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Politics : Rat's Nest - Chronicles of Collapse -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Wharf Rat who wrote (3931)	4/17/2006 5:31:50 PM
From: Wharf Rat	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 24225

The Top Twenty Fields: Are They in Decline? Posted by Prof. Goose on Mon Apr 17 at 11:01 AM EST Taking the lead from this thread over at peakoil.com, I thought a discussion of whether or not the top 20 fields were in decline, and then consolidating that into a reference resource would be a good idea. Under the fold is the list they put together. (click here to see the peakoil.com thread for the resources they have used to this point. I will update as we make progress in the comment threads.) 1. Ghawar Unknown 2a. Burgan CONFIRMED DECLINE ~14% 2b. Cantarell CONFIRMED DECLINE ~14% Bolivar Coastal Unknown Safaniya-Khafji Unknown Rumaila Unknown Tengiz Unknown Ahwaz Unknown Kirkuk Decline - (smiley) Marun Unknown Gachsaran Unknown Aghajari Unknown Samotlor CONFIRMED DECLINE ~ 9% 13a.Prudhoe Bay CONFIRMED DECLINE ~11% 13b. Kashagan Unknown Abqaiq I don't know, but have you seen the cross section? It's all water! Romashkino Unknown Chicontepec Unknown Berri Unknown Zakum Unknown Manifa Unknown Faroozan-Marjan Unknown Marlim, Campos Unknown ====================== new] peakguy on Mon Apr 17 at 11:34 AM EST The recent Saudi announcement about a mature fields declining by 8% sounds like Gwahar is in decline by about that much now or shortly in the future. It's interesting how high the decline rates are for the ones that are confirmed. A lot of drilling is going to be needed to replace that oil every year. ============= new] westexas on Mon Apr 17 at 12:00 PM EST Reuters: Qatar says OPEC can do nothing about high oil price cnn.netscape.cnn.com Excerpt: "Oil prices have risen more than 20 percent since mid-February, despite sizable U.S. crude inventories, as geo-political fears compounded fundamental worries that refiners might struggle to make enough gasoline for the summer driving season." Guess what else happened in mid-February? Total net US imports started falling. The following numbers are weekly, not four week running averages. The week ending 2/10/06 showed average daily net oil imports of 13,396,000 bpd. Seven of the subsequent weeks have shown declines. The most current weekly data show 11,634,000 bpd. This is a decline of 13.2%. (The same period last year showed about a 3.7% decline.) Looking at a slightly bigger picture, 12/30/05 to 4/7/06 (four week running average) we saw a decline of 8.7% (versus an increase in imports for the same time period last year). Note that we don't know what percentage of crude oil inventories consists of heavy, sour crude. Also, total product inventories are only up 2.9% year over year. But fundamentally, what do you expect to see at peak production? I expect to see peak everything, followed by a permanent and irreversible decline in conventional oil production. Note that the EIA data show that world crude + condensate production was down by close to 500,000 bpd from 12/05 to 1/06 (versus an increase last year), following the all time record high number in December. What did Deffeyes have to say about December? If refiners don't need the imports, why are they bidding up the price? ========== peakearl on Mon Apr 17 at 12:02 PM EST A very worthwhile study. Don't have time to work on this right now, but I think it would be very helpful to put in date of discovery and recent production stats. Most important right now is not just original reserves but the production they contribute currently. For example, China's largest field Daqing is not on the list but should be, and it peaked in 2003, I believe. chinagate.com.cn chinadaily.com.cn \========= [new] peakearl on Mon Apr 17 at 3:51 PM EST Looks like Daqing dropped below 1 mbpd starting in 2003-2004 after decades of production over that figure. [new] westexas on Mon Apr 17 at 12:05 PM EST Re: Top 20 It looks like they left off Daqing, which is a confirmed decline. As I understand it, there are four fields that are currently producing about one mbpd or more: Ghawar; Cantarell; Burgan and Daqing. We know that three of the four are declining, and it is very likely that Ghawar is now declining. Note that it takes lots of smaller fields to make up for declines in fields producing about 10 mbpd. theoildrum.com