[tkn317071]

It seems like the barrel (bbl) is a standard unit used to talk about oil.


Natural gas is another story...I've seen units of billion cubic feet, million cubic meters, british thermal units, therms, and more, I think. Why is there so much variation in the units used for natural gas? All these different units just create confusion.

[zceb90]

A lot depends on regulatory requirements of country concerned. US works in bbls / tcf whereas some EC countries and others require tonnes / cu metres. Agree it would be nice to see things standardised somewhere so comparisons can be made without having to continually convert. As Matt Simmons says though, the first step would be to get the field producing data in the first place as there is very little from some countries right now, especially the key Gulf States.