Barnett Shale seen as model for drillers worldwide

BY JACK Z. SMITH

[email protected]

The search for unconventional natural gas deposits in areas like the Barnett Shale of North Texas not only is dominating gas drilling in the United States, but it will also become pervasive worldwide.

That was the message given Tuesday by two experts at the opening of a three-day energy conference in the Fort Worth Convention Center.

"I think unconventional gas is the future, both in the U.S. and overseas," said Vello Kuuskraa, president of Advanced Resources International, known for his work in energy economics and petroleum recovery technologies.

Unconventional gas includes shale gas, tight gas and coal-bed methane, deposits that require measures such as horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing to enhance their recovery and make them economically feasible.

Unconventional gas accounts for more than half of U.S. production, Kuuskraa said, even though what he called two new "rock stars" among shale fields — the Haynesville Shale in northwest Louisiana and East Texas, and the Marcellus Shale in the Appalachian region of the eastern United States — are just beginning to be significantly developed.

Meanwhile, Kuuskraa said he expects his end-of-the-year calculations to show that the Barnett Shale has become the biggest gas-producing area in the U.S., outstripping the San Juan Basin in New Mexico and Colorado.

The U.S. is leading the way in the search for unconventional gas, and developing the technology that will "be used around the world," said Stephen Holditch, head of the petroleum engineering department at Texas A&M University and former president of the Society of Petroleum Engineers-International.

Oil and gas exploration and production companies either based in North Texas or with substantial operations in the region are in the thick of the search for unconventional gas.

That includes three Fort Worth-based companies, XTO Energy, Range Resources and Quicksilver Resources; two Oklahoma City-based companies, Devon Energy and Chesapeake Energy, the top two Barnett Shale producers; and Irving-based Exxon Mobil Corp., which is drilling for unconventional gas everywhere from Colorado to Hungary.

Kuuskraa said Exxon Mobil is said to have gotten encouraging results from initial drilling in the Mako Trough in Hungary.

There are reportedly "massive concentrations" of gas — estimated at 700 billion cubic feet per square mile — in a small area of the Eastern European nation, he said.

Future unconventional gas recovery worldwide could significantly expand supplies, which would help make gas increasingly attractive as a fuel for transportation and electric power generation, Kuuskraa forecast at the Unconventional Gas International Conference & Exhibition, which resumes today.

JACK Z. SMITH, 817-390-7724