The U.S. Geological Survey recently discovered the largest continuous oil and gas deposit ever found in the United States, officials said Tuesday.”
What an utter crock of crap. The USGS does not “discover” anything. They do not drill. They do not do seismic, nor much of anything else other than accumulate data from the oil companies and their research. And these are estimates of “TRR”s… Technically recoverable resources….what they don’t tell you is that 90% or more is technically drillable at some price…not $65/bbl…more like $250/bbl or even $2,500/bbl. And if you ban fracking then zero of that 20 Billion bbl. can be produced.
The Wolfcamp has been a round a long time. It is well understood to have tight formation oil that is not recoverable by conventional drilling and production techniques. The assessment is merely a literature examination and a statistical modeling of projections they make using electric logs and generalized data. The sampling is then extrapolated into a “big picture” for the entire basin. A better assessment is that done by the Texas Dept. of Economic Geology. The pdf I attached explains the difference in proven and unproven reserves and reserves and resources. One such assessment recently gave millions of barrels of oil potential in the Reelfoot Rift of NE Arkansas and the Ouachita Basin…two areas that has never produced a single gallon of oil or more than a puff of gas. Another such assessment was written down by about 90%. USGS Assessments
the-difference-in-proven-unproven
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