At OilPrice Tsvetana Praskova reports on Russian developments in oil production:
ussian scientists and local oil field services companies claim to have created a technology for thermochemical gas fracturing that could be an alternative to hydraulic fracturing and could increase oil production by between 1.7 and 6 times, Russia’s news agency RIA Novosti reports, citing the University of Tyumen’s press service.
In hydraulic fracturing, rocks are fractured with high-pressure injection of fluids, while the new breakthrough technology, as claimed by Russian scientists and media, is creating chemical reactions in the strata that contain oil.
The chemicals react and emit heat and gas, which makes extraction easier and lifts well productivity, according to the scientists and researchers.
The other upside in the technology, the Russians claim, is that the main component in the chemical reactions is ammonium nitrate, which is often used as fertilizer.
Hmm. Oil; ammonium nitrate. I expected an earth-shattering kaboom.
More seriously, if this strategy proves successful I would expect it to be imitated here in the U. S. as well as in Saudi Arabia. Getting more yield from existing wells is likely to be less expensive than drilling new ones. And if it’s cheaper and more effective than fracking, all the better.
or at least, a “strongly exothermic reaction” as my old lab text said when we did the soak cotton in nitric acid exercise.
Reminds me of Project Gasbuggy and similar Atoms to Peace projects.
Very sorry to hijack post, but looks like good news, Chief of Staff John Kelly may have just jettisoned Steve Banon. This is presumably why Trump appointed Kelly. To coordinate his staff, and advance his agenda as per mandate, and campaign promises. Maybe Kelly is the right man.