Niobrara shale formation
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The Niobrara Shale formation is an oil and natural gas play spanning northeastern Colorado and portions of Kansas, Nebraska, and Wyoming. The shale in the formation ranges from 900 feet to 1,800 feet thick. The Niobrara region was formed approximately 145.5 million years to 65.5 million years ago by an inland sea that deposited layers of shale, limestone, and marl into the area. Several basins are found within the Niobrara formation, including the Denver-Julesburg, Powder River, Green River, North Park, Sand Wash Laramie, and Ranton basins. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, operators produced 1,294 barrels of crude oil per day and 4,285 thousand cubic feet of natural gas per day in the region as of March 2017.[1][2]
The image below shows examples of the wells used to extract oil and gas resources from shale rock formations like the Niobrara Shale formation.
Production
Oil and gas operations in the Niobrara region began in 2009 when a well was drilled in Wyoming. The two images below show oil and natural gas production from the Niobrara Shale from 2008 to March 2017, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.[3][4][5][2]
Operators
The top five oil and gas producers with operations in the Niobrara formation as of August 2016 included Anadarko Petroleum, Noble Energy, Devon Energy, EOG Resources, and Whiting Petroleum.[6]
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See also
Footnotes
- ↑ The Niobrara News, "Niobrara Formation Genesis," accessed April 18, 2014
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 U.S. Energy Information Administration, "Niobrara Drilling Productivity Report," accessed April 12, 2017
- ↑ Six thousand feet of gas equals about one barrel of oil, which equals about 19 gallons of gasoline.
- ↑ U.S. Geological Survey, "World level summary of petroleum estimates for undiscovered conventional petroleum and reserve growth for oil, gas, and natural gas liquids (NGL)., 2000," accessed April 23, 2014
- ↑ U.S. Energy Information Administration, "Frequently Asked Questions," May 30, 2013
- ↑ The Motley Fool, "The 5 Companies Dominating the Niobrara Shale Play," August 25, 2016
