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Graeme
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 Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 6:29 am Post subject: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world
| Quote: | Iraq dramatically increased the official size of its oil reserves yesterday after new data suggested that they could exceed Saudi Arabia’s and be the largest in the world.
The Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister told The Times that new exploration showed that his country has the world’s largest proven oil reserves, with as much as 350 billion barrels. The figure is triple the country’s present proven reserves and exceeds that of Saudi Arabia’s estimated 264 billion barrels of oil. Barham Salih said that the new estimate had been based on recent geological surveys and seismic data compiled by “reputable, international oil companies . . . This is a serious figure from credible sources.” |
timesonline
I'll try posting this on the front page news section as suggested by BigTex.
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dorlomin
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 7:00 am Post subject: Re: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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Hmmmm the Kurdish deputy prime minister anounces that Iraq has vast amounts of oil but it needs to pass a magic new law to exploit it?
The Kurds are very keen to create there own country but are very heavily opposed by the Arabs in the center of the country who have no oil.
The overwhelming majority of the country is deeply opposed to this new oil law. Then as if by magic this statement appears out of nowhere.
Is there undiscovered fields in Iraq, quite possibly. Are they giantic titans of unbelivable wealth.... perhaps not. |
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Cashmere
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 10:14 am Post subject: Re: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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What a great coincidence that we liberated them!
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Electric_Economy_2025
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 10:45 am Post subject: Re: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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| Graeme wrote: | Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world
| Quote: | Iraq dramatically increased the official size of its oil reserves yesterday after new data suggested that they could exceed Saudi Arabia’s and be the largest in the world.
The Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister told The Times that new exploration showed that his country has the world’s largest proven oil reserves, with as much as 350 billion barrels. The figure is triple the country’s present proven reserves and exceeds that of Saudi Arabia’s estimated 264 billion barrels of oil. Barham Salih said that the new estimate had been based on recent geological surveys and seismic data compiled by “reputable, international oil companies . . . This is a serious figure from credible sources.” |
timesonline
I'll try posting this on the front page news section as suggested by BigTex. |
Why do you think we INVADED IRAQ is was'nt to free them just thier OIL. |
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TheDude
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 11:31 am Post subject: Re: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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Not updated obviously. That big jump in the 80s was Saddam waving his cigar vehemently. And I'm curious how the country could be in the aftermath of being invaded and have time for seismic surveys and test wells.
Need to see some real data. Until then "reputable international oil company" will remain something of an oxymoron.
FWIW Deffeyes does say that Iran and Iraq (pre Gulf2) have remained largely unexplored - nothing more sophisticated than aboveground geologic surveying.
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JustaGirl
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 1:10 pm Post subject: Re: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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| The last I had read, I believe an article from '06, stated something like only 25% of Iraq had been explored. I really don't doubt they have that much oil & could surpass SA, but how much will even be pumped out in such an unstable area? My guess is not much. Time will tell. |
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Aaron
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 1:21 pm Post subject: Re: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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If it's true & a best case scenario we are talking about 3-4 years of supply.
If it's like most other producing areas in the region it won't be a best-case scenario and will likely only provide 1-2 years supply at most.
If you can get it out of the ground that is.
troll
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Twilight
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 1:57 pm Post subject: Re: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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That oil, if it exists, might as well be on Titan.
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seahorse2
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 2:09 pm Post subject: Re: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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| Let's assume this news is true. Is it any surprise then, that the US is building permanent military bases there? As Aaron says, what are the odds we can get it out of the ground, with the strife that has plagued this area since the dawn of time? Must all our hopes rest on Iraq? Is this the best we can hope for? |
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yesplease
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 2:31 pm Post subject: Re: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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| Twilight wrote: | | That oil, if it exists, might as well be on Titan. |
That's what we get for destabilizing the region. Not that it wasn't expected, with oilmen in la casa blanca. Pump up consumption while hamstringing alternatives and making sure one of the only regions left with significant spare capacity, in part thanks to UN embargoes, is unstable for the next decade or so. Sounds like a good bidness plan to me! 
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Barbara
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 2:45 pm Post subject: Re: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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The higher the reserves, the higher the export quotas.
Rebellious Saudi Arabia will learn the lesson...
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BigTex
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 4:40 pm Post subject: Re: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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When was the last supergiant discovered?
TheDude's graph makes one wonder whether maybe Iraq's oil is abiotic.
Wouldn't that be a nice surprise?
Has any increase in proved reserves in an OPEC country in the last 30 years not been politically driven?
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OilFinder2
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Joined: Mar 26, 2008
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 6:27 pm Post subject: Re: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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| BigTex wrote: | | When was the last supergiant discovered? |
I read recently about at least one oil field in the Kurdish region which was discovered back in the Saddam era but which was never actually properly assessed, and now that some foreign companies are doing serious exploration work there, they're saying it's at least 10 billion barrels. It's near one of their existing big oil fields. I'll see if I can dig up the article I found.
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yesplease
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| Posted: Tue May 20, 2008 6:55 pm Post subject: Re: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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| BigTex wrote: | | TheDude's graph makes one wonder whether maybe Iraq's oil is abiotic. |
If by abiotic you mean oil they left in the ground thanks to the first gulf war, subsequent embargoes, and US occupation, then sure! 
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TheDude
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| Posted: Wed May 21, 2008 9:00 am Post subject: Re: Iraq could have largest oil reserves in the world |
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| yesplease wrote: | | BigTex wrote: | | TheDude's graph makes one wonder whether maybe Iraq's oil is abiotic. |
If by abiotic you mean oil they left in the ground thanks to the first gulf war, subsequent embargoes, and US occupation, then sure!
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They're on fast track to emulate the USSR/FSU experience of multiple peaks. Might look like the Grand Tetons if the instability is cyclical.
Some data about Iraq's reserves is in ASPO Newsletter 79:
| Quote: | Petroleum Resources Of The Western Desert of Iraq
By Moujahed Al-Husseini and Sadad Al-Husseini
Dr Moujahed al-Husseini has been Editor-in-Chief of GeoArabia, the journal of Middle East Petroleum Geosciences, since 1995. He was Saudi Aramco’s Exploration Manager between 1989–92 when eight Paleozoic oil and gas fields were discovered in central and northwest Saudi Arabia, and one in the Red Sea. Dr Sadad al-Husseini, formerly Saudi Aramco’s Executive Vice President for Exploration and Producing and a Member of its Board of Directors, retired from the company on 1 March 2004.
On 18 April 2007, the US energy consultancy IHS issued a press release stating that up to 100bn barrels of oil resources remained to be discovered in the Western Desert of Iraq (www.ihs.com). The following day this release was quoted on the front-page of London’s Financial Times and the following week in many other newspapers and magazines (for example: Dubai’s Gulf News, 23 April; Time Magazine, 24 April; and MEES, 30 April).
This conclusion stands in stark contrast to the 2004 study by the US Geological Survey (USGS) and GeoDesign (a consultancy that specializes in Iraq’s petroleum geology) that estimated the undiscovered oil resources of Iraq’s Western Desert to total only 0.5bn barrels at the 95% level of probability, and 1.6bn barrels at the 50% level of probability (Verma, Ahlbrandt and Al-Gailani, 2004).
The USGS-Geodesign study used a modern geological-statistical basin model that combined all the then-available data and knowledge regarding the petroleum reservoirs, source rocks, migration routes and structural traps of Iraq. It considered 526 known prospects and fields, of which 370 remained undrilled, to estimate the potential number and sizes of undiscovered fields. The IHS press release stated that its own study had evaluated a comparable number of 516 known structures, of which 435 were undrilled prospects or non-commercial discoveries.
The USGS-Geodesign study concluded that the undiscovered crude oil resources of all of Iraq, including the Western Desert, may only total 13.2bn barrels at the 95% level of probability, and 45.1bn barrels at the 50% level of probability. They did not consider Iraq’s undiscovered resources to exceed 84.1bn barrels even at the 5% level of probability. These total estimates fall far short of the IHS conclusions for just the Western Desert of Iraq.
This discrepancy is paradoxical because the potential petroleum resources of Iraq’s Western Desert are relatively easy to estimate. For example, it is well-established from existing wells and seismic data in this and adjoining regions that the prospective formations in western Iraq are mostly of Paleozoic age and characterized by complex geology (Al-Hadidy, 2007). This is confirmed by the reservoirs in Akkas field, the only commercial oil and gas/condensate field in the Western Desert of Iraq. |
Actually that was excerpted from Petroleum Resources Of The Western Desert of Iraq since ASPO's pdf is copy protected.
IHS of course is CERA's parent company. This isn't reflected in the EIA graph I posted since it would put their URR at 215 billion barrels. According to Iraqi Oil : More Plentiful Than Thought - TIME the IHS engineers
| Quote: | | examined 438 undrilled fields and used new technology to recalculate old reservoirs. |
According to the Al-Husseinis:
| Quote: | Based on these results, the indications are clear that this vast region (extending from northwest Saudi Arabia through eastern Jordan and Syria, and western Iraq) is not very prospective for oil. In fact to discover 100bn barrels of crude oil in the Western Desert of Iraq, as suggested by the IHS report, would require discovering and delineating the equivalent of 3,000 Risha-sized oilfields. Clearly if this was a realistic possibility, many such prospects would have been discovered and drilled decades ago when intensive exploration became widespread across the entire Middle East region.
Perhaps the most important conclusion to be drawn from these profoundly contradictory studies is the need for a higher level of discipline and objectivity in the process of estimating global oil resources. After all, the difference between the two studies, in just one region, of nearly 100bn barrels of oil resources represents nearly 10% of the proven oil reserves of the world. While identical conclusions from such studies are not realistic, discrepancies that differ by two orders of magnitude must surely indicate a major flaw in the resource estimation process. |
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