Quote:
Originally Posted by leerjet
I'll look into it some more but that was the number put out in the KSL article.
Also Urban Boy, while there may be some validity to your past statements; I really don't think that this is the place to call a religious orginization out on their 'shit' and I think most of us would agree. I am not sticking up for the Mormon church but I just don't think people come here to get your opinions on their faith. 
I will say though that I really appreciate and enjoy your thoughts and insights on development. I really think you add a ton to the forum.  |
Leerjet: You're right. 4K barrels of production is nothing in the world oil market. When the Saudi's announced last week that they were going to raise their daily production from 9.5M barrels to 10M and eventually to 12M, the world oil markets yawned.
I believe the 4K figure the KSL report is referencing is the initial figure for the operations planned by the Brazilians, which is roughly equivalent to the production from the Sigurd field in south Sanpete County, which is nothing.
A better grasp on the potential production comes from the Bureau of Land Management's draft Environmental Impact Statement, which is now open for public comment. The BLM estimates reserves in the Green River Basin between 1.5 and 1.8 trillion barrels (1 followed by 12 zeros). I have seen similar estimates from the US Geological Survey and Shell Oil, so the reserve is pretty well understood. If half of that is recovered, which is probably a conservative estimate, there is enough energy there to run our country at current consumption rates for the next 400 years! Hard to believe, but true.
In the BLM report, they refer to a pilot plant to produce up to 50K barrels a day within 5 years, which is what the group in Orem is also claiming for their project. The time frame is probably too slow given the increased emphasis around the world. It will depend on how long it takes to get the final EIS approved. My guess is, even on a fast track, that EIS is going to attract enough attention to slow it down considerably.
Best case scenario is that if people started designing the pilot plant today, it might be on-line within 5 years. Once the pilot is on-line, scale up to eventually 1M barrels a day will take 10 years at best, unless the project receives unprecedented government and private attention. It took the Canadians more than 20 years to get production from the Athabasca tars sand to the 1M barrel-a-day level, which is very significant, especially considering that at least 50% of the gasoline that is sold along the Wasatch Front today originates in these tar sands.
If the world remains stable, meaning no major wars nor economic disasters, you will probably see production from Utah oil shale reach 10M barrels per day plus (which is the current level of the Saudi's) in 30 to 40 years. The only limit on production will be water, which limits everything in the West. If water is available, through conservation and improved technology, the production from Utah alone could easily surpass the combined production from all OPEC countries.
Sorry about being so long winded here.
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. Obviously, Chase must be the major tenant now, or they are paying a certain premium for the honor of having their name at the top. If you prefer Utah-One then that's cool too.
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