One of Mexico’s earliest private-sector energy investors says that it has struck it big with a significant oil discovery in Mexican waters.It may be "world-class," but OOIP pales in comparison to what the Bakken has.
Britain’s Premier Oil PLC, along with partners Talos Energy of Houston and Sierra Oil & Gas of Mexico City, said Wednesday that exploratory drilling in the Zama-1 field, located in the shallow waters of the Gulf of Mexico, had uncovered a “world-class” formation with between 1.4 billion and two billion barrels of light crude oil, or roughly double earlier predictions.
Earlier this year, the group had estimated that there were between 700 million and 800 million barrels in the deposit.
| $45.46 | 7/12/2017 | 07/12/2016 | 07/12/2015 | 07/12/2014 | 07/12/2013 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Active Rigs | 58 | 28 | 73 | 190 | 186 |
Week
|
Date
|
Drawdown
|
Storage
|
Weeks to RB
|
Week 0
|
Apr 26, 2017
|
529.0
|
180
|
|
Week 1
|
May 3, 2017
|
0.9
|
528.0
|
178
|
Week 2
|
May 10, 2017
|
6
|
522.0
|
29
|
Week 3
|
May 17, 2017
|
1.8
|
520.2
|
95
|
Week 4
|
May 24, 2017
|
4.4
|
515.8
|
38
|
Week 5
|
May 31, 2017
|
6.4
|
509.9
|
41
|
Week 6
|
June 7, 2017
|
-3.3
|
513.2
|
60
|
Week 7
|
June 14, 2017
|
1.7
|
511.5
|
63
|
Week 8
|
June 21, 2017
|
2.5
|
509.0
|
62
|
Week 9
|
June 28, 2017
|
-0.2
|
509.2
|
71
|
Week 10
|
July 6, 2017
|
6.3
|
502.9
|
58
|
Week 11
|
July 12, 2017
|
7.6
|
495.3
|
47
|
NRG Energy Inc. announced Wednesday a "transformation plan" aimed at cutting recurring costs by $1.1 billion, slashing debt obligations by $13 billion and completing assets sales worth up to $4.0 billion.
The integrated power company said it plans to deploy up to $6.3 billion in excess cash through 2020, including $4 billion by end of 2018, in either projects or investments or shareholder return programs. As part of the plan, the company is targeting divesting 50% to 100% of its interest in NRG Yield and its leading renewables platform.NRG is surging about 17% this morning.
As of January 1, 2017, U.S. operable atmospheric crude distillation capacity reached 18.6 million barrels per calendar day (b/cd), 1.6% higher than at the beginning of 2016.
This increase in operable capacity was slightly lower than last year’s increase of 2.0%.
The capacities of secondary units that support heavy crude oil processing and production of ultra-low sulfur diesel and gasoline, including thermal cracking (coking), catalytic hydrocracking, and hydrotreating/desulfurization, also increased.
Catalytic hydrocracking and deasphalting units experienced the largest capacity increases over the past year, rising by 4.5% and 6.1%, respectively. --- EIA
Just one play, the Pimienta, spans 1,000 km and is between 50 and 100 km wide (27,000 sq. miles, 17 million acres). Rock quality is similar to the Eagle Ford, but it has "more than 200 m of gross shale thickness, double the typical Eagle Ford thickness in South Texas," the O&G Journal says.
"The Pimienta can be found in the volatile oil to wet gas windows (0.8-1.2%) and at optimal depths of 2-3.5 km. Porosity has been measured at a reasonably high 7%. Reservoir pressure often is high, reaching 50% over hydrostatic in places. The stress gradient has tested at a moderate 0.9 psi/ft, enabling good 3D fracturing systems during stimulation. Coupled with the vast prospective area, these are intriguing reservoir properties."
| $45.74 | 7/12/2017 | 07/12/2016 | 07/12/2015 | 07/12/2014 | 07/12/2013 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Active Rigs | 57 | 28 | 73 | 190 | 186 |
It may take a number of years to pan out, but Mexico is taking steps to accelerate the development of its natural gas-rich Burgos Shale region, which lies just across the Rio Grande from South Texas’s newly resurgent Eagle Ford play.
Today (July 12, 2017), Mexico’s Secretaría de Energía (SENER) is expected to name the winners of a competitive bidding process for the rights to drill for natural gas within 1,500 square miles in the states of Nuevo Leon and Tamaulipas.
If the effort to juice Burgos drilling activity and production proves successful, it could affect how much natural gas Mexico needs to import from the U.S. Today we discuss the prospects for reversing gas production declines south of the border and the challenges that exploration and production companies (E&Ps) face in Mexico’s most promising shale play.
Saudi Aramco, which plans what could be the world’s biggest initial public offering, will invest more than $300 billion over the next decade to maintain its spare oil-production capacity and explore for more natural gas, President and Chief Executive Officer Amin Nasser said.
The outlook for oil supplies is “increasingly worrying,” with about $1 trillion in investments lost during the current industry downturn and fewer new deposits being discovered, Nasser said at a conference in Istanbul. Some estimates suggest that at least 20 million barrels a day of new output is needed over the next five years to offset rising oil demand and the natural decline of developed fields, he said.
“There seems to be a growing belief that the world can prematurely disengage from proven and reliable energy sources like oil and gas, on the mistaken assumption that alternatives will be rapidly deployed,” Nasser said in a speech on Monday. The petroleum industry will be at the heart of global energy for years, and the transition to use of alternatives will be “long and complex,’ he said.