Wednesday, October 31, 2007

Oil Shale Breakthrough?

Fortune Magazine Reports a breakthrough in oil shale recovery.

...a cutting-edge technology that, according to Shell, will produce large quantities of high-quality oil without ravaging the local environment - and be profitable with prices around $30 a barrel. Now that oil is approaching $90, the odds on Shell's speculative bet are beginning to look awfully good.

Shell declines to get too specific about how much oil it thinks it can pump at peak production levels, but one DOE study contends that the region can sustain two million barrels a day by 2020 and three million by 2040. Other government estimates have posited an upper range of five million. At that level, Western oil shale would rival the largest oilfields in the world.
That will be very helpful if they can actually begin production.

1 comment:

linearthinker said...

1998. West Texas Crude crashed to $15/bbl, Shell invested $799 M; Exxon, $549 M in R&D. Combined $1.348 Billion from those two companies alone.

Remember that next time the leftists piss and moan about big oil's windfall profits.

The Green River formation area is not the scenic wonderland that the Democrat governor of Colorado and the greenies have their panties in a twist over. Sounds like Shell has more diplomatic folks than me doing their negotiations. Who'd a thought that Miss Congeniality, Gale Norton, would have resigned from Sec of Interior and then resurfaced as negotiator for Shell? Go Gale! I'd be inclined to tell them to enjoy their windblown desolation, and I'd move the operation north into Wyoming. But that's just me.