1. yes
2. yes
3. Yes for the three, although the amount of free gas(as well as overpressure) appears to significantly change the ability of reservoir liquids to be produced. The gas drives a lot of liquids to the wellbore as it expands. A super-duper gas expansion mechanism to make it.
4. most not retrograde but exist as gas in reservoir and are transformed to liquids on way to surface. The Bakken I am very familiar with. It is simply a reservoir unmatched elsewhere due to a. a carbonate having heavy fracturing between the two overlying/underlying shales that are the source beds, of world class quality. b. very high overpressurization due to the hydrocarbon expansions into the carbonate c. relatively light liquids. Nothing like it anywhere else as I see.
5. I agree. the big variable, besides pricing of course, is the variance in capital cost modeling. These have proven to be quite different in the unconventionals. Put that with the dominant ability to improve productivity, any static model can be non-descriptive of eventual reality.
6. will think about it and revert.
And I am not really new here, just a change of alias.
To the previous points:
4. Then the Bakken is similar to the coal seams interbedded in the very tight Mesa Verde in the Four Corners area. There several companies encountered over pressured coal in the coal bed methane days and staged blowouts to create gob holes in the block coal seams. The Mesa Verde more-or-less collapsed into the holes creating massive secondary fracturing and high production. Not saying the same of the Bakken but that the coal seam, like shale, released into the carbonate. Similar thing happens in the Penn sands of the Fayetville Shale area. We saw absolutely flat declines in that area 40 years ago. Stephens production were kings of the area but did not relate the flat declines to leakage from the Fayetville and I believe that was / is the process in play.
5. NO DOUBT that the capital cost modeling can change the whole game of self-funding. I can make a model sing any song you want it to sing so long as honesty and objective realistic evaluation are not considered. You can pull the levers on project gearing in lots of ways to make the story look good or find the goal to make it profitable. Then the real engineering starts.
6. Separate reply.