Posted on 07/21/2007 12:34:42 PM PDT by Rick_Michael
WASHINGTON, July 20 Technology to draw oil from rock in Rocky Mountain states and other unconventional sources is getting another look from companies and the government as the demand for energy increases and supply tightens, especially in the United States.
Oil was more than $78 per barrel Friday, nearing an all-time high. According to a National Petroleum Council report, commissioned by U.S. Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman and released this week, demand will exceed supply by 13 million barrels per day by 2030.
One potential major source of domestic oil is found in shale rock in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming. Interest and experiments rose and fell with the oil price spikes during the 1970s to early 1980s and have risen once again.
"It's an enormous resource," said Daniel I. Fine, an MIT research affiliate. The area was protected for the future with the creation of the Naval Petroleum and Oil Shale Reserve in 1912. "It was understood that one day we would use it at a time when the technology and economics would be right," Fine added.
The oil found in these rocks is called kerogen, organic matter containing hydrocarbons that must be converted to oil and gas. It's unclear how much oil may eventually be produced, but the United States holds 60 percent of the world's shale.
On-site experiments to heat and extract the kerogen are starting on 160-acre tracks leased by the Bureau of Land Management. The 10-year research development & demonstration leases are intended "to test and demonstrate what are considered state of the art methods of recovering shale oil," BLM spokeswoman Heather Feeney said. They can be converted to commercial leases for oil shale after demonstrating commercial production capacity and a BLM review.
Shell is probably the leader in the field, said Jeremy Boak, project manager for the Colorado Energy Research Institute at the Colorado School of Mines. Shell expects to extract from 3.5 to 5 barrels for each barrel of energy used, Boak said, by heating the rocks underground for three or four years, after which the oil seeps through cracks so it can be pumped out. It's relatively efficient, he explained, because it partially refines the kerogen underground and brings it to the surface as fuels requiring little processing: naphtha, diesel and kerosene.
Chevron has partnered with the Los Alamos National Laboratory to recover oil from shale formations in Colorado's Piceance Basin. Fine explained that it will use explosives underground to fractionate the shale, then inject a critical fuel, which creates a hot gas and allows extraction. The need for water and on-site production will have a heavy impact on the environment, however.
Raytheon, known for numerous military technologies, has developed the use of radio frequency, or RF, technology with contributions from partner Critical Fluids Technologies.
John Cogliandro, program manager for Raytheon's oil from shale technologies program, said the new technology is powerful and environmentally responsible. Since it doesn't use steam or heat the actual rock, there's no residue that might enter groundwater supplies, he said.
RF heats much more uniformly and quickly through radiation that targets the hydrocarbon molecules. Cogliandro added that critical fluids release and move the oil, so that the oil seeps through cracks in the shale and is pumped to the surface.
Fine said Raytheon's technology is an advance over earlier microwave feasibility tests -- dating back to the 1980s -- because it heats the shale rock more quickly and it is easier to control while deploying smaller, cost-effective equipment.
Global Resource Corp. uses microwaves to extract oil from shale. While previous microwave tests didn't experiment with different wavelengths, GRC is using a continuing microwave system with variable frequencies. Operating in a vacuum, the microwave frequencies gasify, then condense the hydrocarbons, which turn into gas and liquid oil, said a GRC spokesman.
GRC is using the technology to reinvigorate older wells as well as draw oil from tires, petroleum-based plastics and automobile shredder residue. The company has patent-pending numbers for seven different technologies, and both the U.S. Energy Department and the state of Pennsylvania have given GRC a capped well for experimentation.
GRC CEO Frank Pringle said interest is growing, despite skepticism about the technology: "I know what my process can accomplish, but there's a lot of prejudice against us."
Raytheon is seeking to license its know-how to energy companies that are better able to apply the technology in the field. Oil companies experimenting with shale have shown significant interest in Raytheon's technique, but Cogliandro doesn't think they'll abandon current approaches.
"You'll see a lot of pilot projects out in the field being tested. They are going to find where certain technologies work best and then they'll analyze the economics of each," Cogliandro said.
Cogliandro has also received samples of oil sands, or "heavies," from Oklahoma and Texas on which to test the technology. Raytheon's methods had been tried successfully with Canada's tar sands and should work with the heavier oil sands, he said.
Both Raytheon and GRC say their technologies use one barrel of oil's worth of energy to produce 4.5 barrels of shale oil compared to one barrel for 3.5 barrels using older methods.
Boak said these technologies will have to prove how they can do as well or better than the newest techniques in the field.
"The big question for shale oil and heavy oil processing is how far you can make those waves reach out into the rock," said Boak. He emphasized the importance of field tests given the uncertainty in geological formations. GRC said the microwaves can be used as far down as can be drilled.
If the technology leads to commercial viability, only limited investment in refinery extensions and pipeline spurs will be needed because the industry can make use of existing regional refineries.
(e-mail: energy@upi.com)
water is one big thing. The area is already a semi desert, and the traditional methods use a lot of water. Maybe they can come up with a different way that doesn’t use so much.
When the liquid oil runs out, perhaps the US should become radical capitalists, and use the shale oil weapon against the Islamic economies, who then will be relying on us for their oil supplies.
Most of which is in my yard, here in New Jersey.
Lots of oil off Florida coast if you’re willing to drill deep enough.
I saw an article the other day that said environmentalists were moving to have the federal land barred from shale oil extraction. In other news, a Federal Judge has barred Exxon form drilling offshore in Alaska off the North Slope.
The area was protected for the future with the creation of the Naval Petroleum and Oil Shale Reserve in 1912.Thank god rationalists secured it before environmentalists could f* it up.
Source?
http://www.heritage.org/Research/EnergyandEnvironment/wm1542.cfm
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/07/21/business/NA-FIN-US-Shell-Offshore-Drilling-Alaska.php
Earthtimes really should pull their head out of their butt and keep up on the issue. Shell withdrew because of economic reasons and rumors have more withdrawals on the way by others citing cost and methods. It is coming just not as soon as some would like it is all
http://test.denverpost.com/extremes/ci_6155257
Yep, the greens will battle ANY extraction of fossil fuel, anywhere they can. As you seem to be well aware, it is because the environmental movement has been hijacked by the socialist movement; the reds are now cloaked within the greens.
The war is being fought on the battleground of "global warming". The greens/reds have succeeded already in getting our Supreme Court to allow the EPA to regulate carbon dioxide, and some states to pass legislation effectively establishing CO2 as a toxin.
We are losing this war.
CO2 CANNOT be causing our current warming. The man-made CO2 in our atmosphere is a mere 383 parts per million, ALL the CO2 is less than one percent of all greenhouse gases in the air, 95% being water vapor. Studies have shown that CO2 increases FOLLOW rises in temperature, drop-dead proof that CO2 isn't the cause of our recent warming. Of the roughly 8 tenths of one degree centigrade that global temp rose during the 20th century, three-fourths of THAT rise occurred prior to the year 1940, that is, prior to the advent of the bulk of our smokestack industry. Botanists tell us that higher CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere allow plants to grow WITH LESS WATER, the addition of CO2 from my SUV can thus be a very good thing, as higher crop yields, more potable water, and the greening of deserts are just a few of the benefits. Follow the link below, and you will find 7,000 scientists who agree with everything I say above.
http://www.oism.org/pproject/
We just returned from our annual vacation in central NY where there is a lot of shale. People are wanting to explore the area for oil, but Senator Clinton has blocked it. Upstate NY is dying because of high taxes and this could be a real boom to the area. Mrs Clinton does not seem to care, why am I not suprised.
What do they need oil for? They have no economy to speak of except producing oil.
Regards,
GtG
I own mineral rights to oil shale land in Mississippi. I sure wish someone would drill there.
A small part, never significant. The oil industry study announced this week that the oil industry will not be able to keep up with demand over the next two decades. If the ME is lost it will happen a lot sooner and a lot bigger. It is not an oil shortage in the sense of there being no more oil, but of oil production by whatever means. The oil being produced now is easy and cheap. The next batch will be more expensive and harder to produce. Oil from shale is an industrial process quite a bit different than simply drilling and pumping oil out of the ground.
“Some time?”
They’ve been talking about this for 45 years that I can remember, and they seem no closer today than they were back then.
That oil off Florida is China’s now through their partners in Cuba ,,,, our environmentalists and governor Crist won’t let us drill but they can’t stop China from drilling..
I’d love to see some leadership from the top declaring an economic emergency and allowing (actually demanding) drilling in ANWR , off FL and refusing to renew refinery licenses unless they increase capacity...
Plenty of oil in CA too but we can’t think of drilling there although the fields are known (LA once looked like Oklahoma with all the derricks..) .
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