Eagle Ford Update

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It has been a while since I have updated my estimate of actual output from the Eagle Ford.

Kevin Carter (KC at Peak Oil Barrel) graciously offered help pulling together data for the 39 fields which make up the Eagle Ford play (see this page at the RRC of TX, spreadsheet download here .)
Kevin has strong programming skills in Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) and has made the job of gathering the Eagle Ford data considerably easier.  Thank you Kevin!

My previous estimates only included the Eagleville fields (Eagle Ford 1 and Eagle Ford 2 and the inactive Eagle Ford and Eagle Ford Sour fields), Briscoe Ranch, Sugarkane, Dewitt, Gates Ranch, Hawkville, and Eagle Ridge fields.  Together these 10 fields produce about 99% of Eagle Ford C+C output so these previous estimates are not bad, this new estimate includes all Eagle Ford output reported by the RRC from June 1993 to January 2014.

Note that from June 1993 to Dec 2006 C+C monthly output from the Eagle Ford play was 12 b/d or less, which is why the chart starts at Jan 2007.

An Excel spreadsheet with the data can be downloaded here .  More below the fold.

Bakken and Eagle Ford Revised Scenarios

Edit: April 2, 2014  This post was a failed attempt at humor on April Fool's Day.  When a "joke" has to be explained, clearly it is not funny.  I apologize to those who took this seriously.

Essentially I was trying to see what it would take to arrive at the 24 billion barrels of Bakken oil that Harold Hamm often claims.  It takes 69,000 wells (at 2400 new wells per year) and no decrease in new well EUR (up to 2041) to accomplish this with a realistic well profile (similar to USGS estimates).  I really thought that people would realize (given the date), that this should not be taken seriously.

I was incorrect and again my apologies.

Dennis Coyne

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There has been a lot of discussion about the United States as the new Saudi Arabia.  Output of crude plus condensate has been expanding rapidly in the light tight oil plays in North Dakota (Bakken) and Texas (Eagle Ford).  In the past I have been very skeptical of how long this rapid increase could continue.

The argument was basically that some areas are more productive than others and that these “sweet spots” would run out of room for new wells eventually and that well productivity would decrease.

I have revised my thinking based on the continually upbeat predictions by CEO’s of successful oil companies such as Harold Hamm of Continental Resources.  In addition, there have been several encouraging pilot projects suggesting that well spacing might be dramatically reduced.  This will allow many more wells to be drilled than the 40,000 wells that I have often used in previous scenarios.