The world is heading toward greater availability of fossil fuels. The global energy chessboard is changing, and markets will be realigned. Countries that have never had so much available energy will become self-sufficient, and perhaps even exporters. Fossil fuels may become cheaper and the growth of alternative energies will slow down. --Humberto Márquez,
IPS News, 3 January 2012
The abundance and new distribution of reserves of shale gas and other non-conventional fossil fuels will have major geopolitical effects. An initial effect is that the largest and best discoveries are outside the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), which will see its influence on the global energy market diminish in the long run. --Kenneth Ramírez,
IPS News, 3 January 2012
Natural gas is no longer the “bridge” to a low-cost, low-environmental impact, job-creating future — it is the future. –Jon Entine,
New York Post, 2 January 2012
Over the last couple of years I’ve realized that what’s happening with unconventional natural gas is the biggest energy story that’s happened in the 40-plus years that I’ve been watching energy development in this country,” says MIT professor John Deutch, who served as undersecretary of the Department of Energy in the 1970s. --
MIT News, 3 January 2012
Shale’s low price tag is one of the reasons for its boom. For every $4 we pay for energy from natural gas, we pay $25 for oil, according to recent statistics from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. --
MIT News, 3 January 2012
First shale gas delivery to local customers in Northern Poland may be possible this year. According to the Dziennik Gazeta Prawna, Poland's state-controlled gas firm PGNiG may makes deliveries of the first shale gas from its test well in Pomerania as soon as in the second half of 2012. DGP estimates, that even in a testing stage, gas from shale in Poland may be cheaper than imported from Russia. --
Natural Gas Europe, 4 January 2012
The energy industry's bet on the future of shale gas in America shows no sign of slowing in 2012, as China's Sinopec and France's Total both agreed multi-billion dollar deals. Total, France's biggest oil and gas company, will pay $2.32bn (£1.5bn) for a 25pc stake in a shale deposit in the east of Ohio. Meanwhile, Sinopec, China's largest energy company, plans to invest $2.26bn to become a partner in developing five natural gas and oil fields with US producer Devon Energy. --Richard Blackden,
The Daily Telegraph, 3 January 2012
Try as government usually does, it's hard to keep the U.S. economy down. That's the message of yesterday's announcement of some $4.8 billion in new foreign investment in America's booming shale oil and gas industry. If President Obama wants to help his re-election chances, he'll stop wasting tax dollars on losers like Solyndra and "green jobs" and start talking about the brown jobs that are already multiplying in the private economy. --
The Wall Street Journal, 4 January 2012
According to a new MIT report, shale gas could impact the U.S. energy policy and lead to future technological development. According to the report, shale gas also reduces electricity price growth by 5 percent in 2030 and 10 percent in 2045, compared to a scenario without shale gas. “This report makes that comparison. And we found much of what we already knew — which is a good thing — that shale makes a big difference. It helps lower gas prices, it stimulates the economy and it provides greater flexibility to ease the cutting of emissions. But it also suppresses renewables.” --
Red Orbit, 4 January 2012
America stands on the verge of a major change that puts it on course to near energy self-sufficiency. The Gulf of Mexico is expected to produce almost three times as much oil by the end of the decade and North Dakota has experienced a staggering oil and gas boom that would qualify it as a member of OPEC. The huge increase in production of shale gas has already resulted in the lowest natural gas costs globally outside the Middle East. This, combined with the oil boom, is providing a huge driver of growth in the economy and is a strong competitive cost advantage to users of gas. As many as one million new jobs may be created over the next 3 years through oil and gas development. Terry Ewing,
FT Adviser, 3 January 2012
