Natural Gas Proved Reserves -- Global -- August 22, 2022

Off Cyprus:

• link here.
• this was considered "breaking news" and breathlessly reported -- oh, give me a break.
• but, yes, it's huge -- see Groningen below 
• but so is the Permian 140 trillion cubic feet
  
• TTE, Eni: Cronos-1 well
• preliminary estimates indicate there are about 2.5 trillion cubic feet (TCF) of gas in place, “with significant additional upside”
• that 2.5 trillion: put into perspective by numbers below
• Groningen, which the Dutch closed down? 2.8 trillion cubic feet
  

US proved reserves of natural gas by top eight states, 2016 - 2022:

Staggering global riches of natural gas (the numbers keep increasing). From an earlier post:

Top five countries:

• Russia: 6,000 trillion cubic feet
• Iran: 1,000 trillion cubic feet
• Qatar: 900 trillion cubic feet
• Turkmenistan: 600 trillion cubic feet
• US: 350 trillion cubic feet
• #11: Australia: 152 trillion cubic feet (as of January, 2014). (See this post.)
  

Now, let's go back and re-run the numbers that were posted earlier:

• that recent huge Mediterranean natural gas find: 30 trillion cubic feet; this was said to be biggest natural gas find ever in the Mediterranean
• Barnett, revised USGS figures: 53 trillion cubic feet
• Utica, newly revised figures: 782 trillion cubic feet
• Marcellus, EIA revised estimates: 65 trillion cubic feet, "proved" reserves
• Bakken/Three Forks, USGS estimate: 7 trillion cubic feet
• Qatar: 800 trillion cubic feet, wiki, conversion

Other recent stories on natural gas reserves

• Marcellus: 480 trillion cubic feet of technically recoverable gas, Penn State geoscientist 

Comments regarding natural gas reserves

• for me, it's hard enough getting my hands around billions of bbls of oil; it's almost impossible for me to get a feel for trillions of cubic feet of natural gas
• proved reserves are based on price of recovery, confusing matters from year to year
• estimates are just that, estimates (and often inflated for "certain" reasons)
• watch for this gotcha: sometimes reported in trillion cubic feet; sometimes in trillion cubic meters (35 cubic feet = 1 cubic meter; not trivial)
• for me it comes down to two things:
• any discovery over 30 trillion cubic feet natural gas is staggering, worth reporting
• "we" aren't going to run out of natural gas any time soon

Bakken, An Oily Play, Is Producing More Natural Gas Than The Mediterranean's Largest Offshore Natural Gas Field -- December 16, 2017

Egypt's giant natural gas field has started production, according to Bloomberg (pay wall) but Reuters also has the story:

• the Zohr field may turn Egypt from LNG importer to gas exporter
• Egypt’s Eni SpA-operated Zohr natural gas field will bring the country closer to its goal of energy self-sufficiency
• discovered in 2015 by Italy’s Eni, the field contains an estimated 30 trillion cubic feet of gas

Gas from the Mediterranean’s largest offshore field is pumped to a facility in Port Said city, to be prepared for delivery to the national distribution network, with initial production of 350 million cubic feet per day. Daily output is set to rise to about 1 billion cubic feet in June and 2.7 billion by the end of 2019, he said.

So just how big is that "giant" field that has captured Bloomberg's attention? For natural gas, about the same size as the Bakken?

First the data points again, from that huge Egyptian gas field:

• 350 million cubic feet per day initial production
• 1 billion cubic feet per day by June (2018?)
• 2.7 billion cubic feet by the end of 2019

Natural gas production from the "oily" Bakken, North Dakota, October, 2017 (most recent month being reported)

• 63,918,772,000 cubic feet for the month of October
• divided by 31 days = 2,061,895,879 bbls/day OR 2.061 billion cubic feet 

It would be nice for Bloomberg to provide some comparison with the Bakken or the Permian. Thank you very much.

See also this post for reserves of natural gas around the world.

Natural Gas Pipeline Shortfall -- Platts -- November 20, 2017

Story here.

The Southeast natural gas market has a problem. Gas demand from LNG exports is expected to grow 10 Bcf/d the next five years, and in a high case, as much as 15 Bcf/d. To supply that growing demand, a massive buildout of pipeline capacity has been undertaken recently to move Northeast gas to the Southeast, with further capacity planned through 2019.

However, the actual new capacity from the Northeast that reaches these demand centers, specifically in Louisiana and East Texas, falls well short of the new demand.

Graphic:

It appears demand is 2.5x the current capacity.

Color Me Confused -- Tea Leaves Suggest The Permian Is Struggling -- October 24, 2017 -- The Energy And Market Page, T+276

Before I get started, wow, I am in a great mood. It feels like a Monday. I had an NFL-free Monday night, completely forgot about it, and then thought that it would be on tonight. And it's not. Six free hours tonight. Wow. 

This never would have happened under the previous administration: utility costs going down! From InvestorVillage:

• utility rates doing down as much as 8% in the Pacific NW due to "glut" of natural gas

From the link above, this is of interest. Compare Canada and California with the US (not including California):

Confused. I have heard / read from multiple sources that the Permian was struggling. Today, there was more talk that US E&P operators would "soon" run out of "Tier 1" drilling locations which would cause problems for those in the Permian. And then, out of the blue, two companies focused on the Permian attracted the attention of CNBC mid-day:

• Alon -- now part of Delek
• Delek (DK)

Disclaimer: this is not an investment site. Do not make any investment, financial, job, travel, or relationship decisions based on what you read here or think you may have read here.

***************************************

The Dow was up more 200 points at one point during the day.

NYSE, 191 new highs, including: BRK-B; Boeing; CAT; Polaris; RDS-B; Statoil;

• new lows, 46, including ATT (oh, my); Baker Huges a GE (BHGE) (oh, my); GE; Weatherford (WFT, oh, my)
• EW: down $7. Ouch.

********************************
Hess: Selling Assets

Link here; data points:

• will divest its subsidiary Hess Norge; sell statkes in Norway's Valhall and Hod fields: $2 billion
• will sell its offshore Equatorial Guinea: $650 million
• will sells its interests in Denmark's South Arne Field

*********************************

Making America Great

US midwest oil refiners boost output, cut region's dependence on Gulf Coast-- Reuters, data points:

• midwest refiners banking on North Dakota oilfields
• oil trade maps are being redrawn
• in 2016, Midwest refining capacity rose to almost 4 million bopd, the highest annual volume on record
• DAPL: made a huge difference
• ten years ago, Midwest refiners a million bopd short
• the Midwest will go from being short roughly 500,000 bpd of gasoline this year to a surplus of roughly 200,000 bpd by 2030
• but, low demand for refined products in Midwest could be a problem

Natural Gas Glut -- July 26, 2017

Link here.

A $27 billion energy project in Canada just became the latest casualty of a worldwide glut of natural gas. Malaysia’s Petroliam Nasional Bhd abandoned on Tuesday its plans for the Pacific Northwest LNG terminal, a plant that would have liquefied Canada’s gas and sent the fuel by tanker from the western shores of British Columbia to buyers in Asia.

Petronas cited market conditions in its decision. Pacific Northwest LNG joins a growing list of projects that have been killed in recent months by plummeting LNG prices, throwing the economics of export terminals from Australia to Russia to Mozambique into question.

Prices have crashed as increasing volumes of gas from Australia and America’s shale formations hit the water, inundating the market with so much supply that analysts say demand may not catch up until the next decade.

See this post for suggested options for Petronas.

Also here.

Is This Important? -- June 2, 2017

From the EIA:

Flashback: the winter of 2009 - 2010 -- the Brits came within 72 hours of running out of natural gas.

****************************

Is This Important?

From Platts: UK South Hook May LNG regasification down 46% on five-year average. Wow. Some data points:

• South Hook stocks began June 2017 at a mere 18% capacity
• five-year average for June: 953 million cu meters
• currently: 90 million cu meters
• last month, 19 Qatari LNG tankers berthed in continental Europe
• 15 tankers in April and 11 tankers in May
• UK's South Hook LNG terminal last month (May) was almost 50% lower than 5-year average
• a total of four Qatari LNG tankers berthed at South Hook last month 
• in comparison, South Hook saw seven in May 2016 and eight in May 2015
• Qatar: world's largest LNG producing country (that's what the article said)
• Qatar: sent more tankers to Europe last month due to higher pricing in Europe

Has The Red Queen Fallen Off Treadmill In The Marcellus? -- April 29, 2017

Updates

Later, 12:45 p.m. Central Time: by the way, did anyone spot this paragraph at the very end of the linked article in the original post:

After drilling 27 gas wells in North Louisiana in the first quarter, Range Resourcdes Corp shut in some production to avoid “frac hits,” or damage that can occur to an older shale well located next to a newer one. [See tag: fracking_halo_effect]

Later, 11:33 a.m. Central Time: see first comment from a reader who really follows the Marcellus closely --

Bizarre article on so many accounts.

The productivity of Marcellus wells this past 12 months has been astonishing.

Range just completed 4 wells on a pad and could only turn 2 of them online as their output - 31 MMcfd - was so high that there was no capacity on the pipeline for the remaining 2. (31 MMcf of high Btu gas is equivalent to about 6,000 barrels of oil).

Cabot's CEO spent a lot of time on the conference call the other day discussing plans for the anticipated quarter billion dollar a year free cash flow which has already begun.
Enno Peters' great site, shaleprofile.com, enables one to observe the incredible productivity of Marcellus wells.

Two big pipelines which are being built, the Rover and Leach Xpress, will be in service in a few months.

The combined capacity of almost 5 Bcf - slightly below Haynesville's TOTAL daily output - will allow Appalachian Basin output to skyrocket by year's end.

This area has not even begun to show its potential.

Original Post

A most interesting article.

Producers have to drill at a breakneck pace just to keep output stable -- a phenomenon known as the Red Queen, after the character in Lewis Carroll’s “Through the Looking-Glass” who tells Alice, “It takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place.” While the number of gas rigs has climbed 90 percent over the past year, output of the fuel in the lower-48 states is down 1.1 percent, data from Bloomberg and Baker Hughes Inc. show.

Bakken Economy And What We'll Be Watching For Wednesday -- April 25, 2017

Remember: the Bakken is an "oily" play.

************************************

They May Be Waiting A Long Time

 
From Financial Times:

Oil traders banking on a sustained market recovery in 2017 are growing impatient.

As the price of Brent crude falls towards $50 a barrel, Opec, energy analysts and some of the most powerful banks in the commodities sector are urging traders to maintain their composure. After a production cut deal between the cartel and rivals such as Russia was agreed late last year, prices began 2017 $10 a barrel higher and hedge funds quickly amassed record bets backing the push to end the biggest slump in more than a decade.

Confidence has since been shaken as evidence that the cuts are working takes longer than anticipated to materialise. Global crude inventories remain stubbornly high and, crucially, the US shale industry has been reinvigorated by the run up in prices last year. 

The graphic at the link won't instill any "confidence."

*******************************

Too Big To Fail

On January 31, 2017, I wrote:

My hunch after XOM reported 4Q16 earnings today: XOM is in deep trouble. What could go wrong?

Today, over at Bloomberg via Rigzone: ExxonMobil and its annual dividend -- to be announced Wednesday, April 26, 2017.

**********************

Peak Oil? What Peak Oil?

From Rigzone, today:

The undiscovered oil and gas resources in the Barents Sea are twice as large as previously assumed, according to the Norwegian Petroleum Directorate’s new calculations.

The NPD recently mapped the eastern part of the northern Barents Sea, a large part of which is located in a previously disputed area. With new information to hand, the NPD revealed that undiscovered resources in the Barents Sea have now been increased to nearly 65 percent of the total undiscovered resources on the Norwegian shelf, up from a previous total of 50 percent.

The resources in the new area are estimated at 1.4 billion standard cubic metres of oil equivalents. This is equivalent to 14 Johan Castberg fields, and more than five times the Snøhvit field.

1.4 billion standard cubic meters of oil equivalent = 9 billion boe (source).

Haynesville

Updates

November 16, 2022: Williams, Sempra partner in the Haynesville.

April 19, 2019: Haynesville sets natural gas production record. 

February 11, 2019: huge, huge update here. Short blurb at that link but another link there will take me to archive (password required).

October 18, 2017: roaring back to life -- the WSJ.

May 16, 2017: Haynesville experiencing a resurgence as takeaway is bottled up in the northeast. 

Later, 7:38 a.m. Central Time: USGS, one word: wow.  My understanding is reserves are based on current technology (definitely) and current pricing (?). Here's the assessment, data points:
the assessment included two formations:

• Bossier Formation: along the coast, stretching from Texas-Mexico border to Louisiana-Mississippi state line, from the coast ot about 150 miles inland
• Haynesville Formation: inland in Texas; along the southern coast of Louisiana, extending up about a third of the state, and extending well into Mississippi, Alabama, and even a bit of the Florida panhandle (where we will never see drilling)
• last assessment, 2010, Jurassic and Cretaceous rocks of the Gulf Coast
• Bossier: 9 tcf
• Haynesville: 61 tcf
• new assessment, 2017, released last week
• "amazing what a little more knowledge can yield"
• updated geologic maps
• expanded production history 
• greater understanding
• (by the way, one dedicated reader tells me the same thing is happening in the Utica and that USGS has not yet updated how fast things are moving in that formation)
• long known that the two formations contain oil and gas ,but it wasn't until 2008 that production of the continuous resources really got underway
• 2017 assessment:
• Bossier: 
• natural gas assessment ranges from 37 tcf to 224 tcf; the mean - 109 tcf;
• oil assessment ranges from 1 billion to 5 billion bbls; the mean - 3 billion bbls;
• natural gas liquids assessment ranges from 424 million bbls to 2 billion bbls; the mean -- 1 billion bbls
• Haynesville: 
• natural gas assessment ranges from 96 tcf to 341 tcf; the mean - 196 tcf;
• oil assessment ranges from 286 million to 2.5 billion bbls; the mean - 1 billion bbls;
• natural gas liquids assessment ranges from 304 million bbls to 1.7 billion bbls; the mean -- 1 billion bbls

Compare these numbers with:

• the Barnett; the Barnett -- twice as large as originally expected;
• total US
• another post on total US
• Marcellus and Utica, defying experts, October, 2016 ; the Utica; 
• the Bakken: 6.7 tcf natural gas and NGLs
• European numbers, 2016

 And still one of my favorite posts: the New York Times hoax / scam on natural gas.

Original Post

 

I've never linked the Haynesville at the sidebar at the right. When I started the blog, I had little interest in natural gas. But with RBN's update today, it seems time I have a Haynesville page. This was posted earlier. Note the USGS recent assessment of the Haynesville: 304 tcf.

RBN Energy: update on Haynesville natural gas shale play. Data points:

• straddles the northeast Texas-Louisiana border; back in the news
• 9,000 square miles of surface area -- extends up to southwest Arkansas
• reserves: 75 trillion cubic feet BUT last Thursday, USGS upped the reserve estimates:
• 304 tcf of natural gas; 1.9 billion bbls of crude oil -- recovery rate unknown
• rig counts have doubled in the past six months
• rig counts up more than 200% in last 12 months 
• concentrated in two counties: De Soto Parish, LA; and, San Augustine County, TX
• Exco Resources: divesting Eagle Ford assets to concentrate on Haynesville
• "perpetual has-been status"? not likely
• natural gas at $3
• improving technologies
• LNG export demand ramping up
• location, location, location

Market Stories On T+14: Huge Jobs Report For Donald Trump; Can't Wait For Tweet -- February 3, 2017

Market late morning: up 180 points. 

Market surges on Trump's job numbers: surges 112 points on the opening!  Dow 30 back up over 20,000. Wow!

Another fake story? I'm waiting for The New York Times to wade in. Yesterday it was the "bacon shortage." Today it's the "severe vegetable shortage in Europe, depriving Europeans of spinach, broccoli." Why? Oh, it's global warming -- "European consumers have been plunged into crisis by a vegetable shortage caused by severe weather. I can't make this stuff up.

Here in Texas? Vegetables are in season:

 *******************************

Pre-Market

Jobs day: everyone watching for first monthly jobs report under President Trump. Forecast: economy will add 175,000 jobs; unemployment will remain unchanged at 4.7%. Some on Fox Business News think we could see a blow-out number of over 200,000, some even say 225,000. The whisper number is 230,000; now talking heads saying much higher numbers. Analyst says Houston oil jobs coming back faster than expected. Market is up 50 points in anticipation.

And the numbers are: 227,000. Unemployment rate ticks up to 4.8%. Labor force participation up. Hourly wage up 0.1%. Labor participation up to 62.9% -- first movement in some time.

• retail: 46K
• construction: 36K
• manufacturing: 5K

Government jobs? Down 10,000. 

Analysis: Trump deserves credit; enthusiasm under Trump. Market jumps; futures now up 84 points.  Fox News gives much credit to Trump; CNBC says it has nothing to do with Trump. Now CNBC says the "great moves (stock market, jobs) not due to Trump winning, due to Hillary losing." Wow, I'm glad I've moved to Fox News. 

Jobs: Japan putting together package to bring 700,000 jobs to the US; putting finishing touches on a package that could create a $450-billion market. Finally mentioned on Fox Business "Morning With Maria" at 7:43 a.m. Central Time. Finally, Stu Varney, 7:52 a.m. Central Time excited about this news, but Maria and others change subject again. I guess everyone is waiting for Abe's package. But remember: when you see Abe's package, you heard about it here first.

**********************************

Oil

WTI: just under $54 before jobs report.

OPEC crude oil cut: OPEC and Russia are "shielding Asia from supply cuts agreed in a landmark deal last year as they fight to protect their market share in Asia." Data points:

• Asia is OPEC's core and growing market
• re-balancing will be slower in Asia unless regional demand picks up
• signs of an ongoing Asian oversupply
• ~ 30 chartered supertankers, known as Very Large Crude Carriers (VLCC) are sitting in the waters outside Asia's oil trading hub of Singapore and southern Malaysia

**************************************

Natural Gas

Warmists tell us this winter has been the warmest winter in the US in a gazillion years. The warmest winter.

One assumes, with the warm weather, REX 3, and the Marcellus, natural gas stores should be surging. Not so fast! Natural gas stores have dropped below the five-year average. Who wudda thoughts? A warm winter and the Marcellus? Can you say "war on coal" and "nuclear energy plants closing":

*************************

Making America Greater Than Ever

Another huge story today: Japan putting together a package to create 700,000 jobs in America; will use Japanese cash reserves to pay for infrastructure builds in the US. Makes one think: what's going on?

Some things to think about:

• cheapest energy in the world, and plenty of it; much of it "green"
• corporate tax reform on the horizon
• repeal ObamaCare: huge corporate tax relief; huge regulatory relief 
• end of "climate change" craziness
• end of huge "multi-national deals that compromise toward mediocrity; America on short end; return to bilateral negotiations; friends of US at front of the line

Random Update Of REX -- The Massive Header Natural Gas System With Access To Almost Every Other US Market -- January 26, 2017

Data points from RBN Energy on the recently completed REX Zone 3 and the future of northeast natural gas markets:

• Tallgrass Energy: Rockies Express Pipeline (REX)
• brought on-line January 6, 2017: the last 350 MMcf/d of its 800-MMcf/d Zone 3 Capacity Enhancement Project
• boosted east-to-west takeaway capacity out of Ohio to 2.6 Bcf/d (~ 400,00 boe/d), up 45% from 1.8 Bcf/d previously
• fully-subscribed
• designed to serve Marcellus / Utica
• filled up almost instantaneously
• But note this:
• Northeast production did not increase! The natural gas came from other pipeliness.
• all Marcellus / Utica pipelines have at least partially reversed flows, but REX Zone 3 has been most significant
• huge volume
• 15-plus interconnects with major long-haul pipelines

REX: a massive header system with access to just about every other US market
Implication: Northeast pipelines are going to be competing for supply; REX appears to have the advantage.

Halcon Buys Into Delaware, $705 Million -- Rigzone -- January 25, 2017

Link here. Data points:

• $705 million
• seller: Samson Exploration
• location: Pecos County, Texas
• 20,748 net acres
• also purchasing 15,040 net acres in Ward County, $11,000 / acre
• company says it picked up the Delaware acreage for "attractive price" of $20,000 / acre
• back-of-the-envelope: $20K is exactly right, and that's a great price for the Permian
• similar to Anadarko, Halcon is also selling all of its east Texas (Eagle Ford) acreage -- generates $500 million; buyer is Denver-based Hawkwood Energy
• comment: this confirms my theme that Eagle Ford has turned out to be less attractive than originally hyped

****************************
More Pipeline News

In an earlier post, RBN Energy provided an in-depth look at Plains All American Pipeline buying ACC.  Now this from Rigzone:

• BridgeTex expansion
• Permian Basin to Houston Gulf Coast area; from Colorado City, TX, to Houston area
• Midstream Partners (50%) / Plains All American Pipeline, LP (50%)
• will be capable of shipping one-third more crude oil
• enhancing existing pumps, related equipment
• will increase capacity from 300,000 to 400,000 bopd
• a new origin point at Bryan, TX -- about 100 miles north of Houston -- will also enable BridgeTex to accept shipments from the Eaglebine (Eagle Ford) shale play 

****************************

So, How's That Renewable Energy Working Out?

From SeekingAlpha:

• Sempra Energy's SoCalGas unit said yesterday that it had withdrawn natural gas from its Aliso Canyon storage facility for the first time since January a year ago to support the reliability of the region's gas and electricity systems as cold weather stressed its pipeline network
• SoCalGas has only limited access to fuel at Aliso Canyon following the massive methane leak from the facility during October 2015 through February 2016
• California agencies had said that SoCalGas could have difficulty meeting a forecast peak gas demand of 5.2B cf on the coldest days this winter without fuel from the facility

California needs to turn on their wind turbines; maybe they could use solar energy to turn the wind turbines faster. 

Human Interest Story: Keenan, Apache, Alpine High Oil Field -- January 8, 2017

August 22, 2022: see update here.

Data points from the Alpine High article below:

• oil: 3 billion bbls in Alpine High vs 5.2 billion bbls in Eagle Ford
• 75 trillion cubic feet of gas; 3 billion bbls of oil
• = 15 billion boe
• EOG leased more than 600,000 acres in Eagle Ford for "hundreds of dollars/acre"; later Eagle Ford acreage valued / sold at $35,000 / acre
• 350,000 acres in southern Reeves County
• Apache leased for average $1,300/acre (Permian now goes for $30,000 / acre)
• "discovery well" in Alpine High: Spanish Trail 55 1H
• November, 2015
• off County Road 318, just outside Balmorhea
• 10,767 feet down, 4,326 feet horizontal (almost identical to a middle Bakken short lateral
• "embedded" in clay? clay does not fracture well
• two years to study how to recover oil
• no infrastructure in the area yet 

Staggering global riches of natural gas (the numbers keep increasing). From an earlier post:

Top five countries:

• Russia: 6,000 trillion cubic feet
• Iran: 1,000 trillion cubic feet
• Qatar: 900 trillion cubic feet
• Turkmenistan: 600 trillion cubic feet
• US: 350 trillion cubic feet
• #11: Australia: 152 trillion cubic feet (as of January, 2014). (See this post.)
  

Now, let's go back and re-run the numbers that were posted earlier:

• that recent huge Mediterranean natural gas find: 30 trillion cubic feet; this was said to be biggest natural gas find ever in the Mediterranean
• Barnett, revised USGS figures: 53 trillion cubic feet
• Utica, newly revised figures: 782 trillion cubic feet
• Marcellus, EIA revised estimates: 65 trillion cubic feet, "proved" reserves
• Bakken/Three Forks, USGS estimate: 7 trillion cubic feet
• Qatar: 800 trillion cubic feet, wiki, conversion

Other recent stories on natural gas reserves

• Marcellus: 480 trillion cubic feet of technically recoverable gas, Penn State geoscientist 

Comments regarding natural gas reserves

• for me, it's hard enough getting my hands around billions of bbls of oil; it's almost impossible for me to get a feel for trillions of cubic feet of natural gas
• proved reserves are based on price of recovery, confusing matters from year to year
• estimates are just that, estimates (and often inflated for "certain" reasons)
• watch for this gotcha: sometimes reported in trillion cubic feet; sometimes in trillion cubic meters (35 cubic feet = 1 cubic meter; not trivial)
• for me it comes down to two things:
• any discovery over 30 trillion cubic feet natural gas is staggering, worth reporting
• "we" aren't going to run out of natural gas any time soon

Original Post

Very, very interesting human interest story sent to me by a reader. I received it some time ago (December 30, 2016) but delayed in getting it posted, sorry.

This is the story of how a retired geologist discovered one of the biggest oil finds in the continental US this past decade: the Alpine High oil field.

[Steve] Keenan [retired geologist] and [Roberto] Alaniz [chief geologist] became intrigued by a section along a southern strip of Reeves County. The rest of the industry didn't think much of it. More than 100 wells had failed before Apache arrived, drilled by storied explorers like Oklahoma's Chesapeake Energy and Houston's Petrohawk Energy.

Petrohawk once owned half the oil rights in the area, said Floyd Wilson, the company's former CEO and current chief executive of Halcon Resources, another Houston oil company. But it didn't know quite what it had. "We didn't even have a clue those plays were there," Wilson said.

Oil companies largely avoided southern Reeves County. Most believed rock in that part of the Delaware was too deep and too hot to hold oil. In addition, as seas filled the basin millions of years ago, they deposited clay, which doesn't fracture well to let out oil and gas.

More:

Apache hired Keenan in April 2014, and Keenan opened a San Antonio office. Colleagues from EOG, including geologist Sara Reilly, 37, soon joined him. "I wanted to work for Steve again," she said.

Keenan's team started slowly, helping to improve existing wells and prospects, and operating other wells in the western half of West Texas' Permian Basin, called the Delaware. Keenan and chief geologist Roberto Alaniz, 67, a long-time colleague, had never worked in the Permian. But they liked the Delaware, with its deep underground basin that trapped organic material - the building blocks of oil - as seas rose and fell millions of years ago.

More:

In November 2015, the state approved the drilling of Spanish Trail, off County Road 318 on the edge of a lake outside the sleepy town of Balmorhea. Apache broke ground in January, drilling 10,767 feet below the surface, then turning 4,326 feet horizontally, according to state records..

One night a month later, a field report arrived in the inbox of Tim Samson, a 34-year-old geologist. Samson looked, then looked again. Spanish Trail had hit clear, sweet crude in a reservoir 2,000 feet thick more than a mile below the surface. .

Apache found something else there, too - something Keenan won't talk about, for fear of revealing the secret of Alpine High. But, whatever it was, it told him every well in the play would strike oil.

Much, much more at the link.

The big takeaway for me: there's a lot more to all these plays, including the Bakken, that we don't yet know about.

And the coolest thing: I had already placed "Alpine High - Apache" at the sidebar at the right. 

Electoral College VotesToday -- December 19, 2016

Aleppo: according to hosts at MSNBC "Morning Joe" Obama's legacy will be viewed through the Aleppo unfiltered lens. Period. Dot. It all connects back to him. By the way, on another note, there seems to be a huge weight lifted off the shoulders of all the folks around "Morning Joe's" table (with a couple notable exceptions). It seems this crew is finally saying what they have wanted to say for the past several years but were not allowed. For the first time, I hear "honesty" with regard to their analysis of President Obama and his foreign policy decisions, and very, very balanced with regard to PEOTUS. That would be Trump, assuming Electoral College doesn't stage a coup.

Sand. Saudi Arabia, with great fanfare, announces it has just taken delivery of its first wind turbine (announced 9 minutes ago -- about 6:26 a.m. Central Time). Yes, one wind turbine. Wiki notes that North Dakota has twelve wind farms -- not twelve turbines, but twelve wind farms. And wiki admits the list is incomplete. The #1 problem for US helicopters flying combat missions out of Saudi Arabia during Gulf wars? Very, very fine gritty sand that got into everything, including rotors. Dust/sand and solar panels is a major challenge but being worked; that problem will pale in comparison to rotors and sand. Memo to self: google status of Saudi's one wind turbine one year from now.

Planes. Airbus -- first jets to Iran within weeks; Boeing -- deal with Boeing, preceded by months of regulatory delays, has only just been signed. Or as the Carpenters would sing, "we've only just begun."

Presidential campaign poll: before the Comey letter, Hillary polled 40.0%; after the Comey letter came out, Hillary polled 40.2%. An inconvenient truth.

Press conference: "I told Putin to 'cut it out' after DNC hack" -- President Obama. McCain: "I'm sure Putin quit hacking as soon as Obama told him to quit."


Shootings: quiet in Chicago overnight? At "Breaking News" right now --

• 20 items; 4 of those 20 items have to do with shootings in the US
• Memphis (one dead); Monaca, PA (gunshots heard); Houston (shooter opens fire inside night club, one dead); Corpus Christi (one wounded after gunshot); Kent, WA (triple shooting overnight; 1 woman dead)
• it must have been a quiet night in Chicago -- not one gunshot reported over at "Breaking News" 

Later. I wrote the previous note ("quiet in Chicago overnight"). It turns out I was correct. LOL. The graphic below is Chicago shootings.

**************************

Back to the Bakken

Active rigs:

	12/19/2016	12/19/2015	12/19/2014	12/19/2013	12/19/2012
Active Rigs	40	64	182	188	187

RBN Energy: stock levels whipsaw the propane market.

U.S. propane inventories rose by an impressive 55 million barrels (MMbbl) during the spring/summer/fall of 2014, and the mild winter of 2014-15 left propane stocks at well-above-normal levels the following spring. Another impactful inventory build—53 MMbbl—occurred during 2015’s March-to-November stock-building season, leaving propane stocks at a record 104 MMbbl as the freakishly mild winter of 2015-16 started.

But propane inventories grew much more slowly through the spring/summer/fall of 2016, due in part to rising exports, and—while stocks are high as this winter begins—even-higher exports and the possibility of real winter weather raise the specter of an especially big drop in stored volumes. In today’s blog we begin a series on the significance of propane inventory levels with a look at why propane stocks rose so much in the 2014 and 2015 stock-building seasons.

Some data points:

• To sum up 2014, growing supply outran demand (despite a big assist from exports), and stocks built by an average of 225 Mb/d from March through October 2014.
• Moving forward another year, during the 2015 stock-building season, total propane supply averaged 1,831 Mb/d­­—a whopping 552 Mb/d higher than during the 2011 season. On the demand/export side, product supplied during the non-winter months was about flat with 2014 at 1,048 Mb/d, although for different reasons.  
• To sum up 2015, the same thing happened again: growing supply again outran rising exports, and domestic demand was flat, resulting in a 53-MMbbl stock build.
• The 20-MMbbl difference between a big stock-build year like 2015 (53 MMbbl added to inventory from end of winter to start of winter) and a more typical stock-build year like 2011 (35 MMbbl) may seem like a lot (and it is). But when you look at it from a stock-build-per-day perspective—and you factor in the magnitude of propane demand and the much bigger role that exports have taken on—you can see how quickly things can change.

Then, RBN does the math.

A contributor over at SeekingAlpha also does the "natural gas production and storage forecast for 2017." I have not read the article, nor did I even look at who wrote the article. 

TransCanada To Build New Export Facility To Deliver Natural Gas To Malaysia; Keystone XL Killed But The Beat Goes On

Updates

June 14, 2017: TransCanada moves ahead with $2-billion NGTL system expansion. Data points from Oil & Gas Journal:

• NOVA Gas Transmission Line (NGTL)
• $2 billion expansion; adding to the system's current %5.1 billion near-term capital program
• in the aggregate: 273 km of pipeline; 150 MW of compression at five compressor stations, new meter stations
• construction expected to start in early 2019
• initial projects to be in service in 4Q19
• expansion needed due to growing producer demand to link Montney, Duvenay, and Deep basin production to the NGTL system and move to intra-basin and export markets
• the 24,012-km NGTL system gathers 75% of Western Canada Sedimentary Basin gas production in Alberta and northeastern British Columbia 

Original Post

Reuters is reporting, but it looks like a standard press release from the company:

TransCanada Corp said on Tuesday it has signed an agreement with Malaysian-owned Progress Energy to transport two billion cubic feet per day of natural gas to underpin the $1.5 billion extension of its NGTL pipeline system in British Columbia.

The extension will also include an interconnection with TransCanada's planned Prince Rupert Gas Transmission project, which will supply natural gas to a proposed liquefied natural gas (LNG) export facility in Prince Rupert, BC.

Malaysia's Petronas acquired Progress Energy in a $4.9 billion deal last year. Petronas has applied to Canada's National Energy Board for a license to export nearly 20 million tonnes of LNG a year from the West Coast.

The 305 kilometre (189 mile) pipeline extension, called the North Montney Mainline, will reach the export delivery facilities in 2019, pending regulatory approvals.

The Keystone XL may have been killed, but the TransCanada beat still goes on. Good for them.

The Beat Goes On, Sonny and Cher