Methods

After more than a century of production from conventional pools, astronomical volumes still await the new methods of extracting natural gas and oil from Alberta’s shale, according to provincial earth scientists.

A rush for liquids-rich natural gas and tight oil embedded in dense rock formations, using shale drilling methods imported from the United States, is bailing the Alberta government out of sinking deeply into the red.

Changes to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ (USACE) methods of reviewing and permitting natural gas pipelines in Pennsylvania, which were instituted by the Corps July 1, will result in “substantial delays” in pipeline construction in the state’s Marcellus Shale area, according to David Spigelmyer, Chesapeake Energy vice president of government relations.

It didn’t take long for the natural gas industry and energy insiders to react to a New York Times (NYT) story on Sunday, which cited unnamed industry and government sources describing the shale gas industry as a “Ponzi” scheme with a future similar to Enron Corp. and the bursting of the dot.com bubble.

Researchers at Missouri University of Science and Technology are studying methods for extracting natural gas from tight sands and shale formations using a single-molecule imaging system.

Despite recent complaints from one environmental group about methods used last year to dispose of some of its drilling wastewater, Cabot Oil & Gas Corp.’s Marcellus Shale operations in Pennsylvania have been recycling 100% of flowback water for several months, a company spokesman told NGI’s Shale Daily Wednesday.

Intensive application of improved drilling methods has paid off for an aggressive “junior” among Canadian natural gas producers while highlighting an industry trend of using technology to tap targets previously regarded as beyond economic reach.

Procurement of natural gas imports for the northeastern United States is changing methods and migrating from Alberta to Ontario, where TransCanada PipeLines will overhaul its eastern end to accommodate the switch.

Canadian producers, prodded by strong demand and their inability to catch up by sticking to prevailing methods, show signs of at last adding dimensions in exploration and unconventional development to their natural gas supply strategies.