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The first of the Geocontroversies debates held at the Petroleum Geology Conference in London earlier this year brought up some interesting arguments and ideas around the concept of ‘Peak Oil’.
Offshore Norway, exploration activity over the last couple of years has reached record-breaking levels, leading to many discoveries, but few of any size. The Norwegian Petroleum Directorate, however, believes that large discoveries can still be made in areas of the shelf that have not been extensively explored.
As Iraq's political and security situation gradually becomes more stable and safer, the country's rich oil and gas resources will increasingly draw the attention of international oil companies. This article evaluates the geological inventory of Iraq's oil and gas fields, linking the progress and problems of the past to the prospects of the future.
The Gulf of Mexico Basin has proved to be a highly successful hydrocarbon province, and the vast untapped volume of both oil and gas ensures that the basin will continue as a major player for decades to come.
Recent tests in the Arctic permafrost clearly demonstrates that gas hydrates can be produced using current technologies, opening the door for a new, viable energy source.
With more than 2 billion barrels of oil to be recovered, StatoilHydro has a huge resource to tap into in the Alberta oil sands, which may last into the second half of this century.
Heavy oil offers a possible solution to our need for a constant supply of new and secure energy supplies, but its production is characterized by low recovery, so the industry faces the conundrum of how to convert these giant resources into easily produced supplies.
The question is not when we run out of oil, but when we are no longer able to increase our total energy output. In the meantime, like it or not, we will have to rely on the coal industry.
A small coal basin located near the south central Oregon
coast will soon be producing gas. Against all odds, this
project provides an in depth look into how one man and
a lot of persistence can pay off.
With exploration underway in almost every country in the continent, Africa is playing
an important part in the exploitation of the world’s gas resources. Successful commercialisation
of smaller fields, however, still presents challenges.
The new assessment carried out by USGS indicates that northeastern Greenland may
be a very important future petroleum province. If the mean estimate of 31 BBOE were
discovered and proven, this huge basin would rank 19th out of the world’s 500 known
petroleum provinces.
Large deposits of oil and gas await development and discovery above the
Arctic Circle. The harsh environment and remoteness of the region will
challenge both the technology and economics to exploit these resources.
The first oil was extracted from the Gulf of Mexico back in 1938. Since then, 30 billion barrels of oil equivalent have been produced from the US Gulf, but the area is still thought to have huge remaining potential, particularly in the deep and ultra-deep waters.
As the oil price rises and technology develops, interest in alternative forms of hydrocarbons such as ‘heavy’ oil has increased.
The oil shock of 1973 transformed the global energy picture. As lines of automobiles snaked down the street awaiting their turn at the pumps, the realization dawned that plentiful, cheap energy was not something to be taken for granted.
Canada's oil sands are the world's largest single hydrocarbon resource. The huge volumes of thick, sticky crude oil – bitumen – are now being exploited at an increased pace. Thanks to thriving oil prices and improved technology, production is bound to double and reach two million barrels per day in only a few years time.
Shale oil represents a vast resource of energy. The cost of extracting the oil and the environmental consequences, however, seem to inhibit economic exploitation in the near future.
Canada's hydrocarbon resources are both plentiful and varied. In addition to conventional resources of light to medium crude oil and gas that have been tapped for more than 150 years, unconventional resources like oil sand, coal bed methane, tight gas, shale gas and gas hydrates represent a vast potential for the future.
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