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Fri, 2009-02-06 11:41 — The Conductor
Topic: 
Economics
Technology
Places: 
U.S.A.

The prophets of Peak Oil have fallen silent. A price collapse and drop in global demand have allowed other paranoids to push to the headlines. But their voices will rise again. When that happens, remember this:

North Dakota and Montana have an estimated 3.0 to 4.3 billion barrels of undiscovered, technically recoverable oil in an area known as the Bakken Formation.
…

"It is clear that the Bakken formation contains a significant amount of oil - the question is how much of that oil is recoverable using today's technology?" said Senator Byron Dorgan, of North Dakota. "To get an answer to this important question, I requested that the U.S. Geological Survey complete this study, which will provide an up-to-date estimate on the amount of technically recoverable oil resources in the Bakken Shale formation."

The USGS estimate of 3.0 to 4.3 billion barrels of technically recoverable oil has a mean value of 3.65 billion barrels. Scientists conducted detailed studies in stratigraphy and structural geology and the modeling of petroleum geochemistry. They also combined their findings with historical exploration and production analyses to determine the undiscovered, technically recoverable oil estimates.

3.65 billion bbl ÷ 21 million bbl daily US consumption = 10 years of oil.

The Bakken has enough oil to meet the entire US demand for 10 years. With current technology.

As technology advances, our demand is likely to drop while the recoverable portion increases. This field hadn’t been thoroughly prosepcted because we didn’t need it. Now that we’re looking, we’re finding oil all over the place.