Economics

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Saudi Arabia Level Oil Production from the Rocky Mountains

In terms of Proved Oil Reserves, the EIA indicates Saudi Arabia has 301 billion bbls, while the U. S. has 35 billion bbls. The US has the largest reserves of kerogen, the precursor to oil and gas, in the world. If this kerogen could be converted to oil and gas, the US oil and gas reserves would increase by more than an order of magnitude and rival those of Saudi Arabia. DOE has assessed that greater than 3 trillion bbls of potential oil exist in the Green River formation in Utah, Wyoming and Colorado. The only way this resource is accessed today is through strip mining and cave mining followed by above ground retorting. The DF2S has the capability to access a portion of this resource (~1.2 trillion bbls – kerogen richness of 25 gal/ton or greater) using typical oil well production techniques augmented with Radio Frequency (RF) heating. Many in situ conversion processes have been tried, but none have been economically successful, and none are operating in the U. S. today. Our Dry Fracture Shale System is being developed as an economic and environmentally favorable solution to achieve this and to obtain a parity with Saudi Arabia. 

System Economics

Our initial pilot wells and commercial operations will be centered in the Rocky Mountain Green River formation, with high kerogen concentrations. Our economic projections that follow assume a high (85%) recovery. The key components – RF Generator/amplifiers, gas to electrical conversion, RF switches and materials for dielectrics, conductors – exist in present technology. Some components will be modified because of the extreme environment. As we gain operational experience we will continue system enhancements geared toward higher efficiencies and lower system costs. Our objective is to expand system application to include competitive post processing of selected previously fracked fields.