Monday, April 16, 2007

Drilling at the Farm: Bluebonnets on the Barnett Shale


These are pictures of the farm, and my Mom and Dad's house in the upper left corner of the photos. As you can see, local exploration companies are currently drilling into the Barnett Shale. This single field stretches from the city of Dallas west, covering 5,000 square miles (13,000 km²) and at least 17 counties. It is the second largest oil field in the United States.

Some experts have suggested the Barnett Shale may be the largest onshore natural gas field in the United States. The field is proven to have 2.1 trillion cubic feet (59 km³) of natural gas, and is widely estimated to contain as much as 30 trillion cubic feet of natural gas resources. Oil has also been found in lesser quantities, but sufficient (with recent high oil prices) to be commercially viable.
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The Barnett Shale is known as a "tight gas" reservoir, indicating that the gas is not easily extracted. The shale is very hard, and was virtually impossible to produce gas in commercial quantities from this formation until recent improvements were made in hydro-fracture technology (and recent price increases in natural gas prices made the technology economically feasible). For more, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barnett_Shale

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