Promising New Oil Find in Gulf of Mexico

[AngryAmish]

"OSLO, Norway (AP) -- Tests of a deep-water well in the Gulf of Mexico could indicate a significant oil discovery, three companies announced Tuesday, in the first project to tap into a region that reportedly could boost U.S. oil and gas reserves by as much as 50 percent.

The Jack 2 well was drilled by U.S. oil company Chevron Corp., with partners Statoil ASA of Norway and Devon Energy Corp. of Oklahoma City.

''Test results are very encouraging and may indicate a significant discovery. The full magnitude of the field's potential is still being defined,'' Statoil said in a statement.

During the test, the Jack 2 well sustained a flow rate of more than 6,000 barrels of oil per day, Statoil said."

[DavidDvorkin]

1. Promising future hurrican target

Discovered in the Gulf of Mexico!

Woo hoo!

[TechBear_Seattle]

3. And when (not if) a Katrina strength storm hits a rig farm...

What are the chances that at least one will get sufficiently damaged that it will start pumping oil into the water, to be pushed by the storm onto miles and miles of coastline?

It would make the Exxon-Valdez incident look like a minor issue barely worthy of note by environmentalists.

[DavidDvorkin]

5. Yep

If I'm remembering correctly, this very point was raised when I lived in Houston, during the late 60s, and the offshore drilling platforms were being built at a great rate.

The point was ignored.

[RangerSmith]

8. Pretty much zero.

We haven't used that type of technology in decades.

Katrina knocked many wells totally off of their anchored bases. There weren't any spills.

[Eclectic Man]

66. The possibility exists; however, it didn’t happen during Katrina.

That tells me that this is a relatively safe technology. Nevertheless, I’m sure that many backward looking people will oppose it.

[pitohui]

59. way to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory

c'mon folks this is a good thing

we've been drilling the gulf of mexico for a good many decades now, we want to drill here, the oil is doing nobody any good under the ground

you can't seriously be arguing that we can't drill the gulf, one of our most important resources, because of threat of hurricane

[KansDem]

2. self delete

misread article :(

[theophilus]

4. Promising, indeed! Promising to:

Keep spewing CO2 into the atmosphere with more fossil fuel burning making catastrophic climate change more certain.

Enrich the greedy oil barons even more and keep them in control of our country and the world.

Spill oil into the Gulf fouling beaches further and killing ocean life.

Keep us on the teat of nature's black heroin until we gork out, along with most of the other species on our little blue planet.

Yes, promising. Promising more pain and misery.

Change WILL happen.

[rman]

6. evidence that the end of the age of cheap oil is here

"deep water" = "need deep pockets"

[hatrack]

7. It's in 7,000 feet of water, and the deposit is another 20,000 feet down

No pipelines in that part of the Gulf, either.

Might be a bit, shall we say, costly, don't you think?

[Jersey Ginny]

40. Amen! Well said! n/t

[Jersey Ginny]

44. Peak Oil is here

All of the easy oil in the world has been discovered and is depleated. Saudi Arabia pumps 25% water down into its wells to keep up the pressure in its largest fields. Basically, as the cost of oil goes up due to dwindling supplies (now), then there is more profits where companies seek out riskier oil drilling (See Exxon's recent quarterly profits). These new oil fields yield results initially (like the new disc in the gulf) but since the world seeks oil at larger and larger amounts each year, then the new wells can't keep up. Prices rise again, more wars are fought over this 20th century commodity. Glaciers melt. Please read "The End of Oil" by Paul Roberts.

[gasperc]

51. interesting kick-off to mid-term election, no?

Bush blabbers on and on about the US leading the way with fuel cell and electric car manufacutring on labor, as if he actually gives a shit and then this gets pulled out of the woodwork. I bet the've known about it for years but haven't have the money(massive oil profits) or technology to pump it. With 28,000 feet to get to it, it'll obviously be years and years before any oil is pumped out.

Nope, I think this was a full on ploy to run a fluff news piece to ausage the public about gas prices. Peak oil is here and with these buffoons in charge we're fucked.

[PhilYerHead]

70. Correct all around.

One-hundred eighty miles offshore and 7 miles down, the project will not make it to the gas station until 2012. Waste all the energy you want between now and then.

[Eclectic Man]

67. Costly indeed; but supposedly $60 oil will make it worth doing.

[The Brethren]

9. if finding new oil sites

is promising by increasing the amount of oil available, then why I have I been hearing that large companies are buying out smaller reserves and closing them? Doesn't make sense, unless you own an oil company and want to keep the competition on a tight leash and whine about how low the reserves are.

This new site might bring in much needed oil....and you would think cheaper prices. But then it's also been in the news how outrageous the record breaking profits have been this past year for the major oil companies. I sure would love to see a complete audit of their record keeping including 3rd parties......

I'm not sold on the idea that our reserves are so low that it warrants continual alarms that we're running out and why oil companies seem to sky rocketing in sales if things are so terrible. Likewise, I'm not all that convinced that a new site here in the US will translate into more reasonable prices for the public. Anyway you cut it, oil companies tell us what prices they want and we take it. Time will tell.

[RangerSmith]

11. Oil is traded as a commodity on the open market

which is indeed ripe for manipulation.

But that's hardly the same thing as "oil companies are setting the prices."

They are sitting back and reaping the HUGE benefits of this farce brought to you by ALL of our elected officials.

As long as the American public keep thinking it's the oil companies that are screwing us and not the folks who are protecting this scam by not letting actual supply and demand dictate prices, it will continue on just like it is.

They have a very convenient bogeyman more than willing to take the heat.

[The Brethren]

15. i appreciate

what you're saying. But oil companies are very much imvolved in the final prices we have to shell out at the pumps. Their glut in profits this year alone has been reported in the news...unless the reports I've heard and read are lying. They sell the oil at whatever price they want to vendors....as you mentioned a commodity. Who then in return add their percentage to the final prices. Gas station owners have also been complaining that they're in the middle because of this and are the ones directly taking the heat from angry customers. Many are also complaining that they are not ones making the ridiculous profits from gouging customers as people think. I don't know how true that is - w/o seeing their profits vs. expenses for the oil.

I agree with you that oil companies are certainly not the only guilty party. When they get out of bed with politicians and lobbyist, we might actually see fair prices for fair trade. Instead we have junior lectoring us on how we are addicted to oil and must conserve. Sounds nice, except a huge number of Americans are not addicted to oil, they just have to travel a lot to make a living.....minor details for bush. We really need to get away from oil altogether - at least for transportation and tell the oil companies to take a hike --- on their dollar.

[RangerSmith]

18. It isn't an arbituary number THEY decide...

thats the whole point-problem....

If it worked the way you seem to think it does with each Oil Company selling at prices they decide, we wouldn't even have stories like this one...

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/story.aspx?guid=%7BF5C1BB5A-933C-4268-BBEF-8E06D2E2FEB9%7D

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

33. Go to an intersection.

Look at the 4 stations, owned by different mega-corps, one on each corner.

Look at the prices. Virtually identical.


Now, go to the store and buy a pen. Notice how the prices range from a $1-$25+? Plastic, ink and metal are founded on set resource prices just like oil. Yet we get a variety of price on pens but not oil. Strange. One of these mega-corps must have a cost-cutting advantage over the others, whether it be by transportation, labor or technical advantage. But nope. Same price. That's called collusion, my friend.

[RangerSmith]

50. Pretty poor analogy, really

Shop the exact same package of Pens at Office Depot, Staples, and Walmart and get back to me.

[pscot]

53. Baseless speculation

is so much more entertaining. Like the blind man and the elephant, each believes he has taken the full measure of the beast.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

60. Went right over your head, apparently.

They're claiming to be separate sets of "pens."


Office Depot:

Ballpoint Retractable Pens

From $6.19 to $12.99 (dozen units)

http://www.officedepot.com/browse.do;jsessionid=0000kte_w6tyHPQ1AQvKgIO00gA:10gghks9k?N=200963

Over a 100% variance in price. Foray, PaperMate, Bic and Pilot.

Now compare Chevron, Union, Shell and Exxon.

Get it?

[RangerSmith]

61. No, they aren't

seperate products.

There are standards set forth by govt agencies about tolerances and additives. They are each selling the same product with the only difference being octane ratings.

You don't actually believe these guys all use seperate refineries do you?

I mean all you are doing here is proving the point that the reason it will remain screwed up is people know nothing about the real oil business and scream at some fictional bogeyman.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

62. Transportation costs alone dictate a variance in price*.

Size of refining capacity alone dictates a variance in price*.
Cost of labor alone dictates a variance in price*.
Etcetera.


*If a free market is really in effect.

[RangerSmith]

64. In August, I was out on a 2800 mile car trip...

Two weeks. The low I paid for regular gas was 2.69, the high was 3.39.

That ain't all just different state taxes.

How do you account for all that price difference?

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

69. I'm willing to bet that when you paid $2.69 the

station across the street was within a cent or two of $2.69.
And when you paid $3.39 the station across the street was within a cent or two of $3.39.

I'm not talking about interstate price differences, which are typically caused by taxes and proximity of product, I'm talking about price differences between :sarcasm:"competitors." :sarcasm:

It is a virtual impossibility for two or more companies to have the exact same retail price for a product when their infrastructures are completely different and they are acting in a competetive free market unless there is collusion. One company gets the majority of it's oil from the North Slope. Another gets it's majority domestically. A third grabs it's lion's share from Gharwar in Saudi Arabia. Transportation costs alone dictate a price difference.

Collusion Pronunciation<kuh-loo-zhuhn>
–noun 1. a secret agreement, esp. for fraudulent or treacherous purposes; conspiracy: Some of his employees were acting in collusion to rob him.
2. Law. a secret understanding between two or more persons to gain something illegally, to defraud another of his or her rights, or to appear as adversaries though in agreement: collusion of husband and wife to obtain a divorce.

:shrug:

[GeorgeGist]

43. Ummm...

you forgot to mention who bought the elected officials.

[Jersey Ginny]

45. We are running out of oil

These outrageous record corporate profits are in fact an indicator of peak oil, or that more than 1/2 the total world oil, is gone. Conservation would go MUCH FARTHER helping the US to conserve its reserves than this oil discovery. These Republicans think it is the 1950's all over-not just with their McCarthy fear based politics, but in their arrogant philosophy that the US needs to dominate the world oil market. We were the leading exporter in the 50's. Now with Iraq conquered, the US has its influence it wanted over today's oil market. Such backwards vision and a total disregard for the habitability of the globe.

[Betty]

10. so no need to convert to renewable energy sources

right????

[Communism_not_USA]

12. This is how to help the war on terror

That's why oil money keeps going to terrorist producing countries.

Their oil is cheap to extract and they don't care about the environment in the sandy desert.

The best way to reduce terror is to reduce consumption of oil and thus the money that is sent to places like UAE and Saudi Arabia.

We have to get rid of SUV's that block traffic, and pollute by using far too much gasoline.

There are far better technologies that just are not being used!!

[MacCovern]

13. Oil might be renewable....sorry to say

I really do have serious doubts that oil is a fossil fuel.
In the Soviet Union of the 1950's professor Nikolai Kudryavtsev
developed a theory that "oil should be seen as a primordial material that the earth forms and exudes on a continual basis."

If that's true, then there will not be a rush to develop alternate
transportation around the world based on non-polluting energy, and I think that would be very bad news. The sooner cars start using other energy sources, like hydrogen, batteries, etc., the better off we'll all be.

[belab13]

16. the abiotic oil theory is totally bogus...

The earth doesn't just magically exude large quantities of oil...


Not a geologist, but know enough to state that a pretty narrow band of conditions are required to produce oil.


You need the appropriate temperature range, pressure, and material...

[MGD]

46. "You need the appropriate temperature range, pressure, and material..."

Kind of like the conditions that exist a few hundred miles beneath the earth's surface?

[ktlyon]

56. What was the geologic event that created all the oil?

How did it get buried so deep?
I would sooner believe that the heat of the earth is creating black goo as a byproduct that leaks its way up.

[TX-RAT]

65. What was the geologic event that created all the oil?

Ancient sea bed deposits.

[NickB79]

17. It really doesn't make any difference if it is abiotic or biotic

The key is the rate of production. If oil is abiotic (which most believe it is is not) then it is being created and percolating to the surface at an incredibly slow rate by human standards. Depleted oil fields are not refilling at any measurable rate, meaning that if abiotic oil is being created, it takes millions of years to fill oil fields we empty in decades. That may be renewable on a geological scale, but not on a human scale.

Without alternatives and massive conservation, the oil will peak, and then we will be hurt severely.

[ktlyon]

57. good point

thanks

[theophilus]

34. Woweee! Great news for Global Oil Greedocrats! Bad news for

the organisms stuck on planet Earth.

[Ishoutandscream2]

14. Alright!! I'm buying a Hummer!!!!!!

God has given us more oil!!:silly:

[krispos42]

19. Chevron says Gulf drilling a success

September 5 2006: 12:36 PM EDT

NEW YORK (Reuters) -- Chevron Corp. said Tuesday it had successfully drilled for oil in the Gulf of Mexico's deep waters, in what could be one of the most significant finds for the domestic oil industry in a generation.

The successful well, known as Jack 2, reached a record total depth of 28,175 feet, coming in 7,000 feet of water and more than 20,000 feet under the sea floor. Analysts said the find suggested the success of that drilling may mean more oil than previously believed is available under the Gulf of Mexico, a region that already provides a quarter of U.S. output.

One published report suggested the breakthrough could increase U.S. oil reserves by as much as 50 percent.

During the test at record depths and pressure, the Jack No. 2 well flowed at more than 6,000 barrels of crude per day, Chevron (Charts) said. That puts it on a par with discoveries in exploration hot spots such as the waters off Angola.

With U.S. oil output in decline, big new fields are increasingly rare, and oil companies are widening their search to more difficult places

Chevron, the No. 2 U.S. oil company after Exxon Mobil (Charts), did not give an estimate of the field's reserves.

The Wall Street Journal cited Chevron officials as estimating recent discoveries in the Gulf of Mexico could hold as much as 15 billion barrels of oil and gas reserves. That would boost U.S. current reserves by 50 percent.

The region could become the nation's biggest new domestic source of oil since the discovery of Alaska's North Slope more than a generation ago, the Journal said.

<more>

http://money.cnn.com/2006/09/05/news/companies/chevron.reut/index.htm?cnn=yes

Well, this might drive a nail in the price gouging, at least. Of couse, if I put on my tinfoil hat I wouldl be forced to note that is comes a mere two months from the midterm elections which Big Oil's bitches, the Grand Oil Party, are looking to lose.

[Thor_MN]

20. Incredible timing!!! Just in time for campaign season!!!

See!!! The * Admin isn't filled with totally incompetant buffoons!!!

[rayofreason]

21. Vast Oil Pool Tapped in Gulf of Mexico

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A trio of oil companies led by Chevron Corp. has tapped a petroleum pool deep beneath the Gulf of Mexico that could boost the nation's reserves by more than 50 percent. A test well indicates it could be the biggest new domestic oil discovery since Alaska's Prudhoe Bay a generation ago.

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/060905/major_oil_discovery.html?.v=24

[Lautremont]

22. Oh good. I was worried about those oil companies.

Now I'll be able to sleep at night.

[MikeyJones]

23. Notice the word "could"

If this is true then I will be very, very glad to know because this will be one reason less to drill in ANWR -- which has almost no oil worth taking out in the first place but I digress. This is in many ways wonderful news.

As an environmental engineer, I know that there is no fuel that burns as clean or as effeciently as light, sweet crude. Biodiesel, ethanol, etc. are all extensively funded and kept afloat by massive governmental subsidies that keep the dying industry afloat. I think we need to keep up with the production of hybrids and expand our public transportation system. Those are the only 2 viable ways to keep our economic growth going.

[Canuckistanian]

24. So, will they lay off ANWR drilling now?

Looks like this one dwarfs anything that ANWR could produce.

[MikeyJones]

25. I hope to God so.....

I did the math one time and found out ANWR would barely do ANYTHING to our massive oil-sucking economy. We have to reduce demand, it's that simple. And since it takes more oil to make ethanol than ethanol to save oil, it's not cost-effective to make any sort of goofy biofuels that will only give people false hopes and wet dreams about the possibilities of the future. We need a pragmatic view of the future and that all will NOT be well and good unless we cut back in our excessive consumption.

[ConcernedCanuk]

29. "We have to reduce demand" - well, shut down the WarMachine!

.
.
.

THAT oughta do it!!

Y'all can't be having troops and machinery in over 120 countries without OIL ya know . . .

Can you just imagine what the fuel consumption of the US Military is just for Afghanistan and Iraq?

I can't

[MikeyJones]

47. To be fair.....

our military consumption is minimal and not worth mentioning when compared with the juggernaut of heating our homes and all the fat-ass Americans running around in their big gas-guzzling pick-ups and SUVs sucking down gas and spitting out smog. That's the biggest problem.

So many environmentalists erronously believe(as do now many Repukkkeikkkans) that biofuels are a solution to oil and that simply isn't so. The ethanol industry is kept up by influential Midwestern congressmen and senators who use their influence to send taxpayer subsidies to ethanol corporations to help keep them in business. It's one of the biggest pork projects in this country.

Check this out:

http://www.perc.org/perc.php?subsection=4&id=637

-------
(.......)
"....Sen. Chris Bond, R-Mo., told AP after supporting a change an earlier bill that would have doubled ethanol production, "There are tremendous economic benefits."

He is right. Economic benefits abound for senators and one company in particular. Moving from "Supermarket to the World" to "Corner Gas Station to the World," Archer Daniels Midland has championed ethanol with campaign dollars. Producing over half of the country's ethanol throughout the last decade, ADM receives a lion's share of ethanol subsidies. Over $400 million left the federal treasury for ADM coffers annually during the 1990s.

In return, the company funds Democrats and Republicans alike. Common Cause, a watchdog group, identified $4.5 million worth of political contributions from ADM between 1987 and 1997 - a small investment for hundred-fold returns......."
(......)
"....In fact, Cornell's David Pimentel argues that ethanol takes 29 percent more energy to produce than it creates....."
-------




The special-interests here go to both parties and its slowly crumbling our rights and our economic vitality as a nation.

[Canuckistanian]

39. ANWR was never about reducing foreign sources

It was all about ANWR being used as a PRECEDENT for plundering all those millions of acres of untouched National Park land.

Hell, even the oil companies said it didn't matter to them, they would just sell it off to the Asian markets anyways.

[MikeyJones]

49. I know

There was a quote I read someplace where Tom DeLay said exactly that. He said he wanted to open ANWR just to break the back of the anti-drilling movement. Or, as you correctly noted, as precedent for a much bigger massive expansion of drilling.

And the big oil companies wouldn't even touch it because there wasn't enough potential profit for them. It was a few Alaskan oil corps that wanted dibs on the oil. I guess that asshole Ted Stevens tried to railroad his fascist corporate agenda down everybody's throats in his attempts to destroy his own state. Fucking sick.

[Thor_MN]

26. Amazing timing...

Tuesday after Labor Day, typical campaign kickoff time. Wonder if this will turn out to be a phantom find, say about the second week in November...

[Julius Civitatus]

28. I thought so too

Just in time to REDUCE GAS PRICES two months before the elections.

Wonder if they will adjust these very optimistic numbers right after November.

[markam]

37. you mean like in Mexico

When they announced the 10 billion barrel field about 3 months before the election. Very quietly, after the election, it was announced that in fact, it was a "modest" natural gas field.

BTW, mexican oil production is in the process of collapsing, and will likely take down the entire country of Mexico. God knows what it will do to the US.

"Seawater is threatening to swamp the wells of Cantarell as the field's pressure diminishes, a debilitating symptom of old age that makes it tougher to extract the remaining oil. Leaked internal reports of Pemex's own worst-case scenarios published in Mexican newspapers show production plummeting to about 520,000 barrels a day by the end of 2008 — a 71% free-fall from May levels in less than three years."

[Julius Civitatus]

27. Yaaaayyyyy!!! Let's produce more SUVs right now!

A Hummer H3 on every driveway. More gas to guzzle away!

:sarcasm:

[zonkers]

30. I'd tap it.

[Xenotime]

31. Translation: We found a new spot to fuck up the environment.

Look out Gulf Coast! Get your oil slickers ready and make sure you have enough detergent on hand to clean all the birds from the oil spills they have out there.

But nobody cares. The gulf coast is lost anyway.

[ktlyon]

58. There are proposals to drill up and down our coasts

I won't go in the water anyway but I don't want oil on my shoes and feet from walking. I experienced it in Galveston Tx years ago, hotel provided little oil wipes in single packages. The animals are the big losers.

[robcon]

32. Good news.

Timing of announcement - pre-election 2006? Questionable.

[theophilus]

35. You can call me cynical.................

I'll wager they have known about this deposit for decades. The thing is, this is FIVE MILES DOWN!!!! Under the frakking ocean!!!!

The fact that they "might" go after this now says to me, "all the easy oil is going, going, almost gone". Now, this five mile oil, will it be a buck a gallon............? I kinda doubt it, don't you? Maybe $5.00? I mean, they gotta pay for a lot of pipe or whatever they'll use to actually get to it. And how stable is this pumping structure going to be? It all sounds pretty horrific to me, but I don't know squat about oil wellin'. All's I knows is that we don't need to keep a burnin this petroleum and loading up our atomosphere with the CO2.

[Kablooie]

42. They announce it now to bolster the GOP in the Nov election.

[CatholicEdHead]

36. Check out the WSJ 7/5/06

They had a full page article about how all the oil rigs are leaving the Gulf of Mexico becuase there are easier, more profitable areas overseas, off China and other places off Africa. I have the actual paper copy of this article.

I find it very intresting this comes out now.

[unkachuck]

38. see....

....we didn't have to invade the Middle East to steal Iraqi oil after all....

....so, OUT OF IRAQ, NOW!!!

[Kablooie]

41. NONSENSE! This is just election propaganda.

Watch how the marvelous find turns out to be nowhere near as big as they thought ---
in December.

[Eclectic Man]

68. Where did you hear that? Link...?

[Javaman]

48. My qustion is: what was the time between it was found

and when it was announced? Funny how it comes out when we are now within the 2 month windown of the midterms.

Timing is everything folks.

pigs.

[OzarkDem]

52. Its another scheme to milk the taxpayers - like the Destin Dome

Jeb and his buddies did the same thing a few years ago with natural gas in the Destin dome -

http://www.ngsa.org/docs/pressrelease/2002/DestinDomeAnnouncement5_29_02.pdf#search=%22destin%20dome%22

But there was concern over environmental impact

http://www.gomr.mms.gov/homepg/whatsnew/techann/000044.html

So the US agreed to buy the drilling rights from Exxon and Chevron since the oil and gas companies couldn't develop it, to the tune of $200 million of our tax dollars

http://www.flmnh.ufl.edu/fish/southflorida/news/drilling2002.html

[stepnw1f]

54. Like I Care.... How WIll This Benefit Me

or most people? It won't....

[Joanne98]

55. What a cowinky dink! Texas Walker Ranger Oilmen save da day!

Just in time to trick the oil speculators into shorting oil futures TWO MONTHS BEFORE THE ELECTION. hmmmmmmm

[CaptAhab]

63. That's not a whole lot of oil

The article says the new field is estimated to have a capacity of between 3 and 15 billion barrels. Since the United States consumes an average of 20 million barrels a day, this means that 3 billion barrels will last about 150 days, or five months, if we rely solely on that field. Even if the most optimistic estimate of 15 billion barrels is true, and remember that not all the oil can be extracted from the field, that's still about two years worth of oil at maximum consumption rate. Somehow I don't think this would be enough to offset the economic effects of Peak Oil, which we are already feeling.