What They Aren’t Telling Us
by Blake on Jul 31, 2009 at 10:38 Political
Boone Pickens has said, (among other things), that there is plenty of natural gas to power our power plants and our vehicles for at least a hundred years. Sarah Palin has touted the oil and gas reserves of Alaska as long as she has been governor. One person is listened to, and the other is ridiculed for saying the same thing, but one thing is becoming perfectly clear- the government does not want you to know the true state of our oil and gas reserves.
Oh, not the ones off of the East and West coasts- that is politically difficult- but the reserves in America’s heartland. These reserves they especially do not want you to know of.
North Dakota and Montana have an estimated 3.0 to 4.3 billion barrels of undiscovered, technically recoverable oil in an area known as the Bakken Formation.
A U.S. Geological Survey assessment, released April 10, shows a 25-fold increase in the amount of oil that can be recovered compared to the agency’s 1995 estimate of 151 million barrels of oil.
Technically recoverable oil resources are those producible using currently available technology and industry practices. USGS is the only provider of publicly available estimates of undiscovered technically recoverable oil and gas resources.
New geologic models applied to the Bakken Formation, advances in drilling and production technologies, and recent oil discoveries have resulted in these substantially larger technically recoverable oil volumes. About 105 million barrels of oil were produced from the Bakken Formation by the end of 2007.
The USGS Bakken study was undertaken as part of a nationwide project assessing domestic petroleum basins using standardized methodology and protocol as required by the Energy Policy and Conservation Act of 2000.
The Bakken Formation estimate is larger than all other current USGS oil assessments of the lower 48 states and is the largest “continuous” oil accumulation ever assessed by the USGS. A “continuous” oil accumulation means that the oil resource is dispersed throughout a geologic formation rather than existing as discrete, localized occurrences. The next largest “continuous” oil accumulation in the U.S. is in the Austin Chalk of Texas and Louisiana, with an undiscovered estimate of 1.0 billions of barrels of technically recoverable oil.
usgs.gov
3 to 4.3 billion barrels of oil- that is quite a bit of oil, and that doesn’t take into account the natural gas amounts that there might be. We are not running out of oil, so much as running out of political will. We would rather impoverish our people while trying, and failing, with untested pie in the sky so- called solutions to a crisis that we would not have if we as a people would wake up and smell the fossil fuel.
“It is clear that the Bakken formation contains a significant amount of oil – the question is how much of that oil is recoverable using today’s technology?” said Senator Byron Dorgan, of North Dakota. “To get an answer to this important question, I requested that the U.S. Geological Survey complete this study, which will provide an up-to-date estimate on the amount of technically recoverable oil resources in the Bakken Shale formation.”
The USGS estimate of 3.0 to 4.3 billion barrels of technically recoverable oil has a mean value of 3.65 billion barrels. Scientists conducted detailed studies in stratigraphy and structural geology and the modeling of petroleum geochemistry. They also combined their findings with historical exploration and production analyses to determine the undiscovered, technically recoverable oil estimates.
USGS worked with the North Dakota Geological Survey, a number of petroleum industry companies and independents, universities and other experts to develop a geological understanding of the Bakken Formation. These groups provided critical information and feedback on geological and engineering concepts important to building the geologic and production models used in the assessment.
usgs.gov
Now, I am not turning my back on wind, or solar, and especially not nuclear power, but we need to get our heads out of the clouds and back on firm ground. Right now, at this point in time, what we need is a national effort to find energy. The type of energy shouldn’t matter as much as obtaining the energy itself.
We, as a nation, need to position ourselves for the coming century- there are other countries hard on our heels, and if you don’t think our position in this world matters, you really need to go sit on the sidelines, because you will not be any help to your nation, or your family.
Diversification means that a multitude of options will be used- it does not mean to close off any options for consideration, and yet that is exactly what this administration would have us do when we have the resources, and we have the techniques, and we have the infrastructure in place.
This Bakken Formation could, along with Alaska’s gas reserves, give us the breathing room to diversify effectively, rather than impoverish ourselves in an attempt to have alternatives without the assistance of the existing power sources.
To read more about this, go here: http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article.asp?ID=1911
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Tags: cap and tax, energy needs, fossil fuels, reserves
Being from Texas, I remember how the Austin Chalk formation was drilled during the Reagan years, and with new technology, we can go back and find new oil and gas there,as well as the Bakken formation.
Economically, the exploration of the Austin Chalk formation in the 1980s was an economic boom, with every house rented, leased, or bought, and people who were working the rigs living in reclaimed 10′ wide pieces of steel pipe fitted with walls , floor, and plumbing. For about five or so years, this spurred the regrowth of many towns that had been fading off of the map, as people scrambled to find places to live, near where they worked.
BLK: “Boone Pickens has said,… plenty of natural gas to power our power plants and our vehicles for at least a hundred years.>>
DAR
I am all for using NG for vehicles but…
a) a hundred years is not very long.
b) estimates of NG reserves vary widely. He is cherry picking the longer numbers and to get this “100 years” for vehicles he is assuming a great amount of NG being switched from electricity generation to vehicles (which may or may not happen).
BLK: Sarah Palin has touted the oil and gas reserves of Alaska… One person is listened to, and the other is ridiculed for saying the same thing”>>
DAR
You wish. She was ridiculed because she ignorantly said Alaska: “produces nearly 20 percent of the U.S. domestic supply of energy.”
The correct answer is:
“Alaska’s share of domestic energy production was 3.5 percent, according to the official figures kept by the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
And if by “supply” Palin meant all the energy consumed in the U.S., and not just produced here, then Alaska’s production accounted for only 2.4 percent.”
Link.
Regarding the Bakken formation, there has long been great optimism and GREAT skepticism about how much oil can actually be extracted. Consider:
“While these numbers would appear to indicate a massive reserve, the percentage of this oil which might be extracted using current technology is another matter. Estimates of the Bakken’s technically recoverable oil have ranged from as low as 1% — because the Bakken shale has generally low porosity and low permeability, making the oil difficult to extract — to Leigh Price’s estimate of 50% recoverable.”
Link.
D.
I think Americans would rather go the “great optimism” route, than to just give up in defeat. like Hussein would like us to- when the USGS provides this report, combined with possible formations off of the coasts and in Alaska, well, you begin to have more and more recoverable oil, until you have, all of a sudden, a great deal of oil and gas- certainly enough to try to recover. Just going back into the Austin Chalk region in the 1980s revived the economy in those places, and that was a good thing.
I just threw Palin in there to make you crazy- it works, too- doesn’t it?
BLK: “I think Americans would rather go the “great optimism” route…”>>
DAR
I recommend the non BS, reality route. But okay, lets pretend. Take your optimistic number of 3.65 billion barrels and divide by 20 million to see how long this reserve will feed just “America’s addiction” (GW’s Bush’s words).
You should get 182 days.
Does that seem like a long time? To see how long it carries the world, divide by 4 (45 days).
BLK: “all of a sudden, a great deal of oil and gas- certainly enough to try to recover.”
DAR
Of course we are going to get it. We are going to get it all. We will need every bit of it to provide fertilizers and roads and plastics and jet fuels and lubrication for our electric vehicles. There is no substitute for oil, nothing of comparable energy density. The dumbest thing you can do with it is burn it. Then it’s gone. What we don’t need to do is go to great extremes to get these last reserves, at bargain prices, so mouth breathing birthers can continue to flush it down their Hummers at $2.50 a gallon.
BLK: “in the 1980s revived the economy in those places,”>>
DAR
There is more to living on this planet than reviving the economy in isolated places for a few moments. Try to think a little more long term than that.
BLK: “threw Palin in there”
DAR
No response to her energy ignorance noted.
D.
I see you have Maher (the most ignorant man in America) on again- does he send a thrill down your leg?
Personally, I like the birther thing, because it drives you all so crazy, and that is a good thing.
You may think a hundred years is not long, but it would allow us to PERFECT other energies, rather than throw things against the wall to see what sticks.
The one thing we need, regarding any other form of energy, is INFRASTRUCTURE, something we do not have now.
The oil and gas would allow us some breathing room in developing this infrastructure.
Tell me what is wrong with this, besides the fact that it clashes with your ideology?
Other energies will not substitute for the properties of oil.
You want the “breathing room” because you want the gas for your pickup to stay cheap. That’s not going to happen. We can only subsidize this addiction for so long.
BLK: “Tell me what is wrong with this…”>>
DAR
It is a hopeless dead end. We don’t remotely have the reserves. We will have to cut back while throwing everything against the wall at the same time.
D.
You are not even in the same room with logical, Darrel- giving us time and room to perfect technologies is a good thing, and only invertebrate liberals too wedded to Hussein’s blatant attempts to bring us down to a third- world economy would think otherwise.
This would provide work, provide energy, and that is money that would stay at home- the downside, as you see it is it conflicts with your liberal agenda and beliefs.