Your expert isn't. Tell him to read the Oil Drum.
theoildrum.com
Peak oil: “It’s the flows, stupid!”
by Steve Andrews and Randy Udall
Message 24583775
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Shell Oil is currently developing an in situ conversion process (ICP). The process involves heating underground oil shale, using electric heaters placed in deep vertical holes drilled through a section of oil shale. The volume of oil shale is heated over a period of two to three years, until it reaches 650–700 °F, at which point oil is released from the shale. The released product is gathered in collection wells positioned within the heated zone.
Shell's current plan involves use of ground-freezing technology to establish an underground barrier called a "freeze wall" around the perimeter of the extraction zone. The freeze wall is created by pumping refrigerated fluid through a series of wells drilled around the extraction zone. The freeze wall prevents groundwater from entering the extraction zone, and keeps hydrocarbons and other products generated by the in-situ retorting from leaving the project perimeter.
It is very difficult for me to see how any company is going to make a go of it, given the need to simulaneously heat and freeze the ground for several years. However, as I was recently passing through the Denver Airport - I spotted this story in the Denver Post:
Shell makes run on water
Shale country tends to be dry country, and Shell's process uses a lot of water. Some excerpts from the story:
In its quest to melt oil out of western Colorado's shale, Royal Dutch Shell has been buying up land and water rights in anticipation of what is likely to be a thirsty new industry.
Some officials, however, worry that the demands of the oil-shale industry could drain every drop of the region's remaining water.
theoildrum.com
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Tar Sands: The Oil Junkie's Last Fix, Part 1
Posted by Stoneleigh on August 25, 2007 - 9:00am
This is a guest post by Chris Nelder. It was originally written for Friday's Energy and Capital. Part II will be available next Friday.
For this week's article, I collaborated with energy journalist Roel Mayer, a freelance writer on earth, energy and economy, based in Canada. Roel is a keen observer on energy, and the Canadian tar sands in particular, so he was a natural research partner for this short study on the state of oil production from tar sands.
He was also the one who coined "The Law of Receding Horizons." For those who missed my previous articles on receding horizons, it is a simple concept: as the cost of energy rises, the cost of everything else made with energy (like building materials)* also rises. So an energy project which was expected to be profitable when energy costs were x amount higher than today, turns out to still be uneconomical when you get there.
canada.theoildrum.com
part 2
canada.theoildrum.com
*High Steel Prices: A Preview of Peak Oil
A hint of Crunch Time is in this report from Brazil and a sample is also described in today’s Wall Street Journal. The headline is, “Fast-Rising Steel Prices Set Back Big Projects.” The article starts, “Relentless increases in the price of steel are halting or slowing major construction projects world-wide and investments in shipbuilding and oil-and-gas exploration.”
Message 24596835
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Brazil will save us...
Brazil Oil Trapped by 500-Degree Heat, Salt Barrier (Update2)
By Joe Carroll
April 28 (Bloomberg) -- Brazil's plan to become one of the world's biggest oil exporters hinges on exploiting crude 6 miles below the ocean surface in deposits so hot they can melt the metal used to carry uranium to nuclear plants.
Tapping what may be the biggest oil finds in the Western Hemisphere in three decades will require equipment that can withstand 18,000 pounds per square inch of pressure, enough to crush a pickup truck, pipes that can carry oil at temperatures above 500 degrees Fahrenheit (260 Celsius) and drill bits that can penetrate layers of salt more than one mile thick....
Engineers will have to overcome temperatures that range from near freezing above the ocean floor to temperatures that can melt bismuth, used for transporting uranium rods and for shotgun shells. Layers of salt will also increase the challenge because the crystals absorb seismic waves used to pinpoint oil deposits.
(the salt apparently is in motion, too)
Message 24541704
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Bakken will save us...
1. The Bakken shale has produced about 111 million barrels of oil during the last 50+ years in Montana and North Dakota.
2. Total Bakken production is still rising, and producing at the rate of 75,000 BOPD in October 2007.
3. Because of the highly variable nature of shale reservoirs, the characteristics of the historical Bakken production, and the fact that per-well rates seem to have peaked, it seems unlikely that total Bakken production will exceed 2x to 3x current rate of 75,000 BOPD.
4. The latest boom in Bakken production is driven by the application of horizontal wells and hydraulic fracturing technology, which has added about 70 million barrels of production in 7 years. Ultimate recovery of the already-drilled wells should be at least double this volume.
5. The USGS estimates the mean volume of technically recoverable hydrocarbons to be 3,649 million barrels of oil. This is roughly 7 to 12 times the size of already known resources.
6. Based on current production and areas likely to be drilled, the USGS estimate of technically recovery resources seems optimistic.
7. The Bakken potential resource, while large by US onshore field standards, will have only a minor effect on US production or imports. Using 2006 US imports and consumption for comparison, the Bakken undiscovered resource of 3,649 million barrels of oil, if subsequently discovered and fully developed, would provide us with the equivalent of six months of oil consumption or 10 months of imports, spread over 20 or more years. In reality, the reserves developed are likely to be many times smaller than this value.
8. The October 2007 production rate of 75,000 BOPD amounts only 0.4% of US oil consumption, or 0.6% of imports.
9. Per-well Bakken production peaked in August 2005 at 116 barrels a day, and was down to 79 barrels a day in October 2007. If the Bakken production history in the 1990s can be used as a guide, the peaking of per-well production may portend a peak in total Bakken production.
theoildrum.com
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Kashagan is set to open in '04; it will save us..
The consortium, which includes Exxon Mobil Corp. (XOM) and Royal Dutch Shell PLC (RDSB.LN), has proposed postponing the start of production to 2012-2013 from 2011, Kazakh Energy Minister Sauat Mynbayev was quoted by the Interfax news agency as saying Monday. "We're trying to come to an agreement again," Mynbayev said.
money.cnn.com
In Caspian, Big Oil Fights Ice, Fumes, Kazakhs
by Guy Chazan Dow Jones Newswires Tuesday, August 28, 2007
KASHAGAN, Kazakhstan Aug 28, 2007 (From the Wall Street Journal via Dow Jones Newswires)
On an island in the Caspian Sea, the hub of the world's largest oil-development project, a thousand men in orange jumpsuits train for catastrophe.
Oil in the Kashagan field here is potentially lethal, with high concentrations of hydrogen sulfide gas. So workers carry oxygen canisters and gas detectors and do daily evacuation drills. High-tech getaway boats stand ready to whisk them to safety. The place feels more like a hazardous-chemical plant than an oil rig.
Message 23836813 |
