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57 comments on More on Natural Gas

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Stuart Staniford on November 22, 2005 - 5:02am

There's no comparison between Russia and the US. Russia has literally tens of super-giant untouched NG fields. In the US, we're drilling and fraccing every piece of rock with the faintest smell of methane, and we have a reserves/production ratio of less than a decade. Russia has proved reserves of 1694 Tcf (as of the end of 2004), which is an R/P of 81 years, while the US has proved reserves of 187 Tcf.

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Essex Land Rover Man on November 22, 2005 - 6:11am

Matt Simmons has said that a lot of untapped natural gas reserves (which tend to be stranded) around the world, including Russia, are unproven. He has said that many fields have not been properly surveyed so the field reserves are estimates in the widest sense of the word. He thinks that the Russian fields in the north of the country will be about a $50 to $ 60 billion project to bring to the market.

This is my gut feeling on the figures given how inaccurate numbers are bandied about as proven fact. Has Russia got large amounts of natural gas? Yes. Is it is large as reported (1694 Tcf)? Probably not. Will all of that total reported reserves of gas, be drilled and supplied to the markets in the East and West? No. That is not to say that Russia has large amounts of natural gas, but will it be feasible to extract the gas and bring it to market?

I have also noticed (probably along with most TOD readers) that USA has had about 9 to 10 years reserves of natural gas for the past several years and it looks like it will have 9 to 10 years reserves in a few years time as well.

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wkwillis on November 22, 2005 - 6:56am

Well, if the cost of natural gas gets high enough, demand will drop and the gas fields that have ten years worth of reserves will suddenly have twenty years worth of reserves.

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57 comments on More on Natural Gas

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