WASHINGTON, July 20 Technology to draw oil from rock in Rocky Mountain states and other unconventional sources is getting another look from companies and the government as the demand for energy increases and supply tightens, especially in the United States.
Oil was more than $78 per barrel Friday, nearing an all-time high. According to a National Petroleum Council report, commissioned by U.S. Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman and released this week, demand will exceed supply by 13 million barrels per day by 2030.
One potential major source of domestic oil is found in shale rock in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming. Interest and experiments rose and fell with the oil price spikes during the 1970s to early 1980s and have risen once again.
"It's an enormous resource," said Daniel I. Fine, an MIT research affiliate. The area was protected for the future with the creation of the Naval Petroleum and Oil Shale Reserve in 1912. "It was understood that one day we would use it at a time when the technology and economics would be right," Fine added.
The oil found in these rocks is called kerogen, organic matter containing hydrocarbons that must be converted to oil and gas. It's unclear how much oil may eventually be produced, but the United States holds 60 percent of the world's shale.
On-site experiments to heat and extract the kerogen are starting on 160-acre tracks leased by the Bureau of Land Management. The 10-year research development & demonstration leases are intended "to test and demonstrate what are considered state of the art methods of recovering shale oil," BLM spokeswoman Heather Feeney said. They can be converted to commercial leases for oil shale after demonstrating commercial production capacity and a BLM review.
Shell is probably the leader in the field, said Jeremy Boak, project manager for the Colorado Energy Research Institute at the Colorado School of Mines. Shell expects to extract from 3.5 to 5 barrels for each barrel of energy used, Boak said, by heating the rocks underground for three or four years, after which the oil seeps through cracks so it can be pumped out. It's relatively efficient, he explained, because it partially refines the kerogen underground and brings it to the surface as fuels requiring little processing: naphtha, diesel and kerosene.
Chevron has partnered with the Los Alamos National Laboratory to recover oil from shale formations in Colorado's Piceance Basin. Fine explained that it will use explosives underground to fractionate the shale, then inject a critical fuel, which creates a hot gas and allows extraction. The need for water and on-site production will have a heavy impact on the environment, however.
Raytheon, known for numerous military technologies, has developed the use of radio frequency, or RF, technology with contributions from partner Critical Fluids Technologies.
John Cogliandro, program manager for Raytheon's oil from shale technologies program, said the new technology is powerful and environmentally responsible. Since it doesn't use steam or heat the actual rock, there's no residue that might enter groundwater supplies, he said.
RF heats much more uniformly and quickly through radiation that targets the hydrocarbon molecules. Cogliandro added that critical fluids release and move the oil, so that the oil seeps through cracks in the shale and is pumped to the surface.
Fine said Raytheon's technology is an advance over earlier microwave feasibility tests -- dating back to the 1980s -- because it heats the shale rock more quickly and it is easier to control while deploying smaller, cost-effective equipment.
Global Resource Corp. uses microwaves to extract oil from shale. While previous microwave tests didn't experiment with different wavelengths, GRC is using a continuing microwave system with variable frequencies. Operating in a vacuum, the microwave frequencies gasify, then condense the hydrocarbons, which turn into gas and liquid oil, said a GRC spokesman.
GRC is using the technology to reinvigorate older wells as well as draw oil from tires, petroleum-based plastics and automobile shredder residue. The company has patent-pending numbers for seven different technologies, and both the U.S. Energy Department and the state of Pennsylvania have given GRC a capped well for experimentation.
GRC CEO Frank Pringle said interest is growing, despite skepticism about the technology: "I know what my process can accomplish, but there's a lot of prejudice against us."
Raytheon is seeking to license its know-how to energy companies that are better able to apply the technology in the field. Oil companies experimenting with shale have shown significant interest in Raytheon's technique, but Cogliandro doesn't think they'll abandon current approaches.
"You'll see a lot of pilot projects out in the field being tested. They are going to find where certain technologies work best and then they'll analyze the economics of each," Cogliandro said.
Cogliandro has also received samples of oil sands, or "heavies," from Oklahoma and Texas on which to test the technology. Raytheon's methods had been tried successfully with Canada's tar sands and should work with the heavier oil sands, he said.
Both Raytheon and GRC say their technologies use one barrel of oil's worth of energy to produce 4.5 barrels of shale oil compared to one barrel for 3.5 barrels using older methods.
Boak said these technologies will have to prove how they can do as well or better than the newest techniques in the field.
"The big question for shale oil and heavy oil processing is how far you can make those waves reach out into the rock," said Boak. He emphasized the importance of field tests given the uncertainty in geological formations. GRC said the microwaves can be used as far down as can be drilled.
If the technology leads to commercial viability, only limited investment in refinery extensions and pipeline spurs will be needed because the industry can make use of existing regional refineries.
(e-mail: energy@upi.com)
WASHINGTON, July 20 --
