[whereagles]

Hi all. I came up with two metaphores which might help illustrating the oil depletion problem.

From what I've read at this site and in a few books/documents, I realize that conventional oil extraction is pretty much like squeezing a liquid out of sponge.

Phase 1: the sponge is soaked up with liquid, so it drips by itself. This is the phase where oil flows in by itself, impelled by internal reservoir pressure alone.

Phase 2: the sponge stops leaking spontaneously, but still has a lot of stuff inside. You squeeze it to continue the flow of liquid. This is like water injection into an oil well: apply extra pressure to continue extracting oil.

Phase 3: the sponge is close to depletion. You have to apply more and more pressure and all that to get less and less liquid out. In oil, this is tertiary recovery methods, like MRC wells, water floods, CO2/N2 injection.

Now suppose you have a can with some liquid and a straw. You suck up the liquid with the straw. The rate of flow is constant, right until the can runs out of liquid. In oil this would be existance of super-duper extraction methods that can basically pierce through porosity and permeability issues and suck up the stuff almost unoposed. Depletion would be at a constant rate right until the last day, where it drops close to zero.

The extraction curve for the sponge metaphore would be like Hubbert's bell-shaped curve, whereas the can metaphore is more like constant with a sharp drop in a very short period of time. Kinda like cliff oil.

Extraction techniques get better and better, potentiating the cliff scenario. If my metaphores are correct, they'll move the Hubbert peak curve into something in between bell-shaped and cliff drop.

[SoothSayer]

The can metaphore is quite close to natural gas extraction ... it chugs away steadily ... but then at a random time .... hiss, nothing, all gone.

[grabby]

Hmmm

[CornwallMnt]

Current knowledge of hydrocarbon producing rocks is being rewritten. See Lexam Explorations San Luis Basin Project. They were test drilling for gold and kept getting oil contaminants. It was commonly but mistakenly thought that the Mancos Shale source rock wasn't indicative for oil. We have 1100 acres close by on the Resurgent Core of the Platoro Caldera that we are looking for a green friendly oil exploration. Any suggestions.

[whereagles]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('CornwallMnt', 'C')urrent knowledge of hydrocarbon producing rocks is being rewritten. See Lexam Explorations San Luis Basin Project. They were test drilling for gold and kept getting oil contaminants. It was commonly but mistakenly thought that the Mancos Shale source rock wasn't indicative for oil. We have 1100 acres close by on the Resurgent Core of the Platoro Caldera that we are looking for a green friendly oil exploration. Any suggestions.

[crossthread]

Came across this cool Artical from MIT, on deep water drilling in the GOM.
Even though it's dated 7/06, I don't rightly remember it being posted on PO...

I came across this Artical while doing some research actualy about new drilling in Artic Waters.... :rolleyes:

"""Included in the $44 million package of leases is the Sivulliq prospect, an offshore oil field discovered in the 1980s but later abandoned by Chevron and Unocal as uneconomical.""""""
(Shell)

Theres some information too be gleaned from the following..
Read the Artical carefully...
http://www.technologyreview.com/Energy/17060/page1/

Peace CT

[clueless]

I have been trying to read up on seawater injection techniques for deepwater drilling. Anybody out there have any info on this ???

[jules2]

I have some information on this subject.

[clueless]

Question:

How deep can they drill ?

Is this a new science ?

Is this a technology that is proven ?

[oilpimp]

Even at water depths of 8000'-10,000' we routinely drill 25,000' - 30,000' oil&gas wells (especially over the last four-five years). We keep on getting better. You can get your own deep well for about 100million bucks and a few months. You'll have a tough time getting on a rig drilling schedule anywhere in the world though.

Is it a proven technology? Sure it is. The industry is always pushing the depth limits. Drilling that deep isn't as problematic as safely producing these usually highly pressured reservoirs. Big problems include: hydrate formation at ocean floor, temp differences bt producing fluids and all surrounding fluids, metallurgy that can withstand the stresses and strains of production. Imagine a pipe more than 5miles long and 5" in diameter hanging into the well. When superhot fluids are produced, it affects the metalurgy, weakens the string at some points...etc, etc.

Does that help? Need anything else?

[funzone36]

Does the extraction of natural gas require oil? Just asking out of curiosity.

[Last_Laff]

My answer: Of course! But not by extracting. Transportation is the main thing that needs to be transported all around. Extracting NG is done by it work of its own because of the reservoir contain it own pressure.

Expert answer: I'll leave it all the complexities up to them.

[Tyler_JC]

If it did require oil, would it matter?

[funzone36]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tyler_JC', 'I')f it did require oil, would it matter?

[Tyler_JC]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('funzone36', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tyler_JC', 'I')f it did require oil, would it matter?

[MacG]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Tyler_JC', ' ')Even if oil suddenly jumped to $1000 a barrel, IBM could still be cranking out laptops.

[funzone36]

There comes a point when it's so expensive that demand drops. That's when profits drop. The question is whether there are enough oil left to divert it to the natural gas industry if they do need oil to operate.

This article states that natural gas processing does use oil: http://www.naturalgas.org/naturalgas/processing_ng.asp

Hints: it uses glycol, alumina, granular silica gel, etc...

Even if some of them can be made from natural gas, they have to be transported by oil to reach the natural gas processing plant.

guess I answered my own question by researching for myself

[Tyler_JC]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('funzone36', 'T')here comes a point when it's so expensive that demand drops. That's when profits drop. The question is whether there are enough oil left to divert it to the natural gas industry if they do need oil to operate.

[funzone36]

How do you know the extraction of natural gas will be extremely profitable? There's going to be a Great Depression after peak oil and many people (even a few rich people) are not going to be able to afford expensive energy supplies. The few million barrels of oil left will mostly be diverted towards other services such as agriculture and the military for resource wars. Little can be sacrificed for natural gas since a country has to make sure its people are fed. Sure, some natural gas will be produced but it won't be available to the public for energy use. It'll mostly be used to produce fertilizers.

There will still be oil and natural gas supplies after peak oil. Whether it's accessible to the general public is a totally different question. If I can't access oil/natural gas, my quality of life will be over.

[Tyler_JC]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('funzone36', 'H')ow do you know the extraction of natural gas will be extremely profitable? There's going to be a Great Depression after peak oil and many people (even a few rich people) are not going to be able to afford expensive energy supplies. The few million barrels of oil left will mostly be diverted towards other services such as agriculture and the military for resource wars. Little can be sacrificed for natural gas since a country has to make sure its people are fed. Sure, some natural gas will be produced but it won't be available to the public for energy use. It'll mostly be used to produce fertilizers.

There will still be oil and natural gas supplies after peak oil. Whether it's accessible to the general public is a totally different question. If I can't access oil/natural gas, my quality of life will be over.