USGS Estimates 53 Trillion Cubic Feet of Gas Resources in Barnett Shale plus 2 more

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Title: USGS Newsroom

USGS Estimates 53 Trillion Cubic Feet of Gas Resources in Barnett Shale plus 2 more

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• USGS Estimates 53 Trillion Cubic Feet of Gas Resources in Barnett Shale
• U.S. Reliance on Nonfuel Mineral Imports Increasing
• Intersex Prevalent in Black Bass Inhabiting National Wildlife Refuges in Northeast

USGS Estimates 53 Trillion Cubic Feet of Gas Resources in Barnett Shale

Posted: 17 Dec 2015 07:00 AM PST

Summary: The Barnett Shale contains estimated mean volumes of 53 trillion cubic feet of shale natural gas, 172 million barrels of shale oil and 176 million barrels of natural gas liquids, according to an updated assessment by the U.S. Geological Survey

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This estimate is double the 2003 USGS assessment of the Barnett

Contact Information:

Kristen  Marra ( Phone: 303-236-7756 ); Alex Demas ( Phone: 571-335-6535 );

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The Barnett Shale contains estimated mean volumes of 53 trillion cubic feet of shale natural gas, 172 million barrels of shale oil and 176 million barrels of natural gas liquids, according to an updated assessment by the U.S. Geological Survey. This estimate is for undiscovered, technically recoverable resources.

The previous USGS assessment of the Barnett Shale, which is located in Texas, was released in 2003 as part of an assessment of conventional and unconventional (continuous) reservoirs of the Bend Arch-Fort Worth Basin Province. That assessment estimated a mean of 26.2 trillion cubic feet of undiscovered natural gas and 1.0 billion barrels of undiscovered natural gas liquids within the Barnett Shale. Potential oil resources were not quantitatively assessed for the Barnett at that time.

“We decided to reassess the Barnett Shale following the successful introduction of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing, setting the stage for the current shale gas boom,” said USGS scientist Kristen Marra, who led the assessment. “In addition, the newly revised assessment incorporates estimates for both gas and oil resources within the Barnett.”

The substantial increase in potential resources is largely due to the oil and gas industry’s switch to primarily horizontal drilling within the Barnett, paired with hydraulic fracturing. The 2003 USGS assessment relied solely on vertical drilling. Since 2003, more than 16,000 horizontal wells have been drilled into the formation. Those wells have helped produce more than 15 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and 59 million barrels of oil in the Barnett since the 2003 assessment.

The Barnett Shale is a significant source of potential natural gas resources. For comparison, in 2011, USGS estimated that the Marcellus Shale contained a mean of 84 trillion cubic feet of undiscovered natural gas. The Marcellus has helped fuel the shale gas boom in Pennsylvania and West Virginia.

Horizontal drilling is the practice of angling the well bore to travel along the rock layer, instead of drilling vertically through the formation. It is often paired with the practice of hydraulic fracturing to develop continuous oil and gas.

The Barnett Shale is not the only formation that USGS has reassessed as technology and geologic understanding have advanced. In 2013, USGS released an updated assessment of the Bakken Formation in North Dakota, and the 2011 assessment of the Marcellus Shale was itself an update from an earlier assessment.

USGS is the only provider of publicly available estimates of undiscovered technically recoverable oil and gas resources of onshore lands and offshore state waters. The USGS Barnett Shale assessment was undertaken as part of a nationwide project assessing domestic petroleum basins using standardized methodology and protocol.

The new assessment of the Barnett Shale may be found online. The 2003 Bend Arch-Fort Worth Basin assessment, which included the Barnett Shale, can also be found online. To find out more about USGS energy assessments and other energy research, please visit the USGS Energy Resources Program website, sign up for our Newsletter and follow us on Twitter.

A map showing the Barnett Shale assessment area in east Texas. (High resolution image)

U.S. Reliance on Nonfuel Mineral Imports Increasing

Posted: 17 Dec 2015 06:00 AM PST

Summary: Key nonfuel mineral commodities that support the U.S. economy and national security are increasingly being sourced from outside the U.S., according to a new U.S. Geological Survey publication

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Contact Information:

Steven M. Fortier ( Phone: 571-386-8587 ); Hannah Hamilton ( Phone: 703-648-4356 );

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Key nonfuel mineral commodities that support the U.S. economy and national security are increasingly being sourced from outside the U.S., according to a new U.S. Geological Survey publication.

Over the past 60 years, there has been an increase in the number and diversity of nonfuel commodities that the U.S. imports as well as the extent to which the U.S. is import reliant. In 1954, for example, the U.S. was 100 percent import reliant for the supply of eight minerals commodities, meaning all of the supply came from outside of the U.S. By 2014 this number had increased to 19.

“Because the global distribution of mineral reserves and resources is not uniform, the United States has always been import reliant for some mineral commodities. It is important to recognize, however, that import reliance does not necessarily mean that there is a supply risk,” said Steven M. Fortier, Director of the USGS National Minerals Information Center.  “Essentially, the type of commodities imported and the countries from which they are sourced determine risk related to import reliance.”

In addition, the new report also found the geographic distribution of sources has also changed dramatically. In 1954, the sources for imported mineral commodities were dominantly in the Western Hemisphere, with Canada, Mexico and Brazil as major suppliers. While these countries remain major suppliers today, the geographic distribution of mineral commodity import sources had become much more global with many new sources, particularly in Asia, by 1984. This trend has continued. By 2014, China had surpassed Canada as the leading import source, supplying 24 nonfuel mineral commodities, about half of the 47 nonfuel mineral commodities for which the United States was greater than 50 percent net import reliant.

“As the U.S. becomes increasingly reliant on a wide range of mineral resources needed to fuel technological developments that support our economy and national security, it is more important than ever that we continue to monitor and evaluate global changes in supply and demand of these important resources,” said Fortier.

Intersex Prevalent in Black Bass Inhabiting National Wildlife Refuges in Northeast

Posted: 17 Dec 2015 05:00 AM PST

Summary: Eighty five percent of male smallmouth bass and 27 percent of male largemouth bass tested in waters in or near 19 National Wildlife Refuges in the Northeast U.S. were intersex, according to a new study by U.S. Geological Survey and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service researchers

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Contact Information:

Luke Iwanowicz ( Phone: 304-724-4550 ); Fred Pinkney ( Phone: 410-573-4544 ); Hannah Hamilton ( Phone: 703-648-4356 );

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Eighty five percent of male smallmouth bass and 27 percent of male largemouth bass tested in waters in or near 19 National Wildlife Refuges in the Northeast U.S. were intersex, according to a new study by U.S. Geological Survey and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service researchers.

Intersex is when one sex develops characteristics of the opposite sex. It is tied to the exposure of fish to endocrine-disrupting chemicals that can affect the reproductive system and cause the development of characteristics of the opposite sex, such as immature eggs in the testes of male fish. Intersex is a global issue, as wild-caught fish affected by endocrine-disrupting chemicals have been found in locations across the world.

Estrogenic endocrine-disrupting chemicals are derived from a variety of sources, from natural estrogens to synthetic pharmaceuticals and agrochemicals that enter the waterways. Examples include some types of birth control pills, natural sex hormones in livestock manures, herbicides and pesticides. 

“It is not clear what the specific cause of intersex is in these fish,” said Luke Iwanowicz, a USGS research biologist and lead author of the paper. “This study was designed to identify locations that may warrant further investigation.  Chemical analyses of fish or water samples at collection sites were not conducted, so we cannot attribute the observation of intersex to specific, known estrogenic endocrine—disrupting chemicals.”

This prevalence of intersex fish in this study is much higher than that found in a similar USGS study that evaluated intersex in black basses in nine river basins in the United States. That study did not include river basins in the Northeast.

"The results of this new study show the extent of endocrine disrupting chemicals on refuge lands using bass as an indicator for exposures that may affect fish and other aquatic species," said Fred Pinkney, a USFWS contaminants biologist and study coauthor. "To help address this issue, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service encourages management actions that reduce runoff into streams, ponds and lakes -- both on and off of refuge lands.”

The journal article, Evidence of estrogenic endocrine disruption in smallmouth and largemouth bass inhabiting Northeast U.S. National Wildlife Refuge waters: a reconnaissance study,” by L.R. Iwanowicz, V.S. Blazer, A.E. Pinkney, C.P. Guy, A.M. Major, K. Munney, S. Mierzykowski, S. Lingenfelser, A. Secord, K. Patnode, T.J. Kubiak, C. Stern, C.M. Hahn, D.D. Iwanowicz, H.L. Walsh, and A. Sperry is available online in Ecotoxicology and Environmental Safety.