Trump will go full steam ahead with drilling and mining in US

Nixing the deal that would let Nippon Steel buy US Steel is one of the few issues upon which there is agreement between Trump and Biden and it's an incredibly bad decision. It's an "America First" sop to Trump's working class supporters and rather than saving American jobs in the steel industry it will probably end up costing them. US Steel desperately needs the additional capital from Nippon to modernize and if it's not forthcoming it could be the final nail in the coffin of what was once one of America's largest corporations and employers.

 

further, it would create a formidable competitor to China & bolster our objectives in Asia. This is America last.

 

And ignore 3 decades of success doing this. I can't believe we could be this stupid. There has to be more than just race to this, although Biden did mention "national security", which is utterly laughable. The expansion is HERE. Not to mention, they don't really have the population numbers to "take our jobs" even if they wanted to, which they don't.

 

Wow - how novel! Did you just think of that? Would love to see all posts about Biden - and his incapacity-from the posters implying Musk is POTUS. Rarer than a virgin in Tallahassee

 

Yes, I imagine he’ll take credit for the record breaking production out of the GoM that came under Biden’s watch…

 

Gas needs to be about 3 dollars a gallon. US oil companies won’t increase production unless the price per barrel is adequate for them to make a profit.

 

Well it’s over $3 here

 

I think they are (correctly) banking on the fact that no one in power will let them go out of business. Who's going to be the president that lets US Steel fail? Capitalism isnt real, its a vibes based economy.

 

We’re literally breaking records in the GOM and BLM is reporting record number of permit for Federal lands. Even some O&G CEOs are confused where they’re expected to exploit additional reserves.

I know of some ultra deepwater and HPHT proven and unproven reserves that aren’t being exploited, but you’re in the >$90 per barrel before those became viable, IIRC. Ultra deepwater’s honestly probably higher.

 

lots of shallower stuff off of Africa and south america with less regulations. interesting read here on current cost of offshore and growth areas. US can't compete with price from some of these wells

Offshore oil is back. At what cost? – Global Relay Intelligence & Practice

The discovery – which is rapidly transforming Guyana into the world’s newest petrostate – has spurred new exploration by oil majors and some national oil companies in frontiers from Brazil to Angola.

Last month, France’s TotalEnergies greenlit its $10.5bn GranMorgu project in Suriname, which borders Guyana. Off the coast of Namibia, Portugal’s Galp, along with Shell and Total, have also made huge discoveries.

The renaissance in offshore drilling has big geopolitical implications. For the past 12 years, the shale patch, dominated by the US, has been the biggest source of western oil growth and transformed the US into the world’s top supplier.

But next year, deepwater is predicted to outstrip shale as the biggest source of production growth outside the Opec cartel, giving it a crucial role in western capitals at a time of growing international tension.

 

Trust me when I say you do not want the GOM to go the way of (most) of offshore Africa. Even then, shelf oil is almost always going to be cheaper than when you need a semi-sub to do the work and a floating production platform/boat/spar/whatever to refine and pump it to boats. I worked two months off Angola and the things we got away with would be borderline criminal in the US. I do think Angola’s updated their regulatory framework, but I don’t really pay much attention to the West African market much. Intentionally.

What we have on the GOM shelf left is mostly High Pressure/High Temperature (HPHT.) IIRC, McMoRan drilled a wildcat well that went waaaaaaay over cost a few years back. Hell, the first 20K BOP stacks weren’t even deployed until 2021. Think of the drawworks, riser, and other langniappe needed to deploy that monster. I believe Transocean deployed this on an ultradeepwater operation, but I’m more on the workover and decommissioning side these days.

Also: oil you can exploit with a jackup and traditional pipeline will always be cheaper. No deepwater project is going to compete with that.

 

I've read reports of the shallow shelf replenishing. any substance to that

 

I’m unaware of any material changes or even if that’s possible. Migration from source rock isn’t that rapid, assuming that source rock still has product or if the reservoir is still even in contact with it. Diagenic and catagenic processes are slooooow and on a geologic scale.

I know we’ve seen more sustained casing pressure on the shelf, but that’s mostly from water-driven wells. At that point you’re extracting more produced (and rather toxic) water with less hydrocarbon that makes economic sense… assuming you’re even getting hydrocarbons back at appreciable levels. Also? These wells’ casing often looks like Swiss cheese on a good day.

 

The vast majority of the oil produced here in the US is light crude which is exported. Currently, we are importing about 6.2M barrels of heavy crude and exporting 3.6M barrels of light crude per day.

I'm not an economist, but I don't see how increasing the volume of oil we export will effect gas prices domestically. Maybe someone on the board who knows economics can educate us?

Looks like Old g8orbill is really reaching with this post.

 

it will not.

increasing refinery capacity would impact domestic gas prices.
decreasing demand by putting fleet vehicles on electricity would decrease domestic gas prices.

ignoring a pandemic and causing hundreds of thousands to die will decrease demand enough to drop domestic gas prices..worked last time, just sayin..

saudi opening the spigots and driving price down to punish Iran and russia would drive domestic gas prices down some. it would also reduce domestic drilling and related financial impacts

 

My “I don’t know production facilities, but I stayed at a Holiday Inn” question would be why we don’t retool our refineries to handle domestic production.

My “idiot who knows too little” self says that it’s because the disruption to production refineries would be catastrophic in the short and mid term, if the changes were even economically possible.

 

refineries built to handle Venezuelan crude found light sweet instead and now cost too much in downtime and equipment to retool so we import what we have to in order for the blend to keep working. capital is starting to see an opportunity as the crack spread remains so high and light sweet is cheap at the well

why don't we see more of these to take advantage of domestic production and discounted wellhead prices

First significant U.S refinery in 50 years to be built in Texas - BIC Magazine

Element Fuels Holdings, LLC, a company founded to develop and operate scalable, next-generation clean fuels production, has completed site preparation and pre-construction on a new hydrogen-powered refinery and combined-cycle power plant within the Port of Brownsville, Texas.

The Element complex is innovatively designed to produce and recycle hydrogen using advanced technologies that will generate and deliver significantly cleaner, higher-quality fuels, including much-needed high-octane gasoline and electricity for commercial and consumer consumption.

“Element Fuels has received the necessary permitting to construct and operate a refinery capable of producing in excess of 160,000 barrels, or approximately 6.7 million gallons, per day of finished gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel,” said Founder and Co-CEO John Calce. “A permit for a greenfield refinery of this size, scope, and functionality has not been granted in the United States since the 1970’s. This speaks to the innovative approaches we are taking to address climate and sustainability concerns in cleaner, greener ways that are new to the refinery space.”

Expected to be operational in 2027, Element Fuels’ first-of-its-kind refinery combines advanced, commercially proven technologies, provided by best-in-class partners. Designed to process exclusively high-gravity domestic shale oil, the refinery will produce low-carbon intensity fuels that will materially reduce carbon emissions.

 

Thank you. I did.

 

“The facility will also produce enough low-carbon hydrogen to supply approximately 100% of the refinery’s fuel requirements, essentially eliminating CO2 emissions.”

I’d be curious to the the chemistry behind this. Really curious. Is “essentially eliminating” referring to carbon credits or the actual process? I’m not aware of any (exothermic) organic reaction that doesn’t result in CO2.

 

is there a permit search feature like with muni's and fdep where one can pull the permit plans or are they proprietary or protected?

use nat gas to produce hydrogen to produce gasoline and electricity..does that make it essentially eliminating the carbon normally produced during refinery operations and carbon produced making electricity? maybe add solar or wind power to the hydrogen production power matrix??

lighter oil requires less power to crack? less residual carbon??

define essentially

Home - Element Fuels

The hydrogen-powered refinery is designed to process exclusively high gravity domestic shale oil into low-carbon intensity fuels that will materially reduce carbon emissions. In addition, the company is constructing a natural gas combined-cycle power plant with the capability to incorporate hydrogen to generate utility-scale electricity which will be made available to ERCOT to support the surrounding community’s needs.