Bakken and Eagle Ford in the elite of super-giant oil fields

[youtube=http://youtu.be/0ks2ua4imgU]

Production of Bakken oil in North Dakota will soon hit one million barrels a day. When it does, it will be one of only 4 fields in the U.S. to hit that level. Those 4 are part of an elite group of only 10 super-giant fields.

Applying some new trend analysis concepts, the EIA is predicting Bakken production will be 976K bopd in 11-13 and 1,002K bopd in 12-13.

I’m not sure if that estimate includes production from legacy wells. Even if it does and we back out September production of 65K bopd that only changes the date of crossing the 1M point by a month or so. That doesn’t matter for purposes of this discussion.

Their calculation shows Eagle Ford has already passed the 1M point. Permian production has been over the 1M point (again?) for a while and is at an estimated 1,340K bopd in December.

Along with Prudhoe Bay that makes four American fields that passed the 1M point.

There are only 6 fields outside the U.S. that have joined the super-giant club, as explained by John Kemp at Reuters: Is Bakken set to rival Ghawar? back in November 2012.

Ghawar is one of only six super-giant oil fields that have produced more than 1 million barrels per day at their peak. Others are Burgan (Kuwait), Cantarell (Mexico), Daqing (China) and in the 1970s and 1980s Samotlor (Russia) and Kirkuk (Iraq).

(I’ve previously discussed Mr. Kemp’s article in my other posts Will Bakken be one of the 7 biggest oil fields ever? and also Three of the six biggest oil fields ever found cannot exist – Peak Oil #13.) 

Those six plus Prudhoe Bay, Permian, Eagle Ford, plus Bakken soon, makes 10.

That puts Eagle Ford and Bakken into a very elite club.

Mark Perry says it is a remarkable achievement that four of the ten largest fields ever are in the U.S. Three of those in the U.S. are still producing.

Remember that all three are still increasing their output.

Two of the four (Eagle Ford and Bakken) are only in that club because of fracking (translation: human ingenuity). That the production curve is going up in three fields is also due to fracking.

What peak oil?

(Video by James Ulvog)