The following link leads to a long, but excellent article about many aspects of gas exploration, production and development in the Marcellus Shale of the eastern United States. The challenge to develop this vast gas resource extends far beyond geology and engineering. This article is comprehensive and well worth reading and saving. Here is the link: http://www.lhup.edu/rmyers3/Hemlock/Hemlock2.6.htm
Peter
This issue of Lock Haven University’s The Hemlock has a lengthy article about the Marcellus Shale, introducing a bit of geology, tracing a bit of history and presenting a large number of environmental concerns.
In This Issue...
"Prospects and Challenges of the Marcellus Shale" by Loretta Dickson and Md. Khalequzzaman
"40 Years of Natural Gas Production & Storage on State Forest Land" by Butch Davey
"The Marcellus Shale in Central PA: A Chronology" by Bob Myers
"A Landowner's Perspective: Leasing for Natural Gas Production" by Ralph Harnishfeger
"Another Landowner's Perspective: Gas Well Exploration & Development" by Jamie Walker
"And Justice for All" by Mary Vuccola
"Tapping Our Super-Giant Gas Field" by John Way and Rebecca Dunlap
"Hike of the Month: Natural Gas Production in the Sproul State Forest" by Bob Myers
"What Can You Do?"
"More Information on the Marcellus Shale"
Friday, March 27, 2009
We Have All This Gas, Let's Use It!
Change I can believe in. In these difficult economic times it makes complete sense to use America's abundant supplies of gas and convert our vehicles to run on compressed natural gas. The gas is found nearly everywhere, we have pipelines, the conversion process is relatively simple and inexpensive, the gas is the cleanest-burning fuel available, the process would create untold thousands of jobs, and generate significant revenue for local, state and Federal treasuries. Why aren't we doing this?
See what they're doing in Shreveport, Louisiana.
Peter
March 25, 2009
Lawmakers pushing LNG use in vehicles
Legislation to offer tax credits for drivers who convert vehicles.
By Mike Hasten mhasten@gannett.com (source)
BATON ROUGE — Sen. Nick Gautreaux, D-Meaux, and Rep. Jane Smith, R-Bossier City, sometimes don't agree on politics but they do agree on promoting the use of something that's plentiful in their regions — natural gas.
The two lawmakers from opposite ends of the state are pushing legislation that they say will stimulate the economy while improving the environment by utilizing compressed natural gas to power automobiles.
The bills, expected to be pre-filed later this week for the legislative session that begins April 27, offer tax credits for drivers who convert their existing gasoline-powered vehicles to run on CNG or purchase new vehicles already equipped. Also, credits are offered to filling stations that install the necessary equipment to fuel the vehicles.
"We have the opportunity in the state of Louisiana to be a national leader in this," Smith said. "We have something that's abundant, it's clean and it's American."
Smith said the Haynesville Shale in northwest Louisiana contains enough natural gas to power vehicles for decades.
"I've been told that if a cubic foot of natural gas is the size of a basketball, in the Haynesville Shale there are 250 trillion basketballs," she said. "We're sitting here on the supply, but we lack the demand."
Smith and Gautreaux said their legislation making it more affordable to convert vehicles and install fueling stations can help create the demand.
"This would provide jobs and wean us off foreign oil so we can depend on ourselves, instead of depending on somebody else," said Gautreaux, whose district includes the Henry Hub, the nation's national gas pricing station. Also, since natural gas is clean-burning fuel, "a lot of environmental problems, especially in cities, go away."
The city of Baton Rouge, which has been cited by the Environmental Protection Agency for air quality violations, has initiated a plan to convert its fleet of vehicles to burn CNG.
The lawmakers' legislation would increase the current tax credit for purchasing "qualified clean burning motor vehicle fuel property," which includes the additional costs of purchasing an already-equipped LNG-burning vehicle, the equipment to convert a vehicle and the costs of developing property directly related to the delivery of an alternative fuel.
Smith said vehicle owners could receive a state credit of 50 percent of the cost of converting a vehicle. If it costs $5,000 to convert, $2,500 could be claimed as a tax credit, which directly lowers the amount of tax owed to the state.
Gautreaux said new vehicles built to burn natural gas are more expensive, so a credit of 10 percent or $3,000, whichever is less, could be claimed toward the difference in sales price. Current law allows a $1,500 credit.
Combined with federal government tax credits, "this could make the extra cost of buying a natural gas vehicle zero," he said.
Smith and Gautreaux say that once a vehicle is converted, drivers notice improved performance and a lower-priced fill-up.
Gautreaux said that instead of the 86 octane of regular gasoline, the octane rating of CNG is 130.
Smith said that when gasoline was selling at $4 a gallon, CNG was $1.50. It's currently selling at about $1, which Gautreaux said shows that the price is not nearly as volatile as gasoline.
And, "it's safer than gasoline," he said
.
Another part of the legislation grants a 50 percent tax credit on the cost of developing fuel stations, which Gautreaux and Smith said would make CNG more widely available. Some filling stations already have it available.
The legislation is supported by the Louisiana Oil and Gas Association and the Louisiana Mid-Continent Oil and Gas Association.
Smith and Gautreaux say they have several lawmakers who want to be co-authors when the bill is filed.
Additional Facts
Comparison
According to state Rep. Jane Smith, R-Bossier City, when regular gasoline was selling for $4 a gallon, compressed natural gas only cost $1.50.
See what they're doing in Shreveport, Louisiana.
Peter
March 25, 2009
Lawmakers pushing LNG use in vehicles
Legislation to offer tax credits for drivers who convert vehicles.
By Mike Hasten mhasten@gannett.com (source)
BATON ROUGE — Sen. Nick Gautreaux, D-Meaux, and Rep. Jane Smith, R-Bossier City, sometimes don't agree on politics but they do agree on promoting the use of something that's plentiful in their regions — natural gas.
The two lawmakers from opposite ends of the state are pushing legislation that they say will stimulate the economy while improving the environment by utilizing compressed natural gas to power automobiles.
The bills, expected to be pre-filed later this week for the legislative session that begins April 27, offer tax credits for drivers who convert their existing gasoline-powered vehicles to run on CNG or purchase new vehicles already equipped. Also, credits are offered to filling stations that install the necessary equipment to fuel the vehicles.
"We have the opportunity in the state of Louisiana to be a national leader in this," Smith said. "We have something that's abundant, it's clean and it's American."
Smith said the Haynesville Shale in northwest Louisiana contains enough natural gas to power vehicles for decades.
"I've been told that if a cubic foot of natural gas is the size of a basketball, in the Haynesville Shale there are 250 trillion basketballs," she said. "We're sitting here on the supply, but we lack the demand."
Smith and Gautreaux said their legislation making it more affordable to convert vehicles and install fueling stations can help create the demand.
"This would provide jobs and wean us off foreign oil so we can depend on ourselves, instead of depending on somebody else," said Gautreaux, whose district includes the Henry Hub, the nation's national gas pricing station. Also, since natural gas is clean-burning fuel, "a lot of environmental problems, especially in cities, go away."
The city of Baton Rouge, which has been cited by the Environmental Protection Agency for air quality violations, has initiated a plan to convert its fleet of vehicles to burn CNG.
The lawmakers' legislation would increase the current tax credit for purchasing "qualified clean burning motor vehicle fuel property," which includes the additional costs of purchasing an already-equipped LNG-burning vehicle, the equipment to convert a vehicle and the costs of developing property directly related to the delivery of an alternative fuel.
Smith said vehicle owners could receive a state credit of 50 percent of the cost of converting a vehicle. If it costs $5,000 to convert, $2,500 could be claimed as a tax credit, which directly lowers the amount of tax owed to the state.
Gautreaux said new vehicles built to burn natural gas are more expensive, so a credit of 10 percent or $3,000, whichever is less, could be claimed toward the difference in sales price. Current law allows a $1,500 credit.
Combined with federal government tax credits, "this could make the extra cost of buying a natural gas vehicle zero," he said.
Smith and Gautreaux say that once a vehicle is converted, drivers notice improved performance and a lower-priced fill-up.
Gautreaux said that instead of the 86 octane of regular gasoline, the octane rating of CNG is 130.
Smith said that when gasoline was selling at $4 a gallon, CNG was $1.50. It's currently selling at about $1, which Gautreaux said shows that the price is not nearly as volatile as gasoline.
And, "it's safer than gasoline," he said
.
Another part of the legislation grants a 50 percent tax credit on the cost of developing fuel stations, which Gautreaux and Smith said would make CNG more widely available. Some filling stations already have it available.
The legislation is supported by the Louisiana Oil and Gas Association and the Louisiana Mid-Continent Oil and Gas Association.
Smith and Gautreaux say they have several lawmakers who want to be co-authors when the bill is filed.
Additional Facts
Comparison
According to state Rep. Jane Smith, R-Bossier City, when regular gasoline was selling for $4 a gallon, compressed natural gas only cost $1.50.
What A Brilliant Idea!
Let's all use some of President Obama's "economic stimulus" money to buy some natural gas-powered buses and other vehicles used by our local public agencies. If buses, why not police cars, garbage trucks, and utility vehicles? Let's keep our energy dollars here in the U.S., create jobs, and wow, we can even claim to be "green" and doing our part to "save the environment".
Peter
March 25, 2009
City announces new natural gas-running buses
By Icess Fernandez
ifernandez@gannett.com (source)
In Shreveport, it's a little easier being green.
City officials announced Tuesday they will purchase five new compressed natural gas buses with $4.7 million in economic stimulus money.
"This is something that is significantly important," said Shreveport Mayor Cedric Glover. "The city of Shreveport needs to take advantage of the opportunity with the Haynesville Shale. We've taken time to research this and have done the due diligence, not just followed a trend."
The vehicles would be cheaper to run compared to the regular diesel buses and the new hybrid ones purchased in 2006. But the startup costs will be higher, said Gene Eddy, SporTran director. The buses cost $30,000 to $50,000 more than a diesel bus.
"The hybrids that were bought in 2006 are running fine, but they cost $100,000 more," he said.
The new buses come with perks: they're quieter and will have bike racks on them.
The stimulus money also will be used to build a fueling station for the vehicles and will be the first natural gas fueling station in the state.
The move will bring Shreveport a step closer to being greener without raising bus fares.
"We've been trying to deal with issues of clean air," Eddy said. "We want to do something that's proactive."
The new buses will be running on Shreveport's streets in about 15 months.
In preparation, the city will have to make some adjustments. The maintenance facility will have to be converted, buses drivers and maintenance personnel will have to retrained.
Shreveport is the second city in the state to announce the new buses. Baton Rouge also will purchase these types of vehicles. Fort Worth, Texas, and Birmingham, Ala., also have a fleets of these buses.
"We're seeing this happen all over the country," Eddy said.
Peter
March 25, 2009
City announces new natural gas-running buses
By Icess Fernandez
ifernandez@gannett.com (source)
In Shreveport, it's a little easier being green.
City officials announced Tuesday they will purchase five new compressed natural gas buses with $4.7 million in economic stimulus money.
"This is something that is significantly important," said Shreveport Mayor Cedric Glover. "The city of Shreveport needs to take advantage of the opportunity with the Haynesville Shale. We've taken time to research this and have done the due diligence, not just followed a trend."
The vehicles would be cheaper to run compared to the regular diesel buses and the new hybrid ones purchased in 2006. But the startup costs will be higher, said Gene Eddy, SporTran director. The buses cost $30,000 to $50,000 more than a diesel bus.
"The hybrids that were bought in 2006 are running fine, but they cost $100,000 more," he said.
The new buses come with perks: they're quieter and will have bike racks on them.
The stimulus money also will be used to build a fueling station for the vehicles and will be the first natural gas fueling station in the state.
The move will bring Shreveport a step closer to being greener without raising bus fares.
"We've been trying to deal with issues of clean air," Eddy said. "We want to do something that's proactive."
The new buses will be running on Shreveport's streets in about 15 months.
In preparation, the city will have to make some adjustments. The maintenance facility will have to be converted, buses drivers and maintenance personnel will have to retrained.
Shreveport is the second city in the state to announce the new buses. Baton Rouge also will purchase these types of vehicles. Fort Worth, Texas, and Birmingham, Ala., also have a fleets of these buses.
"We're seeing this happen all over the country," Eddy said.
A World-Wide Opportunity -- "Unconventional Gas"
Any geologist following the recent activity in so-called "unconventional gas" plays in the United States, particularly the "shale gas" plays using horizontal drilling technology and modern staged fracturing methods, knows there is potential for the same development in sedimentary basins all around the world. The following article indicates some people are beginning to realize the significance of these developments.
Peter
UGI: Unconventional gas wealth seen in world's basins
G. Alan Petzet Chief Editor-Exploration (Oil and Gas Journal) source
FORT WORTH, Sept. 30 -- Sedimentary basins in the US appear to contain a volume of technically recoverable unconventional gas that is 10 times the ultimately recoverable volume of conventional gas.
All resources are logarithmically distributed in nature, and the lower quality deposits need more expenditures and better technology to develop economically, Stephen A. Holditch of Texas A&M University told the opening session of Oil & Gas Journal's Unconventional Gas International Conference & Exhibition in Fort Worth Sept. 30.
Results of the studies of eight US basins are being configured into software that can be used as advisory points as operators begin to drill, complete, stimulate, and produce shale, tight sands, and coalbed gas reservoirs outside North America, where almost all of this type of drilling has occurred so far, Holditch said.
Based on the findings, which imply that vast quantities of gas can be produced in the world's basins, even Saudi Arabia's state oil company Saudi Aramco has started a tight gas sands research group, Holditch said. Holditch and a large group of his students plan to release more details of the still incomplete findings at a Society of Petroleum Engineers conference in Pittsburgh in mid-October.
C. Michael Ming, president, Research Partnership to Secure Energy for America (RPSEA), noted the importance of basic research into unconventional gas recovery technology. Partly due to such research, which is under constant threat of reduced federal and other funding, the US has more gas reserves today than when former US President Jimmy Carter made his "moral equivalent of war" (meow) speech in the midst of the late 1970s energy crisis, Ming told the conference.
World gas studyHolditch's students, who compared conventional and unconventional gas statistics from eight US basins, plan to expand the study to 25 basins.
The information covered petroleum systems descriptions and other public data on the San Juan, Green River, Powder River, Uinta-Piceance, Black Warrior, Wind River, and Illinois basins. Data came from the National Petroleum Council, US Geological Survey, Energy Information Administration, Gas Research-Gas Technology Institute, Potential Gas Committee, and other sources.
When looking at a given target basin or formation anywhere in the world, we can find the analogous basin or formation in the US and glean from published case histories that abound in the literature what amount to the best practices for recovery of unconventional gas, Holditch said.
The system, still a work in progress, is advisory in nature and not an expert system, he cautioned. Unconventional oil reservoirs have not yet been considered.
Part of the current study, for example, lists US basins and ranks world basins by most analogous, second most analogous, and so on. The software would eventually help operating companies, service companies, and others to select a tight gas sand fracturing fluid, for instance, using defaults and best practices from similar US reservoirs as a starting point, Holditch said.
Need for research
Carter delivered the "meow" speech about the same time that Houston wildcatter George Mitchell "decided to take a stab" at producing gas from the Barnett shale, Ming recalled.
Noting that the drilling, completion, and stimulation procedures for each shale must be uniquely decoded, Ming said that operators are still improving Barnett shale gas recovery factors. Some of the improvement can be laid to iterative actions, but with concentrated research, the process might become more predictive, he postulated.
The positive contributions from projects such as DeepStar, Norway's DEMO2000, and Brazil's deepwater program demonstrate that what begins as pure research can be driven toward field demonstrations and commercialization, Ming said.
RPSEA, he noted, is shepherding projects on emerging shales in Alabama, the Barnett shale, treatment and management of produced and all other waters, advanced hydraulic fracturing technology, how gas migrates to fill unconventional reservoirs, and how to increase the area of reservoir contact in horizontal wells, among other projects.
Peter
UGI: Unconventional gas wealth seen in world's basins
G. Alan Petzet Chief Editor-Exploration (Oil and Gas Journal) source
FORT WORTH, Sept. 30 -- Sedimentary basins in the US appear to contain a volume of technically recoverable unconventional gas that is 10 times the ultimately recoverable volume of conventional gas.
All resources are logarithmically distributed in nature, and the lower quality deposits need more expenditures and better technology to develop economically, Stephen A. Holditch of Texas A&M University told the opening session of Oil & Gas Journal's Unconventional Gas International Conference & Exhibition in Fort Worth Sept. 30.
Results of the studies of eight US basins are being configured into software that can be used as advisory points as operators begin to drill, complete, stimulate, and produce shale, tight sands, and coalbed gas reservoirs outside North America, where almost all of this type of drilling has occurred so far, Holditch said.
Based on the findings, which imply that vast quantities of gas can be produced in the world's basins, even Saudi Arabia's state oil company Saudi Aramco has started a tight gas sands research group, Holditch said. Holditch and a large group of his students plan to release more details of the still incomplete findings at a Society of Petroleum Engineers conference in Pittsburgh in mid-October.
C. Michael Ming, president, Research Partnership to Secure Energy for America (RPSEA), noted the importance of basic research into unconventional gas recovery technology. Partly due to such research, which is under constant threat of reduced federal and other funding, the US has more gas reserves today than when former US President Jimmy Carter made his "moral equivalent of war" (meow) speech in the midst of the late 1970s energy crisis, Ming told the conference.
World gas studyHolditch's students, who compared conventional and unconventional gas statistics from eight US basins, plan to expand the study to 25 basins.
The information covered petroleum systems descriptions and other public data on the San Juan, Green River, Powder River, Uinta-Piceance, Black Warrior, Wind River, and Illinois basins. Data came from the National Petroleum Council, US Geological Survey, Energy Information Administration, Gas Research-Gas Technology Institute, Potential Gas Committee, and other sources.
When looking at a given target basin or formation anywhere in the world, we can find the analogous basin or formation in the US and glean from published case histories that abound in the literature what amount to the best practices for recovery of unconventional gas, Holditch said.
The system, still a work in progress, is advisory in nature and not an expert system, he cautioned. Unconventional oil reservoirs have not yet been considered.
Part of the current study, for example, lists US basins and ranks world basins by most analogous, second most analogous, and so on. The software would eventually help operating companies, service companies, and others to select a tight gas sand fracturing fluid, for instance, using defaults and best practices from similar US reservoirs as a starting point, Holditch said.
Need for research
Carter delivered the "meow" speech about the same time that Houston wildcatter George Mitchell "decided to take a stab" at producing gas from the Barnett shale, Ming recalled.
Noting that the drilling, completion, and stimulation procedures for each shale must be uniquely decoded, Ming said that operators are still improving Barnett shale gas recovery factors. Some of the improvement can be laid to iterative actions, but with concentrated research, the process might become more predictive, he postulated.
The positive contributions from projects such as DeepStar, Norway's DEMO2000, and Brazil's deepwater program demonstrate that what begins as pure research can be driven toward field demonstrations and commercialization, Ming said.
RPSEA, he noted, is shepherding projects on emerging shales in Alabama, the Barnett shale, treatment and management of produced and all other waters, advanced hydraulic fracturing technology, how gas migrates to fill unconventional reservoirs, and how to increase the area of reservoir contact in horizontal wells, among other projects.
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