American Energy Disrupts OPEC’s Influence

[thackney]

I worked those oilfields out of Bakersfield.  It is the birthplace of steam injection for oil recovery, began by Getty Oil at the Kern River field in the 60s.  Lot of other large steamfloods there as well.  Initially, the source of the steam was via heat generation by burning lease crude.  Besides its ready availability(little gas production in such heavy crude), it was allowed per leasehold terms in most places to use it free of royalty so it was practical at the time. 

Gradually, heat generation was turned over to natural gas instead, mostly as oil was a more valuable product for sales and gas was cheap.

Athabasca is where I heard the idea of nuclear-generated steam to assist in oil production/recovery.  It makes the most sense there as the resources are some of the largest in the world, and is a lot more viscous in a colder climate than the fields in CA.

Of all the technologies out there to assist in oil recovery (steam, fireflood, chemical, CO2, surfactant, etc.) steam far and away has the most usage on the world stage.  Recovery gains in those viscous fields can increase from 0% without steam to over 90% with effective usage.

That's a lot of oil.

In Early 2000s, I was a lead engineer for a Major project of the Kern River Nat Gas pipeline.  We had some meters deep back in Bakersfield.  It was like a time machine driving through the different decades of past buildouts.

[Wingnut]

I started my Master's work on Uranium geochemistry. By the end of the first year, Three Mile Island had happened, and I had hired on in the oil patch. I finished out the school year and went to work.

That darm TMI thing threw a taint on the industry.  That and the Jane Fonda propaganda movie, plus a few three headed babies and people glowing in the dark rumors and there you go. 

[Smokin Joe]

That darm TMI thing threw a taint on the industry.  That and the Jane Fonda propaganda movie, plus a few three headed babies and people glowing in the dark rumors and there you go.

Yeah. Nowadays, if I'd brought back a trunk full of rocks from Canada, they'd call in a NEST team...
http://www.mining.com/saskatchewan-the-uranium-eldorado/ Some amazing deposits up there.

It was the perfect (sh*t)storm for the industry, and a good time to make the jump to oil. With the fukushima mess, I don't expect there to be much recovery for a while, at least not in the US.

[IsailedawayfromFR]

In Early 2000s, I was a lead engineer for a Major project of the Kern River Nat Gas pipeline.  We had some meters deep back in Bakersfield.  It was like a time machine driving through the different decades of past buildouts.

Kern River is a time machine that looks like something out of the Terminator movies.