Shale gas - a breakthrough in the raw materials industry or a hidden danger. What is shale gas

What is Shale Gas

Shale gas is natural gas, which is extracted from shale wells, namely from a gas-rich rock - shale.

What is Shale Gas – in simple words – briefly.

In simple words, shale gas is almost the same natural gas as the one that is extracted from more familiar gas deposits, but it is produced in a different way, which we will discuss later.

What is Slate.

Before proceeding to a brief description of how shale gas is produced, it is necessary to understand what exactly is the very shale from which gas is extracted.

Slate is a very common form of sedimentary rock that is found almost all over the world. This rock is formed from sand, mud, clay and other small particles of minerals such as quartz. Over time, this mixture precipitates and shrinks strongly to form shale deposits. Similar beds are found in rocks from the Paleozoic and Mesozoic period, which leads us to the fact that they are on average 500 to 700 million years old. In addition to the fact that shale contains natural gas, this rock includes a whole range of useful organic substances that can be used by people for various purposes. Quite often, slate is used for various industrial purposes as a filler for concrete or bricks. Also, shale formations serve as an invaluable source of scientific information about the ancient era of our planet. The fact is that shale contains a huge number of all kinds of fossils that can provide information about different times in the geological history of the Earth.

Shale gas production - how shale gas is produced.

As with many other mining methods, shale gas production technology consists of several critical steps:

• Intelligence service;
• Drilling a network of wells;
• Installation of gas collection equipment;
• Creation of hydraulic breaks;
• Collection and sorting of products obtained from wells.

Intelligence service.

At this stage, a company that plans to produce gas evaluates profitability and other indicators related to production and environmental impact. If environmental standards comply with the legislation of the region, the process of drilling several test wells begins. They will be sampled for the amount of gas contained in the shale. If everything is in order, then the company proceeds to the next stage of work.

Drilling.

The process of drilling wells for shale gas production is quite different from the standard “just drill a deep hole in the ground”. The thing is that, unlike the traditional method of extracting gas from gas deposits, such a scheme does not work with shale. The main difference is the fact that shale gas is not located in the conditional "gas bubble underground". It is contained in tiny pores in a shale formation located horizontally below the surface. Thus, having drilled a vertical well to a certain depth, it is taken to a horizontal plane and drilled further as long as necessary. Thus, several (possibly dozens) of such wells are created at the production site.

After the process of direct drilling, the wells are sealed. This is necessary in order to prevent the uncontrolled release of gas and other chemical materials associated with production. In simple words, the inserted pipes are insulated with various hermetic seals that do not allow gas to pass to the surface.

Installation of gas collection equipment.

In simple words, equipment is installed on the pipes that will receive, sort and send the resulting product further to its destination.

Creation of hydraulic breaks.

This is the most unique part of the shale gas production process. The fact is that, as we already know, the required gas is contained in the “pores” of the reservoir, and it is naturally not going to come out by itself. In order for it to begin to stand out, the miners need to destroy the structure of the reservoir and release the gas trapped there. For these purposes, a special pyrotechnic charge is advanced almost to the very end of the pipe. It shoots in the right place creating holes in the pipe and breaks the structure of the reservoir creating cracks in it. In this field, a special mixture of water and sand is pumped into the pipe under high pressure, which actually fills the created cracks. Sand, in turn, does not allow cracks to close back and perfectly passes gas. A similar procedure, if necessary, is repeated over the entire horizontal plane of the well.

Collection, sorting, storage and delivery of gas.

As it has already become clear from the previous stage, after manipulations with hydraulic fracturing, gas, water and other materials that are contained in the bowels begin to flow into the pipes. On the surface, specially installed sorting plants separate gas and water. The gas is sent to special collectors, and the water, in turn, is processed and reused to create hydraulic breaks. This is how shale gas is produced.

Oddly enough, but for the first time the presence of gas in shale was discovered back in 1821 in the bowels of the United States. The discovery belongs to William Hart, who, while exploring the soil of New York, stumbled upon something unidentified. They talked about the discovery for a couple of weeks, after which they forgot, since it was easier to extract oil - it itself poured out to the surface of the earth, and shale gas had to be somehow extracted from the depths.

For more than 160 years, the issue of shale gas production has remained closed. The reserves of light oil were enough for all the needs of mankind, and it was technically difficult to imagine the production of gas from shale. By the beginning of the 21st century, active development of oil fields began, where oil had to be literally pulled out of the bowels of the earth. Naturally, this has significantly influenced the development of technology, and now to extract gas from strong shale rocks and prepare it for use. In addition, experts began to say that oil reserves are coming to an end (although this is not the case).

As a result, in early 2000, Tom Ward and George Mitchell, developed a strategy for large-scale production of natural gas from shale in the United States. DevonEnergy took it upon itself to bring it to life, and it started from the Barnett field. The business got off to a good start and the technology needed to continue to be developed to speed up production and increase the depth of production. In this regard, in 2002, a different drilling method was used in the Texas field. The combination of directional mining with horizontal elements has become an innovation in the gas industry. Now the concept of "hydraulic fracturing" has appeared, due to which shale gas production has increased several times. In 2009, the so-called "gas revolution" took place in the United States, and this country became a leader in the production of this type of fuel - more than 745 billion cubic meters.

The reason for this jump in the development of shale production was the desire of the United States to become a fuel-independent country. Previously, it was considered the main consumer of oil, but now it has ceased to need additional resources. And although the profitability of gas production itself is now negative, the costs are covered by the development of unconventional sources.

In just 6 months of 2010, global companies have invested more than 21 billion dollars of assets in the development of technologies and shale gas production. Initially, it was believed that the shale revolution was nothing more than an advertising ploy, a marketing ploy by companies to replenish assets. But in 2011, gas prices in the United States began to fall actively, and the question of the veracity of the developments disappeared by itself.

In 2012, shale gas production became profitable. Prices on the market, although they did not change, were still below the cost of production and preparation of this modern type of fuel. But by the end of 2012, due to the global economic crisis, this growth stopped, and some large companies that worked in this area simply closed. In 2014, the United States underwent a complete reorganization of all equipment and a change in production strategy, which led to the revival of the “shale revolution”. It is planned that by 2018 gas will become an excellent alternative fuel, which will allow oil to give time to recover.

The "shale revolution" is obviously taking over the minds of politicians and businessmen all over the world. The Americans hold the palm in this area, but, apparently, there is a possibility that the rest of the world will soon join them. Of course, there are states where there is practically no shale gas production - in Russia, for example, the main percentage of political and business elites are rather skeptical about this undertaking. At the same time, the matter is not so much in the factor of economic profitability. The most important circumstance that can affect the prospects of such an industry as shale gas production is the consequences for the environment. Today we will study this aspect.

What is shale gas?

But first, a little theoretical digression. What is a shale mineral that is extracted from a special type of minerals - The main method by which shale gas is extracted, the consequences of which we will study today, guided by the positions of experts, is fracking, or hydraulic fracturing. It's set up like this. A pipe is inserted into the bowels of the earth in an almost horizontal position, and one of its branches is brought to the surface.

In the process of fracking, pressure is built up in the gas storage, which causes shale gas to escape to the top, where it is collected. The extraction of the mentioned mineral has gained the greatest popularity in North America. According to some experts, the industry's revenue growth in the US market over the past few years has amounted to several hundred percent. However, unconditional economic success in terms of developing new methods of producing "blue fuel" may be accompanied by huge problems associated with the extraction of shale gas. They are, as we have already said, ecological in nature.

Harm to the environment

What the US and other energy powers should, according to experts, pay special attention to when working in such an area as shale gas production is the consequences for the environment. The most important threat to the environment is fraught with the main method of extracting minerals from the bowels of the earth. We are talking about the same fracking. It, as we have already said, is a supply of water into the earth's layer (under very high pressure). This kind of impact can have a pronounced negative impact on the environment.

Reagents in action

Technological features of fracking are not the only character. Current methods of extracting shale gas involve the use of several hundred varieties of reactive, and potentially toxic, substances. What does this mean? The fact is that the development of the corresponding deposits requires the use of large volumes of fresh water. Its density, as a rule, is less than that characteristic of groundwater. And therefore, light layers of liquid, one way or another, can eventually rise to the surface and reach the mixing zone with drinking sources. However, they are likely to contain toxic impurities.

Moreover, it is possible that light water will return to the surface contaminated not by chemical, but by completely natural, but still harmful to human health and the environment, substances that may be contained in the depths of the earth's interior. An indicative moment: it is known that it is planned to produce shale gas in Ukraine, in the Carpathian region. However, experts from one of the scientific centers conducted a study, during which it turned out that the layers of the earth in those regions that are supposed to contain shale gas are characterized by an increased content of metals - nickel, barium, uranium.

Technology miscalculation

By the way, a number of experts from Ukraine urge to pay attention not so much to the problems of shale gas production in terms of the use of harmful substances, but to the shortcomings in the technologies used by gas companies. Representatives of the scientific community of Ukraine in one of their reports on environmental issues put forward the relevant theses. What is their essence? The conclusions of scientists, in general, boil down to the fact that shale gas production in Ukraine can cause significant damage to soil fertility. The fact is that with those technologies that are used to isolate harmful substances, some materials will be located under arable soil. Accordingly, it will be problematic to grow something above them, in the upper layers of the soil.

Ukrainian bowels

There are also concerns among Ukrainian experts about the possible consumption of drinking water reserves, which can be a strategically significant resource. At the same time, already in 2010, when the shale revolution was just gaining momentum, the Ukrainian authorities issued licenses for shale gas exploration to companies like ExxonMobil and Shell. In 2012, exploration wells were drilled in the Kharkiv region.

This could indicate, experts believe, the interest of the Ukrainian authorities in the development of "shale" prospects, probably in order to reduce dependence on the supply of blue fuel from the Russian Federation. But now it is not known, analysts say, what are the future prospects for work in this direction (due to well-known political events).

Problem fracking

Continuing the discussion about the shortcomings of shale gas production technologies, one can also pay attention to other noteworthy theses. In particular, some substances can be used in fracking. They are used as fracturing fluids. At the same time, their frequent use can lead to a significant deterioration in the degree of rock permeability for water flows. In order to avoid this, gas workers can use water that uses soluble chemical derivatives of substances similar in composition to cellulose. And they pose a serious threat to human health.

Salts and radiation

There were precedents when the presence of chemicals in the waters in the area of ​​shale wells was recorded by scientists not only in the calculated aspect, but also in practice. After analyzing the water flowing into the sewage treatment plant in Pennsylvania, the experts found a much higher than normal level of salts - chlorides, bromides. Some of the substances found in water can react with atmospheric gases such as ozone, resulting in the formation of toxic products. Also, in some layers of the subsoil located in areas where shale gas is produced, the Americans discovered radium. Which is, therefore, radioactive. In addition to salts and radium, in the waters that are concentrated in areas where the main method of extracting shale gas (fracking) is used, scientists have discovered various kinds of benzenes and toluene.

legal loophole

Some lawyers point out that the environmental damage caused by American shale gas companies is almost legal in nature. The fact is that in 2005, a legal act was adopted in the United States, according to which the fracking method, or hydraulic fracturing, was withdrawn from the monitoring of the Environmental Protection Agency. This department, in particular, ensured that American businessmen acted in accordance with the provisions of the Drinking Water Protection Act.

However, with the adoption of a new legal act, US enterprises were able to operate outside the Agency's control zone. It has become possible, experts say, to extract shale oil and gas in close proximity to underground sources of drinking water. And this is despite the fact that the Agency, in one of its studies, concluded that the sources continue to become contaminated, and not so much during the fracking process, but some time after the completion of the work. Analysts believe that the law was passed not without political pressure.

Freedom in Europe

A number of experts emphasize that not only the Americans, but also the Europeans do not want to understand the dangers of shale gas production in the potential. In particular, the European Commission, which develops sources of law in various areas of the EU economy, did not even begin to create a separate law regulating environmental issues in this industry. The agency limited itself, analysts emphasize, to just issuing a recommendation that does not actually bind energy companies to anything.

At the same time, according to experts, the Europeans are not yet too keen on the earliest possible start of work on the extraction of blue fuel in practice. It is possible that all those discussions in the EU that are connected with the "shale" topic are just political speculations. And in fact, the Europeans, in principle, are not going to develop gas production by unconventional methods. At least in the near future.

Complaints without satisfaction

There is evidence that in those areas of the United States where shale gas is being produced, the consequences of an environmental nature have already made themselves felt - and not only at the level of industrial research, but also among ordinary citizens. Americans living next to wells where fracking is used began to notice that tap water had lost a lot of quality. They are trying to protest against shale gas production in their area. However, their capabilities, according to experts, are not comparable with the resources of energy corporations. The business scheme is quite simple. When there are claims from citizens, they form by hiring environmentalists. In accordance with these documents, drinking water must be in perfect order. If residents are not satisfied with these papers, then, as reported by a number of sources, gas workers pay them pre-trial compensation in exchange for signing non-disclosure agreements on such transactions. As a result, the citizen loses the right to report something to the press.

The verdict will not burden

If litigation is nevertheless initiated, then decisions that are not made in favor of energy companies are in fact not very burdensome for gas companies. In particular, according to some of them, corporations undertake to supply citizens with drinking water from environmentally friendly sources at their own expense or install treatment equipment for them. But if in the first case the affected residents, in principle, can be satisfied, then in the second - as experts believe - there may not be much reason for optimism, since some can still seep through the filters.

The authorities decide

There is an opinion among experts that interest in shale in the US, as well as in many other countries of the world, is largely political. This, in particular, may be evidenced by the fact that many gas corporations are supported by the government - especially in such an aspect as tax incentives. Experts assess the economic viability of the "shale revolution" ambiguously.

Drinking water factor

Above, we talked about the fact that Ukrainian experts question the prospects for shale gas production in their country, largely due to the fact that fracking technology may require spending large amounts of drinking water. I must say that similar concerns are expressed by experts from other states. The fact is that even without shale gas, it is already being observed in many regions of the planet. And it is likely that a similar situation may soon be observed in developed countries. And the "shale revolution", of course, will only help accelerate this process.

Ambiguous slate

There is an opinion that shale gas production in Russia and other countries is not developed at all, or at least not at the same pace as in America, just because of the factors we have considered. These are, first of all, the risks of environmental pollution with toxic, and sometimes radioactive, compounds that occur during fracking. There is also the possibility of depletion of drinking water reserves, which may soon become a resource that is not inferior to blue fuel in terms of importance even in developed countries. Of course, the economic component is also taken into account - there is no consensus among scientists on the profitability of shale deposits.

Myth 2: Shale gas is a third of nitrogen, not transportable, energy unsuitable.

Myth 4. Shale gas is very, very expensive to produce.

Disclaimer 1. Shale gas is harder to produce than traditional gas

To begin with, it is worthwhile to figure out whether this very shale revolution even exists or is it the fruit of an information war?

Myth 1: The shale revolution is a donut hole. It doesn’t really exist and it’s a bloated “duck”.

We will try to use fewer words and more facts and quantitative data. The easiest way to assess the relative scale of the shale revolution is to compare it with the production of other countries:

As you can see, shale gas production in the United States is second only to one country in the world - Russia. US shale gas exceeds at least twice all other gas producing countries and this has been achieved in just a few years. U.S. tight reservoir oil (mistakenly referred to as “shale oil”) is in fifth place, ahead of even such oil countries as Iraq and Iran:

The erroneous thesis about the insignificance of the shale revolution comes from ignorance of the simplest parameter - the volume of production of shale energy resources. A cursory glance is enough to see how huge the scale of shale hydrocarbon production is in just one country.

Myth 2: Shale gas is a third of nitrogen, non-transportable, energetically unsuitable.

It is difficult to say where the myth about the huge amount of non-hydrocarbon impurities in shale gas, which should lead to the mentioned phenomena, came from. Let us turn to the composition of the produced natural gas in the United States and evaluate the content of impurities:

The shale revolution was born in 2005-2008, and by the end of 2012, the share of shale gas in gas production was 35%. The graph shows that the share of non-hydrocarbon gases (nitrogen, carbon dioxide, etc.) has not changed in any way from 2005 to 2013 and methane + homologues still make up 97% -97.5% of the produced gas, and impurities - 2.5-3%. Those. with the course of the shale revolution, the composition of gas has not changed in any way, because. it is identical to the traditional one in the USA. It should be noted that 2.5% -3% of non-hydrocarbon gases is a very good result. For example, the “Caspian” field in the USSR was developed despite the fact that the gas there contained 23% toxic hydrogen sulfide and 20% carbon dioxide, and, for example, in the largest European natural gas field “Groningen” (10th place in the world), the share of non-hydrocarbons is 15 .2%. At the same time, no one has heard about the poor composition of Gröningen (which does not bother anyone), and about the good composition of US shale gas, half of the Runet thinks that it is terrible.

Myth 3: Shale gas/oil wells empty very quickly and therefore contain less gas/oil.

The decline in debits (production) is really fast. But the conclusion is wrong, at least for the United States. For example, consider the average well curves of some US fields:

The curve of a well is its productivity (debit) over time. Months of well operation are plotted along the horizontal axis, production is plotted along the vertical axis. If we take the Haynesville field (in green), we can see that it has the fastest decline in production rates. About five times a year. However, its initial debits are much higher. As a result, due to higher initial flow rates, the cumulative production of such a well (i.e. for the entire life) will be higher than the wells of other fields. The cumulative well production on the graph has the geometric meaning of the area under the curve.

You can see Fayetteville (in red). It has the smallest drop in debits, only twice a year. It would seem - a reason for rejoicing. However, production from such a well will be the least. Simply put, there is no relationship between the decline in production rates and the cumulative production of the well, which is usually assumed there. Yes, debits are falling faster, but also from larger values. As a result, over the entire lifetime, such wells produce more production. Therefore, in itself, a rapid drop in production rates is not a factor on the basis of which conclusions can be drawn (especially about low production) and generally confuses, because in reality, there is a feedback - the more the flow rates fall, the greater the cumulative production of the well. We made a small comparison of the cumulative production of wells here: (table below)

Myth 4. Shale gas is very, very expensive to produce.

According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), the cost of conventional gas in the US is $3-7 per MBTU, and shale...drumroll...also $3-7 per MBTU. In Europe, by the way, the cost of traditional gas is $5-9 per mbtu.

For people dealing with the “shale” industry, this data is not something unusual. Everything is within expectations. The same data is used with a pure heart by the domestic Gazprombank. At the same time, somewhere, of course, traditional gas will be cheaper than shale gas - for example, in the Middle East or in our old fields. But, for example, the sensational new Shtokman field will not be cheaper than shale.

Therefore, shale gas production in the US is economically no worse than the traditional US. In fact, it’s even better: that’s why gas producers stop producing traditional gas and switch to shale (today 50% of US natural gas production is already shale) - His Majesty the “experiment” put everything in its place.

Myth 5. Shale gas is an economic bubble.

Profitability depends on two parameters - on the cost of shale gas and on gas prices. We sorted out the previous myth with the cost price and it became clear that if shale gas is unprofitable, then traditional gas in the United States will also be unprofitable, because. they have the same cost. But it is better to immediately address the root of the problem - the price of natural gas. Where did the theses about unprofitability come from? The fact is that the shale revolution was akin to a gold rush: between 2007 and 2008, gas prices in the United States doubled, this served as a good incentive for mining companies to invest in relatively new horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing technology.

Because the technology was available to so many and the fields were vast, so much natural gas came on the market in such a short time that US gas prices actually fell below cost-benefit levels. All extractive companies tried to get to the market first in order to capture the maximum benefit from high prices. As a result of this race, prices collapsed very quickly and latecomers paid the price, but since then prices have returned to a more or less acceptable level, allowing normal work.

Let's specify, gas prices for HH:

Pay attention to the level of $2-2.5 per mbtu around 2012. At such low prices, traditional US and European gas will also be unprofitable. Those. the reason for some period of unprofitability of shale gas is not in the shale gas itself, but in ultra-low gas prices in the USA.

For comparison, in Europe, prices for LNG and pipeline gas are about $10 per mbtu (including from Gazprom), in Asia, $13-16 per mbtu, that is, many times higher. Current prices in the US are $4.6 per mbtu, which is already above the cost of some of the major fields. The situation today is such that even the outsiders of the gas industry at a relatively low $4.6 per Mbtu show sane results: http://rusanalit.livejournal.com/1867077.html

Myth 6. Shale has a terrible energy return (EROEI)

Let's get into the business. There is economic profitability - shale gas production in monetary terms divided by cash costs. But since energy resources serve humanity not as a source of money, but as a source of energy, then in some cases (not commercial) it is logical to evaluate energy resources and energy profitability, i.e. shale gas production in energy equivalent divided by costs in energy equivalent. EROEI of slates "specialists" on the Internet often lower below seven or even five, when asked how they know this, they are usually silently offended.

Let's say without undue modesty, no one except us EROEI of modern US oil and gas (that is, including shale) normally considered according to generally accepted methodology, and therefore stories about the low EROEI of shale are always speculation. There are only a few research papers in the EROEI world of US oil and gas, and all of them are based on data from the period before the US shale era. Almost all of the works are pen or refer to a small group of researchers, chief among them Cleveland and Hall (the author of the EROEI concept). It is not possible to distinguish the shale sector from the US oil and gas sector using the methodology of these authors, however, it is known that shale occupies a large share in the US oil and gas sector and the poor energy profitability of shale would manifest itself in the total EROEI of the US oil and gas sector. As a result, we took the generally accepted methodology of the mentioned founders and added calculations based on modern data. Result:

As you can see, after the shale revolution, the energy profitability of US oil and gas not only did not fall much, but, on the contrary, stabilized and began to grow slightly. Therefore, the conclusions about the terrible energy efficiency (EROEI) of shale are wrong.

Myth 7. Shale gas production is possible only in the USA

Myth 8. Shale gas is produced solely because of huge subsidies.

Firstly, it is difficult to prove that you are not a camel. Secondly, there are many words about subsidies for shale gas production, but there are no facts and data. From the specifics, there is a reference to Section 29 credit from the Windfall Profits Tax Act of 1980, which really subsidized the extraction of unconventional gas. Everything would be fine, but this holiday in 2002.

There are no federal incentives or subsidies specifically for shale gas/oil. However, there are benefits for the entire oil and gas industry, the largest and most famous of them is Intangible drilling costs. Those. it refers to shale gas/oil only marginally, because applies to all production - both gas and oil, both traditional and unconventional, and its size amounted to ... a meager $ 1 billion in 2013. We add that in the US oil and gas industry, the bill goes to hundreds of billions a year, and ExxonMobil alone has dozens. In total, these benefits amount to $4 billion.

The second nuance is an exclusively political srach about benefits for the “big oil industry” of the United States (BP, ExxonMobil, Shell, etc.), which was not particularly noticed in the extraction of shale, because. prefer traditional. In short, the bottom line is that the five largest oil companies were "brought" to the Republicans, who do not worry about the federal budget and stand up for the preservation of benefits, while the Democrats, who bear all the burdens of optimizing the federal budget, were not "brought". As a result, Obama sleeps and sees how to cancel the benefits of the Big Oil Company, which does not suffer much in the face of high oil prices. The nuances of these srachas can be found in any major US publication. However, for unknown reasons, publicism in Runet calls the benefits of Bolshaya Neftyanka subsidies to shale gas (example). Whether this happens out of ignorance or outright propaganda is another question. In any case, benefits for the big oil industry amount to about $2.5 billion, which again is not comparable to the scale of the industry.

Maybe we missed another billion, but the scale is obvious.

As you can see, “myths” are based either on incorrect data (usually they are not based on any data at all), or they make mistakes in reasoning. Therefore, an endless stream of myths will be reinforced by new fantasies and new mistakes. To refute everything, of course, is not possible and generally pointless, but we tried to make out the main thing.

Let's move on to the second part - realities.

Disclaimer 1. Shale gas is harder to produce than traditional gas.

Based on the amount of gas produced, as shown by economic and energy profitability, US shale gas is the same as traditional US. If, however, per well (which is not entirely correct), then it is more difficult to produce shale gas. The fact is that shale deposits lie deeper than traditional ones and, in addition, it is necessary to perform hydraulic fracturing and drill a horizontal well. Of course, this complicates the well. But on the other hand, the productivity of shale wells (debits and cumulative production) in the US is much higher than that of conventional wells (in the US). As a result, greater well production compensates for the complexity of production and the economic/energy profitability is at least as good as conventional gas.

Disclaimer 2. Special environmental risks from shale gas production

This conclusion is usually drawn from the features of shale gas production - hydraulic fracturing. But there is a problem here: on the one hand, hydraulic fracturing is a mandatory technology for shale production, on the other hand, hydraulic fracturing in modern oil and gas is the norm in the production of traditional oil and gas. Those. Hydraulic fracturing is not a specific shale technology. The fact is that the extraction of traditional oil is not always a fountain (in the literal sense), as it happens in new good fields. As a traditional field is depleted, production stimulation technologies have to be applied, and therefore hydraulic fracturing is an extremely banal thing. Therefore, the stories that a thousand hydraulic fracturing a year in Pennsylvania at the largest Marcellus shale gas field on the other side of the earth are surprising are the end of nature and environmental horrors, while for some reason no one notices, does not discusses and is not indignant about the terrible fate and environmental situation of Tatarstan from the hydraulic fracturing. At the same time, it is worth noting that, of course, there are environmental risks from oil and gas production, no one says that they do not exist. But here is something fundamentally special because of shale production, and linking these risks specifically to shale production is wrong, because. Hydraulic fracturing has become a harsh reality in the world in the development of old traditional oil and gas fields, when simpler methods are inconvenient. Hydraulic fracturing is even used in the production of coal-bed methane, which is much closer to the surface (up to a kilometer) and, accordingly, to aquifers. But nobody cares. The only concern is shale gas fracturing at a depth of 2-4 kilometers.

Water resources

On this topic, as always, you can find a lot of words in RuNet, but not find quantitative data. How debaters draw conclusions about water resources without using quantitative data remains a mystery to us. Specific numbers can be found, for example, in this MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) report. The columns are industries and the share of water consumption is indicated, the rows are the states of four shale deposits

columns: public needs, industry, irrigation, livestock, shale gas (highlighted in blue), total consumption.

It can be seen that the production of shale gas at the main deposits takes a tiny share in the consumption of water resources. Less than 1%.

There are other nuances of the environmental issue, smaller in size, but we will leave them out of the picture.

Bitter truth. Shale gas is more expensive and more difficult to produce than modern traditional Russian gas.

Here without a doubt. The cumulative production of US shale gas wells is much less than the cumulative production of conventional gas wells in Russia. Therefore, the extraction of shale gas or something else of similar value for today and in the medium term is irrelevant for Russia. However, over time, our cheap gas reserves will run out, and somewhere by the end of the 2020s or later, we will have to start using offshore projects in the Arctic or something hard to recover in Western Siberia with might and main. However, in the US, Canada and other countries, shale gas production is justified and is already underway.

Therefore, it is necessary to handle very carefully (methodologically) theses about the inadequacy of shale gas production. For Russia, this is inadequate, for the USA, Canada and China, as facts and data show, shale gas production is a good and convenient satisfaction of their own needs, which they successfully and happily use. Simply put, when comparing shale gas with conventional gas, you should always indicate which traditional gas is being compared (domestic, US, Canadian, new or old fields), because the results of the comparison will vary. Are you comparing US shale gas to traditional domestic gas? Shale gas is bad. With the traditional USA, Canada, etc.? Shale gas is good.

It is more difficult with data sources here, because we could not find reliable and accurate data on wells and fields in Russia in the public domain. However, if we compare the production of Russia and the number of wells to which this production is provided, then we can see a huge positive gap between Russia and the United States (tens of times), which clearly indicates a huge difference in the cumulative production of wells in favor of Russia. Russia has a cumulative production of traditional gas wells of the order of billion cubic meters or more, while the United States has 30-100 million cubic meters. But the United States does not have such good traditional gas (and never has), so they switched to shale gas.

Many people mistakenly believe that shale gas is almost a separate energy carrier, but it received the prefix "shale" only because it occurs in the shale layer of sedimentary rock, and in its composition differs from natural gas in its increased content of methane, carbon dioxide, ammonia and hydrogen sulfide. How is this source of fuel produced, and how does its extraction technology differ from traditional gas?

The main difference is the features of its occurrence. Traditional gas is produced from porous reservoirs, the depth of which ranges from 700 to 4000 meters. Due to the large number of pores, the reservoirs have high permeability (about 25%) and blue fuel is easy to pump out after the well is drilled.
Shale gas, in turn, occurs at a depth of 2500 to 5000 meters in rocks with low porosity (3-4%), so its exploration is much more expensive, and the production technology is much more complicated.

A brief excursion into history

For the first time, gas was extracted from the shale layer of sedimentary rock almost 200 years ago. It happened in the USA in 1821. This type of fuel was also used in the USSR: after the end of the Great Patriotic War, it was mined in Estonia and supplied via a gas pipeline to Leningrad. But soon the Soviet authorities, like the governments of many other countries of the world, realized that the extraction and transportation of shale gas is much more expensive than traditional natural gas, so the development of deposits was stopped.
The idea of ​​shale gas production gained a second life at the beginning of the 2000s, when horizontal drilling and multi-stage hydraulic fracturing technologies began to be actively used, which made it possible to significantly increase production volumes, reducing its cost.

Intelligence Technology

The search for shale gas deposits is much more expensive than the development of traditional blue fuel, and exploration technology is still far from perfect. Due to the great depth of occurrence, many traditional research methods are ineffective.
In simplified terms, shale gas exploration proceeds as follows:
in the proposed area of ​​its occurrence, a well is drilled in which hydraulic fracturing is performed;
the resulting gas is analyzed, and based on the results of the analysis, the equipment and technology that will need to be used for its production are determined;
well productivity is determined empirically, and not with the help of precise hydrodynamic studies, as in the production of conventional natural gas.

World stock statistics

The predicted reserves of shale gas are 760 trillion cubic meters, proven, according to the US agency EIA, - 187.5 trillion cubic meters. For comparison, the world's gas reserves, according to the world's most widely read oil and gas journal Oil & Gas Journal, are just over 36 trillion barrels.
The largest shale gas deposits have SCC - 19.3% of world reserves, USA - 13%, Argentina - 11.7%, Mexico - 10.3%, South Africa - 7.3%, Australia - 6%, Canada - 5, 9%. These estimates may change dramatically over time, because, as already mentioned, shale gas exploration is just beginning to develop and well productivity is determined only empirically.

Drilling and pipe laying

A feature of shale gas production is the technology of horizontal drilling. Its essence lies in the fact that after one vertical well has been drilled to the depth of shale gas deposits, the drill begins to go horizontally. However, there are many nuances that must be observed when drilling, for example, it is necessary to ensure that the level of inclination of the drill matches the angle of inclination of the shale formation, etc.
Mining companies are forced to use this technology, since the gas occurs at a considerable depth in isolated pockets in very small volumes. The life of wells is short - from 5 to 12 years. For reference, the life of a natural gas well is from 30 to 50 years. BarnettShale, the world's largest SG field under development, has already over 17,000 wells.
The horizontal length of the well can reach 12 kilometers (this record was set when drilling on Sakhalin).
Steel pipes are installed in a drilled well in several layers. Cement is poured into the space between them and the soil to isolate the gas and fracturing fluids from the soil layers that contain water.

hydraulic fracturing

Since shale gas lies in a rock with low porosity, it is impossible to extract it using traditional methods. That is why the technology of hydraulic fracturing (fracking) is actively used to extract shale gas. Water, chemicals (corrosion inhibitors, thickeners, acids, biocides and many other chemical elements, the total number of which can reach up to 90 items) and special granules with a diameter of 0.5–1.5 mm, which can consist of made of ceramic, steel, plastic or grains of sand. All this mixture creates a chemical reaction, which leads to hydraulic fracturing. As a result, many small cracks are formed in the rock that contains the gas, in which the granules get stuck so that the cracks can no longer converge. The water is then pumped back (it is filtered and reused for the new hydraulic fracturing) and the shale gas is pumped through the pipes to the surface due to the pressure drop.

Fracturing Fluids

The basis of the fracturing fluid is water (98.5% of the total volume). About 1% of the composition is a “wedging” crack element (usually it is sand). The remaining 0.5% are chemical compounds that affect the permeability of the rock. Without them, hydraulic fracturing is simply impossible.
There has been a lot of controversy in recent years about the environmental impact of hydraulic fracturing fluids. The raised hype led to the fact that many European countries (France, Bulgaria, Italy) banned hydraulic fracturing on their territory, and in the United States, legislators forced shale gas companies to publish information on the composition of hydraulic fracturing fluids.
But the technology of hydraulic fracturing, and, accordingly, the fluids for them, are also used in the production of conventional natural gas. For example, it is actively used by the Rosneft company, which performed two thousand hydraulic fracturing a year a few years ago.

Transport and cleaning

It is impossible to deliver shale gas to end consumers by conventional methods, since standard gas pipelines are designed for a pressure of 75 atmospheres. In shale gas, this figure is much lower due to the increased content of ammonia, hydrogen sulfide, nitrogen and carbon dioxide, and when pumping it through natural gas pipelines, an explosion can occur.
There are two solutions to the problem of transportation: to build refineries, which will make the composition of shale gas close to natural and then deliver it through existing gas pipelines, or to create a separate infrastructure for the transportation of shale gas.
The first option requires significant costs and makes shale gas production simply unprofitable. But the second method is increasingly used by countries producing shale fuel. Moreover, all of them prefer to deliver gas over short distances to consumers who are close to the field, which makes the transportation of shale gas as cheap as possible.
This is exactly what is done in the United States, where the produced gas is transported so far only through short local low-pressure gas pipelines or is pumped into cylinders. The same policy is followed by China, which has begun construction of the first shale gas pipeline to Yunnan, the length of which is only 93 kilometers. As for the transportation of shale gas over long distances, in the absence of an extensive network of gas pipelines, the most promising way at the moment is its transformation in special terminals into liquefied gas and shipped to customers via tankers. Upon arrival at the destination, the product is pumped into storage tanks and then converted back to a gaseous state and delivered via gas pipelines to end users. At the moment, the construction of such terminals is actively engaged in the United States. The first facility through which fuel will be exported to the countries of Southeast Asia is planned to be put into operation at the end of 2015. It is expected that all terminals built by 2020 will allow exporting 118 billion cubic meters of shale gas.

The main know-how of modern mining

Environmental damage from hydraulic fracturing can be minimized by using propane fracking technology. It differs from conventional hydraulic fracturing in that instead of water and chemicals, propane is pumped to the places of shale gas deposits, which, unlike traditional hydraulic fracturing fluids, does not settle in the soil after hydraulic fracturing, but completely evaporates, therefore it cannot pollute the ground or water in any way. .
This technology has seriously changed the attitude of many environmentally conscious European countries towards hydraulic fracturing. The British authorities have already lifted the ban on hydraulic fracturing, other EU countries are only considering this possibility.
True, propane fracking also has a significant disadvantage, which crosses out all its vaunted environmental friendliness. The use of this method costs one and a half times more than conventional hydraulic fracturing. Therefore, this technology can be used only in fields with high profitability.