Posted on 06/08/2013 12:22:53 AM PDT by nickcarraway
UK shale gas finds could mean US-type energy boom Liza Jansen Posted date: June 05, 2013 In: Business, Europe, Latest News | comment : 1
New estimates show there is a massive amount of untapped shale gas in the Northwest of England.
Evidence that the UK might be close to experiencing the energy revolution that has transformed the US market continues to mount.
IGas, an energy company awarded shale gas licences in Northern England by UK authorities, has announced it has found enough gas reserves to meet the UK’s needs for 60 years.
IGas says there may be up to 170 trillion cubic feet (4,810 cubic km) of gas in the areas it is licensed to explore.
“We (Britain) import around 1.5 trillion cubic feet, we consume around 3 tcf a year, so assuming you could recover technically something like 10 to 15 per cent of the shale gas in place, then it could
move import dependency out for about 10 to 15 years,” chief executive Andrew Austin told the BBC.
The firm has previously estimated there was about nine trillion cubic feet of shale gas. The 170 trillion cubic feet figure puts the firm close to rival Cuadrilla Resources, which calculates its prospective gas reserves are nearly 200 tcf.
It remains unclear however how much of the gas will be economically extractable.
The UK’s domestic supplies of gas have declined since the mid-2000s. UK Chancellor George Osborne expressed hope in his March budget that the UK can replicate the US shale gas boom and reduce its dependency on imported gas.
There is a considerable scepticism however from within the coalition and from environmental groups, worrying that the country would lower its commitment to low-carbon energy, and the impact of fracking on air quality and groundwater.
Gas and oil discoveries in shale rock in the US have significantly reduced gas prices. The International Energy Agency (IEA) has estimated the US will overtake Russia as the world’s biggest gas producer by 2015, and Saudi Arabia as the world’s biggest oil producer by about 2020.
Shale gas discoveries in the UK are still in their infancy but expectations are rising within the industry that they could revolutionize the UK’s future energy supplies.
But you’re forgetting about the eco-activists and PETA doing whatever it takes to prevent fracking in GB. A few years ago, I was assigned to review an EU report on shale gas drilling. After reading 83 pages of bureaucratic mumbo jumbo, EU researchers concluded that fracking should be abolished in Europe and it’s not recommended to do fracking anywhere else in the world.
Oops I meant to say EU did not recommend to do fracking elsewhere in the world.
Shale has certainly greatly increased our domestic oil production, but it has has not reduced gas prices very much as the article states.
To be fair, there is great concern about the process across the board in the UK. What little fracking has taken place in the UK has already been linked to small earthquakes and incidents in 2011 in Lancashire (Blackpool and Fylde).
“The impact of fracking on air quality and ground water.”
It amazes me how people can ignore all the studies on this. Hydraulic Fracturing does not effect ground water and never has!
Global demand for oil and gas is increasing.
Hydraulic fracturing has greatly increased our production of natural gas and reduced its price. It costs less to heat our homes than it did in 2008. Because of hydraulic fracturing we have more than we can use and the US is constructing facilities to export natural gas.
Hydraulic fracturing has also increased our production of oil but has not significantly affected the price of gasoline. The US still imports about half of the oil that we use.
I’ll gladly continue to pay $3.00 - $3.50 per gallon for domestic supplied gasoline and the cheap natural gas that comes along with it, to be shed of dependency upon the murderous barbarians who have had a virtual lock on it for decades. It’s a fair trade in my mind.
It has had an impact in unusual ways that are complicated to describe. But, falling diesel fuel prices are rightly attributed to domestic fracking. Diesel is “cracked” from the same crude oil as gasoline. Increased supply has far-reaching effects. Something of a manufacturing renaissance in right-to-work states is taking root due to inexpensive natural gas.
“It has had an impact in unusual ways that are complicated to describe.”
Give it a shot!
I’m curious about the name you’ve chosen, would you be from New mexico by chance?
About a month ago I visited the Flying J at exit 77 on I 81 at Ft Chiswell Va. I found the very large parking lot near the truck wash was all barricaded off.
There was a shiny new natural gas truck fueling station there. The Pilot/Flying J company in joint venture with Boone Pickens is almost ready to revolutionize over the road trucking. Natural gas fuel for over the road interstate routed truckers is here and now
I wouldn’t want to try above and beyond the simple, top-line sort of observations I’ve already posted. There are a few FReepers who are far more qualified than I am, to go into deeper technical detail. Maybe they’ll chime in.
I’m not from New Mexico but I know the place, spent several summers there as a teen while my dad was setting up manufacturing plants, Las Cruces area. Loved it, not a big fan of desert other than the novelty of occasional visits, found myself craving green and driving back into the hills to find it. Now, that part of NM spoke to me, hard to describe why given limited exposure decades ago, but I miss it.
The screen name refers to a pre-Revolutionary war conflict in my home state of NC that many credit with being the harbinger of that revolution. Several ancestors were involved, Ninian Hamilton for one. Another great was orphaned as a result of a Cherokee raid and kidnapping, and ended up bound to Benjamin Merrill.
Interesting, little-known history there, culminating in the Overmountain Men at King’s Mountain. The rough and ready, frontier justice connotation of “Regulator” began here, in the former frontier backcountry at the foot of the Blue Ridge, in the Carolinas.
When I seen Regulator I was thinking the area of New Mexico where Billy the Kid was running his bunch of Regulators, the wife and I are headed to that area next weekend for a little R&R. I’ve been in the oil business for about 2 thirds of my life, anything anybody has to say about it I listen.
A lot of outlaws were former Confederates and would have known about and appreciated the early form of frontier justice applied during the Regulator War. It fueled westward migration since the English had a price on their heads, over the Blue Ridge into what became Tennessee and beyond. The idea and the meaning of the term went with them as they pushed ever westward. So, you eventually get Billy the Kid with his Regulators, who were applying their own form of frontier justice. And Jesse James, a distant cousin.
Cool, hope it works, although I’ve had my suspicions about ol’ T-Bone of late, a little too invested in green schemes for my taste.
I see him on Cavuto from time to time. T Boone is the real deal.
I think he recanted the wind stuff and is concentrating on selling the gas he has amassed. He and the Haslem boys at Pilot/ Flying J are providing the means for transforming the Big Rig business.
I have seen a couple of Schneider tractor trailer rigs set up for LNG.
Thanks nickcarraway.
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