Can anyone validate this article? Your feedback is appreciated!

The problem lies in the term "technically recoverable"

 

http://www.theoildrum.com/node/3868

Yeah, that's a pump and dump email.  Been making the rounds lately.  Somebody either has some shares to unload or a political axe to grind. 

There are rafts of information about the Bakken, much of which has been discussed here previously, but the OilDrum link above is a very solid place to start.  Short story = the Bakken has a lot of technical issues associated with it.

The basic thing with energy plays is that they are no longer simple.  All the simple stuff is gone.  If the Bakken were simple, it would already have been exploited.  Because it wasn't exploited in the past, ergo it is complex.

Here's the basic rule of thumb for energy plays today - DO YOUR RESEARCH!

I have yet to run across anything that has lived up to recent hype and that includes the NatGas plays in the shale formations.  Even today I read close to one article a day that proclaims that the US has 100+ years of NatGas based on the hype emanating from development companies.  But when one spends even 10 minutes digging into the story we find out that there are serious ground water issues, that not all shale plays are equivalent, that even the same shale plays vary tremendously from well to well, and that many wells have not been economically beneficial.  Worse, forget the money, we don't know what the EROEI is for these plays. 

The bottom line here is very simple - if you hear  outlandish claims about energy plays, please do yourself a big favor and at least spend a few minutes investigating them before internalizing the claims as 'real.'

Hypothetically. if there was indeed substantial oil in the US, wouldn't it make sense on a national and corporate level to sit on these finds and continue to deplete the rest of world's reserves first?

Hypothetically. if there was indeed substantial oil in the US, wouldn't it make sense on a national and corporate level to sit on these finds and continue to deplete the rest of world's reserves first?

 

NOT if it means your economy can't grow from a lack of cheap abundant energy source.....!

Mike

Bargaining phase my friend. Ive been there bro we all have. Its good that your researching though. That way in 1 yr from now when one of your co-workers tells u about Bakken you will know the facts. I too got all excited about Bakken until i read oil drum.

 

Bear

Hi Ryan,

Welcome to CM.com! It's great to see so many new posters joining the forums lately.

Chris and others already pointed out that this particular e-mail contains a lot of hype, even though there is basically some real truth behind it.

But another issue to understand is development lead-time. Let's set the Bakken and its "technical issues" aside for a minute. In shallow (relatively low extraction cost) waters off the coast of California, there's a whole lot of oil. Raw crude even washes up on the beach in Santa Barbara from time to time, and in this case, it really is a matter of environmental concerns preventing extraction from being considered.

Let's assume that the California economy continues to deteriorate to the point that unemployment is running 30%+, and the next Peak Cheap Oil shock has hit. Suppose that even the very environmentally sensitive California populace had a change of heart and decided it's time to drill for the oil off California's coastline. It would take at least 5 and probably more like 10 years to build oil rigs and get them online, even if the regulatory process were streamlined due to an energy crisis crippling the economy.

My point is, peak cheap oil is real and it's coming. I do expect a change of national attitude about the balance between environmental and economic concerns, but it won't help avert the financial impact of the next big oil shock because it simply takes too long to get new production projects online and producing oil.

Erik

 

Speaking of new posters. Chris it would be interesting to see a continuing graph of new people to this site. I would like to see if it will grow exponentially with the exponential implosion of our system.

I've seen a lot of hype on the Bakken potential and have come to the conclusion (I'm no expert, but have done some research) that while there is a lot of oil in the ground, not much of it is "conventional" and nearly all of it is very expensive to extract -- not to mention the problems of water required, quality of oil/processing and in general the environmental problems. A few companies will make a lot of money there ............ so as an investment opportunity, it may be good, but as far as solving our energy problems -- not likely.

While the Baaken oil field may end up producing a lot of oil, the Wall Street Journal article indicates that it may produce about 1/2  a year of the US current use. That's a lot of oil, but hardly enough to solve our energy problems. When one subtracts the energy required to actually get the oil, the net usable will be considerably less. If we can figure out how to use the gas, Baaken could be much more meaningful     Quote from article -- " The Bakken Shale could contain up to 4.3 billion barrels of recoverable oil, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. That would make it the biggest oil field discovered in the contiguous U.S. in more than 40 years—and many in the industry believe the amount of recoverable oil could be even greater as new technology allows companies to tap more of it.”     see this link for the entire article:  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703795004575087623756596514.html?mod=WSJ_article_LatestHeadlines

While the Baaken oil field may end up producing a lot of oil, the Wall Street Journal article indicates that it may produce about 1/2  a year of the US current use (my comment - in the foreseeable term). That's a lot of oil, but hardly enough to solve our energy problems. When one subtracts the energy required to actually get the oil, the net usable will be considerably less. If we can figure out how to use the gas, Baaken could be much more meaningful 

 Quote from article -- " The Bakken Shale could contain up to 4.3 billion barrels of recoverable oil, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. That would make it the biggest oil field discovered in the contiguous U.S. in more than 40 years—and many in the industry believe the amount of recoverable oil could be even greater as new technology allows companies to tap more of it.”  

see this link for the entire article:  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703795004575087623756596514.html?mod=WSJ_article_LatestHeadlines

Jim