Shale Oil and the Slurping Sound
The Great Simplification #101 with Arthur Berman
Today, Arthur Berman returns to share new data and analysis on shale oil decline rates that will affect the availability of this important commodity going forward. After ~40 years of declining oil production in the United States, the past decade of rising oil extraction has eased many worries about peak oil. But the past few years of continued growth have been obtained by using “a larger straw”, merely delaying the inevitability of the depletion of this strategic, powerful, but finite resource. Art presents recent data on well productivity in US shale plays indicating we are much closer to ‘the slurping sound’ from the straw piercing the source rock.
Arthur E. Berman is a petroleum geologist with over 30 years of oil and gas industry experience. He is an expert on U.S. shale plays and is currently consulting for several E&P companies and capital groups in the energy sector.
How does technology hide the declining availability of oil reserves, causing us to extract and use them faster without creating any new resources? Going beyond geology, how do geopolitics, finance, and social opinion affect oil availability? Where do we go when economically viable oil isn’t available anymore - and will we have the prudence to make the cultural shifts necessary before we have no other options? Have we now passed ‘peak oil’?
In case you missed it…
On this Reality Roundtable, I was joined by four professionals with decades of experience working with low-income communities, Stephanie Hoopes, Peter Kilde, Marc Perry, and Dalitso Sulamoyo to discuss the state of poverty in the United States. Even in the wealthiest country in the world, poverty is a pernicious problem - and in a future that is more resource constrained it will only get worse.
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Do you have citations for any of these data? Every source I've found shows large increases to well productivity for 12 consecutive years, the result of better drilling techniques and technology.
https://enerknol.com/permian-basin-well-productivity-reached-record-high-in-2021-eia/
I feel fortunate to have found Art's work and yours, Nate. Thank you for the outstanding podcasts week after week.
Question for you both: Art has said that he opposes most regulation on oil production. Would you consider dedicating a podcast to that topic? I'm guessing his opposition isn't just ideological, i.e., that he opposes regulation on principle. Is it that regulations are making the transition to a low-energy future harder? How so?
If you've covered this topic in another episode, please point me in the right direction.