Revised estimates of Ireland's oil and gas resources
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Sunday May 27, 2007 15:28
by NMI
Some people are going to get richer on the profits from Irish resources.
It's pretty certainly a conincidence that the day after the news that same bunch will be running the country for the next while broke, an article appeared in Energy Business Review, pointing out how lucrative the huge reserves of gas and oil off the west coast of Fianna Fáil land will be.
Lucrative for the energy companies that is, not for the people of Ireland (unless you count certain people with different morals from the rest of us).
" Industry players developing the Atlantic Ridge reserves will no doubt be hoping to avoid the problems encountered by the developers of the Corrib field"
Ireland's upstream boom will produce significant opportunities
25th May 2007
By EBR Staff Writer
Recently revised estimates of Ireland's oil and gas resource endowments paint an upbeat picture of future production levels. If these latest estimates translate into the production levels forecasted, Ireland has the potential to not only meet its indigenous oil and gas needs but also to become a net exporter.
'Content Recent estimates published by the Irish Petroleum Affairs Division of the Department of Marine and Natural Resources indicate significant potential for future oil and gas production levels offshore Ireland.
The majority of these reserves are understood to be located in the Atlantic Ridge, a geological structure running parallel with the west coast of Ireland and part of the same geological formation as the North Sea reserves.
The fact that the Irish reserves are on this geological formation bodes well for their future development. The success of the Norwegian, Danish, Dutch and British fields at the other end of the structure is well documented. Closer to home, fields on the same structure such as Dunquin, which is estimated to contain 25 trillion cubic meters of gas and over 4,100 million barrels of oil, all increase the likelihood that the undeveloped reserves will be both technically and economically recoverable.
A recently published government report shows potential reserves of 130 billion barrels of oil and 50 trillion cubic feet of gas. Given Ireland's geographic location, there is significant scope for these reserves to be exported. Subject to the construction of suitable loading facilities, the oil can be relatively easily exported by tanker to anywhere in the world. The existing gas interconnection capacity with the UK could easily be reversed through the construction of new compression facilities, creating scope to export gas to the UK or even Continental Europe. Construction of LNG export facilities is also a possibility.
If developed, the Atlantic Ridge reserves would give a significant fillip to current indigenous production levels in Ireland. Currently, Ireland produces only a fraction of the gas and oil it needs, creating a significant level of import dependence.
Ireland's first indigenous gas reserves were discovered off the southwest coast in 1971 as a by-product of a search for oil. Currently, the majority of Ireland's indigenous gas production activity takes place off of the Kinsale Head area. Smaller levels of production are sourced from the Seven Heads area, although this development has been significantly impacted by technical problems leading to a rapid decline in output.
Industry players developing the Atlantic Ridge reserves will no doubt be hoping to avoid the problems encountered by the developers of the Corrib field, located 70km offshore the northwest coast. Corrib was first discovered in 1996 by Enterprise Oil and was the first significant new gas discovery in Irish wasters since Kinsale Head. In 2002, Enterprise Oil was acquired by Shell and the operating license of Corrib transferred to Shell, with the project owned by Shell E&P Ireland Limited (45%), Statoil (36.5%) and Marathon (18.5%). A long series of legal and planning related delays relating both to the project itself and associated infrastructure development have resulted in the project remaining years behind schedule.
If the new Atlantic Ridge reserves can be developed in a timely, cost-effective and streamlined manner, significant scope exists to transform the Irish energy sector and create a massive injection to the Irish economy.
Comments (17 of 17)
Jump To Comment: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17Strangely, this was noticed by comedians on the RTE show The Panel. You can see a clip here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZO18OMJfWlg
Now that the SWP has revealed that vast reserves of oil and gas are just waiting to be plucked from beneath the sea bed off our west coast, why wait for Shell and all the other capitalist exploiters to steal our patrimony?
Seeing all this wealth is such a sure thing, why doesn't the SWP itself hire a drilling rig, and after paying itself the usual average industrial wage for its efforts on behalf of the Irish people, distribute the balance of this fabulous treasure trove of natural resources among the populace?
(And don't let the fact that only one in twenty wells drilled off our west coast has shown hyrdocarbons, and one in thirty has produced a commercial find - Sure, the SWP is good for the money, and it won't need to ask the Irish people to pay up front for the cost of drilling the dry wells.
Unless the Irish left is prepared to meet the REALITIES of economic life with real answers rather than utopian claptrap it will continue to lose the war of ideas. Ignoring or censoring the hard questions will only convince ordinary people that a vote for the left is a vote for the brain-dead.
Now guys and gals of the left - how do you both get the oil out of the ground and also insulate the population of a small nation from the cost risks attendant on surveying and drilling for oil?
Shell to Sea told to go away?
Don't think the election was a referendum on Shell to Sea was it? It wasn't mentioned on my ballot paper.
The coming weeks will be interesting though. How is Bertie going to square having the Greens in government given their stated support for a full review of the Corrib scheme, or maybe he'll invite independents like Tony Gregory or Finian McGrath, or Labour complete with party president Michael D Higgins.
At the moment there is no pipeline route, no compulsory purchase or acquisition orders, and no community consent. If Shell try heavy-handed tactics like they did with the Rossport Five this time next year then will there be political will in Fiann Fáil to support them?
And if Beverly Flynn should be the weak link in the chain, and a by-election called in Mayo...
Yeah but some aren't, and they may be central to the next government. Maybe they'll abandon their support for Shell to Sea, but maybe they won't.
"Now guys and gals of the left - how do you both get the oil out of the ground and also insulate the population of a small nation from the cost risks attendant on surveying and drilling for oil"
Maybe we could ask the Norwegians?
(Or maybe you can explain how the shareholders in a company like Marathon can afford the "risks" associated with profiting from the oil and gas off the Irish coast, but a nation state like Ireland can't.)
"Don't think the election was a referendum on was it? It wasn't mentioned on my ballot paper. "
Now but cowley and murray were (the political faces of Shell to Sea ).
cowley himself admitted on mid west radio that it had cost him the election.
dont worry about the greens or m.d. higgins, they wont be needed , and flynn I predict will suddenly pay rte everything she owes, (probably shells money).
So H I fear the writing is on the wall "Shell to Sea came "they saw" "they caused strife" and now they leave!
"Or maybe you can explain how the shareholders in a company like Marathon can afford the "risks" associated with profiting from the oil and gas off the Irish coast, but a nation state like Ireland can't."
Marathon, like other oil companies, can only survive and prosper by investing in a variety of opportunities ranging from low risk (such as purchasing reserves from other companies or enhaced production from existing fields) to high risk (such as exporation in frontier areas such as offshore west of Ireland). Too many high risk investments is destined to result in huge losses - unfortunately, all exploration off the west coast of Ireland is high risk (even close to existing production from the Kinsale field exploration is medium risk at best).
"political faces of shell to sea"?
right.
well, given that they were by no means representing shell to sea, them not getting elected doesn't really reflect on the campaign at all now does it? there's not even one mention of shell to sea on cowley's website, as far as i can see.
given the amount of anarchsts involved with shell to sea - people who refuse to participate in elections and electioneering - it's a bit stupid to suddenly act like they were running candidates, eh?
you're a bit rubbish really, aren't you?
I seethe with anger when I think about the blatant rip off of our resources by a short sighted, forelock tugging Fianna fail. Now thats there even more reserves available I cringe at what giveaway deal these incompetent morons will throw together now they feel their entire programme for government has been endorsed by a foolish electorate.
Where is Hugo Chavez when you need him.
Anybody who thinks the election was a referendum on the S2S campaign is not very politically aware.
The people of Mayo voted for power in government, pure and simple.
Cowley was not in a position to deliver that power last time so now Mayo has gambled that
FG can deliver, with a side-bet on FF.
The irony is that were Cowley re-elected he would probably now be in a position to
exert significant influence on the new govt.
It looks like Mayo may have called it wrong again.
Probably the only winners will be the people of Ballina. But if Calleary doesn't deliver for Ballina
he'll go the way of Moffatt and Cowley.
When it came to voting very few people considered pro/con S2S. We're much too self-interested for that.
Will the result damage the S2S campaign? - not a chance. In fact it's only starting to get interesting.
The economic downturn which is now beginning will shortly start to focus people's minds on the
gas and oil giveaway , the 'economic treason' which could fund our public services.
S2S will emerge from this as heros for attempting to safeguard our resources from incompetent politicians and greedy corporations.
Jack,
Its like this if Dr Cowley had of been elected the Shelltoseaers would have been shouting from the mountain tops ,bonfires would have been lit and statements would have been released confirming that the people of mayo have spoken.
Unfortunately for them this failed to materialize, Now we have stsers claiming that the election was not a referendum on the corrib project , well it that is now the case , can anybody explain the statement on the sts webpage which Dr Garvan called for people to support Dr Cowley.
When it came to the crunch the people were not interested in sts
Neither Jerry Cowley or Mark Garavan are "approved" candidates in any sense. Many people involved in the Shell to Sea campaign in Mayo voted for Gerry Murray, or other candidates. For Dr. Cowley to depict himself as a Shell to Sea candidate was false, except in the sense that he supported the campaign. So do lots of people.
Some people within the campaign will mourn the loss of Dr Cowley's seat, but many wil be glad that his influence over Shell to Sea will be reduced.
If you're interested, many Shell to Sea activists who can vote in the Seanad elections will vote for the Green Party in preference to Mark Garavan.
Shell to Sea is a loose network of activists, not a political movement. There are people involved from all parties (including some unlikely ones) and none.
Would you ascribe the loss of John Carty's seat to his support for Shell?
"When it came to the crunch the people were not interested in sts"
Not quite. When it came to the election the people were not interested in sts.
The opinion polls show that most mayo people would like to see the refinery re-located.
But its not an election issue. The people looked at the bigger picture. Cowley was traded
for another FG td. in order to get something worthwhile for mayo.
There is a lot of spin around Cowley's loss but nobody really believes that it happened because of his
stance on the refinery. For instance, his office and his voter base was in ballina but he was undermined and implicitly attacked by ballina chamber of commerce before the election. It just so happens that Calleary has close links with the chamber of commerce. The bcc is regularly accused of meddling in politics. It also took sides in the Nice referendum and ironically most of ballina's job
losses went to the newly-acceded eastern european countries.
So you see its not quite as straightforward as we might like to believe.
"Now guys and gals of the left - how do you both get the oil out of the ground and also insulate the population of a small nation from the cost risks attendant on surveying and drilling for oil"
"Maybe we could ask the Norwegians? "
Still a valid question. How come we can''t do it but Norway can?
The figures quoted from the Energy Business Review report which in turn cites 'a recently published government report' for estimated reserves of 130 billion barrels of oil (100Gb) are very suspect.
It is important to put this figure in prospective. The reserve figures for Iraq are supposed to be around 100 Gb too as are those of Iran. During the mid to late 90s there was huge interest in the Caspian Sea area and reserves were 'estimated' to be anywhere from 100Gb to 200Gb -effectively the equivalent of another Saudi Arabia. In the end it took one of the leading geologists working for the oil company Total to admit that total recoverable reserves were only about 17 Gb -a huge reduction.
When figures for oil reserves are given in different forms which are: proven, probable and possible. Proven are defined as reasonably certain with current technologies and are often given a 90% certain and are quoted as P90 reserves. Probable are often interpreted as 50% likely and given as P50, while possible reserves refer to just that and are given as 10% certain and indicated as P10.
The big question then is which of these three categories should be applied to the figures quoted. Ideally a link to the main source would be very useful if anyone knows where it is. I suspect it is the P10 figure along with gross extrapolation from a sparse set of data. However in this instance it is in the oil companies interest to use this exaggerated figure because government officials and ministers would be drooling at the prospect of any bonzana and so would be very open to make tax rates low, and helping in any way through government subsidies to get this oil out. In effect it is in the oil companies interest to get the government to pay as much as possible for any related infrastruture and thereby reduce their own costs. You can be sure that the estimates made by the government used data supplied by industry from their exploratory wells.
As many will now nearly all of the oil basins of the world have been explored and oil finds peaked back in the mid 60s. Parts of the Atlantic off Ireland were explored back in the 1970s and it is likely if they were any truly big fields they may have found them. Should these reserve figures stand up, then it would be highly unusual in terms of the long term discovery trends. And if they do hold up, then we can be sure the Western seaboard of this country will be destroyed by the scramble of these corporations to get their hands on this oil at any cost. In short it would be a disaster for this country, because we do not have sufficient checks and balances in our fragile democracy as it is, to deal with such an onslaught of what would inevitably be one huge grab regardless of environmental and other costs.
The website energybulletin.net carries an article today that also refutes the figures published by the Petroleum Affairs Division of the Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources and is agreement with the above comment about careful use of the type of reserves specified. The author quotes Colin Campbell who also is quite sceptical of the figures. Here's a few extracts from the article.
Where is all this fossil energy actually to come from and why have we not been aware of it until now? I asked oil geologist Colin Campbell, founder of ASPO, for his comments on the geological likelihood of such discoveries. He kindly sent the following response:
“It seems that the Petroleum Affairs Department (PAD) has made an assessment of Ireland’s oil and gas potential. I stress the word - potential. Most of these claimed reserves reflect simply the size of the untested prospects, which may or may not contain oil or gas. The report is couched in terms of so-called Probability, similar to that of the US Geological Survey.
He continues ...
For example in the case of un-drilled East Greenland, the USGS estimates that there is a 95% Probability of more than zero (namely at least one barrel) ; and a 5% Probability of more than 111.815 billion barrels (quoted to 3 decimal places !!). From this range a Mean Probability of 47.148 billion is computed. The Mean value is supposed to be the best but I think the High Probability case is the only one to be taken seriously.
The Atlantic Margin, of which the report speaks, has been subject to large vertical movements of the crust, which tend to destroy the petroleum systems, and also largely lacks the critical Upper Jurassic source rocks which provide most of the oil in the North Sea. It has been drilled off Norway, the Faroes, Iceland and Scotland, as well as Ireland, without notable success. It has however yielded a couple of fields west of the Shetlands under almost freak conditions whereby some oil was generated and collected in a late Cretaceous structure but later re-migrated under new structural conditions to collect in an adjoining structure. The chances for gas are however somewhat better.
This last sentence seems to be in line with the discovery with the Corrib field.
The author finishes quite rightly by saying:
Far from being on the verge of an oil-and-gas bonanza, I’m afraid the country is more likely to be on the verge of a nervous breakdown as its increasing dependency on imported fuels, with new motorways and expanding airports in the pipeline, leave Ireland ever-more vulnerable to Peak Oil when it comes.
Any new discoveries of oil should be used to carefully develop genuinely low-impact, sustainable infrastructure and localized economies, not to increase GDP.
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