Oil Independence?

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: "Robert C. Atkinson" <rca53 () columbia edu>
Date: September 12, 2005 6:40:44 PM EDT
To: David Farber <dave () farber net>
Subject: Oil Independence?


This is a promising development. Excerpts below, full link:
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/news_columnists/article/ 
0,1299,DRMN_86_4051709,00.html
What do IP skeptics say?

> Shell's method, which it calls "in situ conversion," is simplicity  
> itself in concept but exquisitely ingenious in execution. Terry  
> O'Connor, a vice president for external and regulatory affairs at  
> Shell Exploration and Production, explained how it's done (and they  
> have done it, in several test projects):
>
> Drill shafts into the oil-bearing rock. Drop heaters down the  
> shaft. Cook the rock until the hydrocarbons boil off, the lightest  
> and most desirable first. Collect them.
>
> Please note, you don't have to go looking for oil fields when  
> you're brewing your own.
.


> Upwards of a million barrels an acre, a billion barrels a square  
> mile. And the oil shale formation in the Green River Basin, most of  
> which is in Colorado, covers more than a thousand square miles -  
> the largest fossil fuel deposits in the world.
>
> Wow.
>
> They don't need subsidies; the process should be commercially  
> feasible with world oil prices at $30 a barrel. The energy balance  
> is favorable; under a conservative life-cycle analysis, it should  
> yield 3.5 units of energy for every 1 unit used in production. The  
> process recovers about 10 times as much oil as mining the rock and  
> crushing and cooking it at the surface, and it's a more desirable  
> grade. Reclamation is easier because the only thing that comes to  
> the surface is the oil you want.


--
***************************************
Robert C. Atkinson
Director of Policy Research
Columbia Institute for Tele-Information (CITI)
1A Uris Hall, Columbia Business School
3022 Broadway
New York, NY 10027-6902

212-854-7576
cell: 908-447-4201
***************************************

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