
The oil and gas industry was quick to point out that the calculation could change once again if drillers could improve technology to access the Monterey. After all, no one saw the shale revolution coming only a few short years ago. But as Staub, the EIA analyst noted, for now oil and gas production in "the Monterey formation is stagnant." And it could remain that way.
They a iodized wells before cracking. Run the pipe, perforate, acidified then frack.
Why is that any surprise?
Is it a coincidence that unemployment rates "plunged" just before the 2012 election?
Is it a coincidence that obummercare enrollments suddenly surged above the "magic 6 million" mark on the last day of program enrollment?
I'll bet obummer never knew about this until he heard about it in the news.
-— According to the article, it takes as much water to frack a well as to meet the needs of a family of four. Is that a lot? How much oil and gas would they get from that well? -—
It’s hard to know what they mean. Most of the water is reclaimed, but a percentage remains deep underground in the formation, thousands of feet below the water table, where it will stay virtually forever. I don’t know how big that percentage is. It’s the only practical downside to fracking.
They can actually frack an entire well with less water than a family of four uses in a single year?!
Seriously, that's a figurative drop in the bucket.
The water used in the hydrofrac comes out. Most of it comes out in the hydraulic fracturing process. What little remains after that point comes out in the production. It is pushed in from the play to the well bore. The production from the field is going to push it all back out.
Where hydrofrac water is left in the ground is the disposal of the water along with produced water during production. It is injected into deep formation, but this is not an injection into a producing well.
It's revealing that even that miniscule amount of water was consider too much to the author of this article. Even when converted into a "less than a family of four uses in a year" concept, it was still too much.
to me this is a free enterprise issue. If the companies want to go for it. let them invest and drill. If they don’t believe it is profitable, they won’t. Case closed.
They haven’t mentioned anything about water used in drilling, cement, acidiizing, drilling out any plugs, etc. Just the frac job. I have no idea how many zones they can produce from out there, but here in Texas often times more than one, though some are fairly small.
From the article I surmise the author doesn’t know his ass from a hole in the ground.
Some of what’s pumped gallon wise during a frac is sand and gel, not just water. But at today’s prices, I’m sure the benefits out weigh the price of disposal.
Some argue the original over inflated estimate was used to get investors based upon the unreasonable claim it would be as “easy” as the Bakken and Eagle Ford, relatively flat stable geological formations.
Exactly & WHO places one ounce of credibility in ANYTHING the federal gov’t has a hand in?
I think the long term amount of water produced during the oil/gas production is many, many times greater than the water used during the initial (and including any subsequent) hydraulic fracturing.
In the US oil/gas world, the Energy Information Adminstration, a part of the Department of Energy, is the best source of data. Almost all private analysis for a general area is based upon their data and has been for decades.
should be a company decision reflecting the will of the shareholders and not the government’s responsibility to evaluate.
I know we have some folks here who’ve worked in the oil industry. I’d be more interested in what the industry is saying about the feasability of recovering oil that a bunch of FedGov fags.
Typically, the company decision is based upon some data.
One of the ways we get more energy production in the US is by more private investment.
The oil/gas industry requires a lot of data back for the permits. Rather than the few giants gathering and keeping on the geological data, it is made publicly available and helps spur investment by smaller companies who could never afford to due that massive research, or get access to the data.
It is one of the reasons why the US production rate versus our reserves are so much higher than most of the major producers around the world.
Decision to invest is private concern not government.
I was thinking that Pelosi was involved in withholding the water from the farms in the valley. The farms dried up and values went down.
I wonder if her wealthy husband and family were thinking of making some major investments in the distressed properties.
Would you say it is not appropriate for the government to provide maps for navigable waterways?
Wind Speed Maps or Seismic maps for Building and Structure designs?
This isn’t about making the decision, it is providing data to the public which spurs private investment and grows our economy.
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