US Dominance In Oil, Natural Gas -- Forbes -- December 11, 2019

Now that I've had time to look at the Forbes story that a reader sent me, time for a stand-alone post regarding same. This was the original post.

From the Forbes link, the lede:

The American fracking for oil and natural gas boom will continue on through the 2020s. And why not? Since fracking took off in 2008, we have more than doubled our proven oil reserves to ~65 billion barrels. Natural gas reserves have surged over 80% to ~430 trillion cubic feet. Already the largest oil and gas producer, the U.S. is set to increase its share of ~17% of global oil production and ~23% of gas. In the 2020s, the U.S. is set to supply over 60% of new oil and gas -- see figure at link. 

Natural gas? Staggering:

For natural gas, although the associated gas supply coming from the Permian will help keep U.S. prices low, another 10% rise in U.S. shale gas output to above 100 Bcf/d is to be expected over the next two years. This means that we will soon be producing 50% more gas than Russia, just having passed it in 2009.  

For investors and policy makers:

Ultimately, 1) oil having no significant substitute, 2) gas rising toward being 50% of all U.S. power capacity, and 3) a surging export complex to export both fuels ensure that our massive resource base will be developed. Simply put, those pushing divestment should realize that it obviously cannot work: divestment does nothing to reduce demand. 

Collusion:

Vladimir Putin knows that U.S. shale production and surging associated exports are throwing a big wrench into his grand strategy of energy domination. Russia’s position as the largest oil and gas exporter rakes in over $300 billion each year. No wonder then that Putin has been funding NGOs whose job is to persuade governments to stop shale development. “Without Fracking For Natural Gas, The U.S. Loses And Putin Wins,” making anti-shale positions the real “Russian collusion” story. 

The next revolution?

As for the “end of shale,” be....very careful with that. You should know that not even the industry itself ever saw the revolution coming in the first place. I really do think, however, that the next energy revolution could be CO2-EOR, for which we have literally hundreds of billions of barrels of oil in mature fields primed for development, while also storing CO2 safely in the ground to cut emissions. Now yielding ~450,000 b/d, the industry itself does not promote CO2-EOR nearly enough. But to its credit, the Natural Resources Defense Council calls CO2-EOR a win-win-win for our environment, energy, and economy. 

Graphics:

From a previous post: