Posted on 05/23/2014 5:56:46 AM PDT by thackney
The vast bulk of production problems in California is political, not technical. With “Moonbeam” Brown running the state, and “Bat$#!t” Obama running the country, the best estimate of oil production California is ZERO.
I am certain the earlier number is the more accurate one.
In any event, we need to develop it and see.
With the government we have today, any report must be suspect of being corrupted for political purposes.
My guess is that technologies will continue to improve, that 600 million barrel number will go up over time, and should prices rise, more effort will be brought to bear on the problem of recovering this oil.
The government hates hydrocarbons. I think this is PsyOps to discourage and perhaps codify anti-fracking data. Of course there are challenges; of course the bright minds in industry will figure out solutions. And of course O and the Thug will get their pants in a bunch.
Governor Moonbeam - however hard this is to believe - supports fracking and has shot down a number of anti- bills in Sacto. He knows it will bring money to the state. My husband’s a geologist and is up-to-date on the politics in this, and has been pleasantly surprised. The anti-frackers will not go down without a fight.
I am certain it is not. My opinion is based upon the relatively poor production rates from the private companies drilling the holes for the last few years.
Is your certain based on any data? Or just wishful thinking and distrust?
The same group has been raising the producible reserves in the Bakken and the Eagle Ford.
The first report was junk and they included language in it that said it was based upon production from other fields.
It was a guess, and it wasn’t a good guess.
I’m guessing the recoverables are still there, it is just that the industry will make prognosticated adjustments according to regulatory environment.
Example: Formation A, when frac’d, has 5 MMM BBL recoverable reserves. But, state and local regulation will “stay” any frac activity and those hydrocarbons can no longer be considered ^recoverable^.
Industry says, “We must downgrade our estimates.”
I presume government numbers to be wrong.
Is it just me or is the tone here “this one instance of fracking estimates is bad, therefore fracking is bad”?
Very true. The same will effect places like the Bakken, Permian, Eagle Ford, etc. Rising proved reserves often does not requiring finding anything new.
The first government numbers certainly were.
I cannot help but wonder if they were pushed to get something out so the pump&dump stock guys could rake in the money before it was looked at too closely.
Many good companies in the industry criticized that first publication as not realistic. Many bad companies grabbed a lease and used that report to raise money before the bottom fell.
I don’t see that.
What the author is implying and it is a fair assertion is that “estimates” are exactly that.
Now, my problem with the author is he seems almost celebratory that the Monterrey formation isn’t as big as it was estimated to be...but anyone with a brain puts an over/under on an estimate. And in another few years that formation could be found to be larger than they ever dreamed.
As the empirical data grows so does the certainty.
BUMP!
__________
BTW, will the Chinese, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, AG Holder, POS Obama and Jerry Brown be forbidden to bid on the soon to be decreased mineral rights value of the Monterrey Shale downgraded acreage?
I agree that US gov and the greenies want to downplay potential and kill fracking. That said, we should leave open the possibility that fracking in flat-lying sedimentary geological formations in the center of the continent may be hugely more productive than the same technology applied to the melange of rocks scraped from the ocean floor and volcanic island arcs pushed onto the continental margin. And the reports refers to the possibility that oil within this formation may have already migrated—meaning we may have sucked some of it up already drilling in the lower Cental Valley.
Coming from an administration known for cooking numbers . . .
Apparently, many are convinced it is there, but sorting out the rest will take some doing.
Even the Bakken has its hotspots where production is better and other areas where is is less, before it peters out completely near the edges of the formation (it does not outcrop anywhere and is only in the subsurface). I have only worked two out of roughly 200 wells in the Bakken and Three Forks which were non-productive, and they were where we were looking for the limits. We found them.
Among the other wells, though, IPs ranged from 3000 BOPE to 250 BOPE, depending on where in the basin we drilled.
And you should apply that thought process to the original report they put out.
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