There’s Twice as Much Oil Below North Dakota than We Thought

Free Enterprise ^ | 5/1/13 | Sean Hackbarth

[Nachum]

Don’t expect the energy boom in Montana and the Dakotas to end anytime soon. According to the United States Geological Survey (USGS), the formations below these three states hold double the amount of oil and triple the amount of natural gas than was believed five years ago. National Journal reports:

The formations, called Bakken and Three Forks, span much of western North Dakota, the northern tip of South Dakota and the northeastern tip of Montana. The last time the United States Geological Survey assessed this area for its oil and gas reserves was in 2008. But that assessment did not include the Three Forks formation, which explains the substantial increase in the estimates. USGS estimates that these two formations together hold 7.4 billion barrels of undiscovered—but technically recoverable—oil and 6.7 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.

Reuters points out that USGS estimates are often conservative. The United States Geological Survey noted that 450 million barrels of oil have already been produced from these formations since 2008. Expect much more to come.

[muawiyah]

The gub'mnt already surveyed the land, divided it, tried to sell it ~ some of the railroad land still isn't sold ~ and then planted thermonuclear warheads in the ground all over the place.

That doesn't even count running off the Indians on behalf of the goldminers!

Gub'mnt doing something else to the Dakota country is probably in the cards but keeping it rural is the least of our concerns.

Think about all of our oil being located in a region we've made an attractive ICBM target!

[muawiyah]

Fur Shur!

[COBOL2Java]

Oil is only found in sedimentary basins. It is often found in layers under sealing rock with another layer above that with another layer of sealing rock.

Kind of like liberal ideology...