Peak Oil News and Message Boards

Hello everyone,

This forum have been really helpful and helped me to have a better understanding of the oil industry and the peak oil issues.
However I need some datas about the oil field discoveries since the 90's, at least the number of discoveries made each year. I don t have an access to IHS or Wood Mackenzie that s why I m looking for other reliable datas. Of course before asking for some help I have been trying to find those datas on internet. Do you have in mind some database or website that can help me?

Thanks for your help

Kind regards

goretexe4 wrote:However I need some datas about the oil field discoveries since the 90's, at least the number of discoveries made each year. I don t have an access to IHS or Wood Mackenzie that s why I m looking for other reliable datas. Of course before asking for some help I have been trying to find those datas on internet. Do you have in mind some database or website that can help me?

Thanks for your help

Kind regards

The easiest way is to write the check from one of the few organizations that gathers this up globally.

Ponying up to the table costs, dial them up and see what the price tag looks like.

https://www.ihs.com/products/oil-gas-tools-edin.html

g - Here's one link with a lot of useless and misleading info:

http://instituteforenergyresearch.org/s ... resources/

You may already be aware of the confusing metrics and phrases tossed around. Such as "contains X bbls of oil" which could mean might ultimately recover X bbls of oil even if not one bbl makes a profit: your "technically recoverable reserve". Or it means X bbls exist with the rocks but only a small % might be " technicaslly recoverable". Or it might mean X bbls could be recovered profitably but often not giving the oil price required. Or it might mean a small % of X bbls could be recovered profitably but often not giving the oil price required.

Also many of the "newly discovered fields" are neither new nor fields. The Eagle Ford Shale and Bakken are oil TRENDS composed of numerous small accumulations which may or may not be classified as individual fields. And both formations were first drilled and produced over 50 yeasrsd ago. As far as the recent Permian Basin "discovery" of the largest US oil field: again not only is it not a "field" it even isn't a "trend": it's 5 different shale interval trends. And were know to contain oil more then half a century ago when it was dertertmined they wered the source rocks for mucvmucvh of the tens of billions of bbls of oil produced from the fields n that portion of the Basin. Currently companies are applying various technologies such as frac'ng and horizontal driling to determine how commercial those reservesdreservesd might be a currernt prices.

Another slippery slope: not only is it vital to know at what oil price such "reserves" might be commercially viable. The Deep Water Brazil trend is a good example. Over 10 years ago much hype about the BILLIONS of bbls of oil discovered. Look at the huge growth in reserves just thru 2013:

http://www.offshore-mag.com/articles/pr ... tives.html

Now look at how little production has increased over a 10 year period from 2005 - 2015 despite big reserve discoveries: barely 1 million bopd. IOW a more then 300% increase and about a 75% increase in rate. So not only can the economic value of "big new oil discoveries" vary greatly but also how much (or little) they add to the available supply.

Lastly many of the numbers you find (in particular those from NOC's...national oil companies) cannot be verified even in a general sense because the details are deemed classified secrets.

Keep searching "new oil field discoveries" and you'll find much material. IMHO uderstanding it, trusting it and putting it into a proper perspective would be a bit of a challenge for a very experienced oil patch hand.

Good luck. LOL.

AdamB wrote:

goretexe4 wrote:However I need some datas about the oil field discoveries since the 90's, at least the number of discoveries made each year. I don t have an access to IHS or Wood Mackenzie that s why I m looking for other reliable datas. Of course before asking for some help I have been trying to find those datas on internet. Do you have in mind some database or website that can help me?

Thanks for your help

Kind regards

The easiest way is to write the check from one of the few organizations that gathers this up globally.

Ponying up to the table costs, dial them up and see what the price tag looks like.

https://www.ihs.com/products/oil-gas-tools-edin.html

Thanks a lot for your answer but buying those reports for me is impossible (I m an intern).

ROCKMAN wrote:g - Here's one link with a lot of useless and misleading info:

http://instituteforenergyresearch.org/s ... resources/

You may already be aware of the confusing metrics and phrases tossed around. Such as "contains X bbls of oil" which could mean might ultimately recover X bbls of oil even if not one bbl makes a profit: your "technically recoverable reserve". Or it means X bbls exist with the rocks but only a small % might be " technicaslly recoverable". Or it might mean X bbls could be recovered profitably but often not giving the oil price required. Or it might mean a small % of X bbls could be recovered profitably but often not giving the oil price required.

Also many of the "newly discovered fields" are neither new nor fields. The Eagle Ford Shale and Bakken are oil TRENDS composed of numerous small accumulations which may or may not be classified as individual fields. And both formations were first drilled and produced over 50 yeasrsd ago. As far as the recent Permian Basin "discovery" of the largest US oil field: again not only is it not a "field" it even isn't a "trend": it's 5 different shale interval trends. And were know to contain oil more then half a century ago when it was dertertmined they wered the source rocks for mucvmucvh of the tens of billions of bbls of oil produced from the fields n that portion of the Basin. Currently companies are applying various technologies such as frac'ng and horizontal driling to determine how commercial those reservesdreservesd might be a currernt prices.

Another slippery slope: not only is it vital to know at what oil price such "reserves" might be commercially viable. The Deep Water Brazil trend is a good example. Over 10 years ago much hype about the BILLIONS of bbls of oil discovered. Look at the huge growth in reserves just thru 2013:

http://www.offshore-mag.com/articles/pr ... tives.html

Now look at how little production has increased over a 10 year period from 2005 - 2015 despite big reserve discoveries: barely 1 million bopd. IOW a more then 300% increase and about a 75% increase in rate. So not only can the economic value of "big new oil discoveries" vary greatly but also how much (or little) they add to the available supply.

Lastly many of the numbers you find (in particular those from NOC's...national oil companies) cannot be verified even in a general sense because the details are deemed classified secrets.

Keep searching "new oil field discoveries" and you'll find much material. IMHO uderstanding it, trusting it and putting it into a proper perspective would be a bit of a challenge for a very experienced oil patch hand.

Good luck. LOL.

I guess finding an exhaustive list of oil field is not possible this way however your answer helped to consider this issue differently and I must say thank you! (my poor English skills are due to my nationality, sorry!)

Have a nice day

.
As in all tings start with Wikipedia and then go further ,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_oil_fields
and as usual the words matter ,
do you mean an oil field , an oil reservoir or an oil province , they come in all shapes and sizes
there are producing oil fields in Paris , downtown L.A. ...etc..etc

oil fields are generally understood to be crude oil accumulation with a geological commonality
oil reservoirs are part of an oil field ,individual pocket of oil separated from each other
a dubious analogy is like individual spots in a splatter .

finding oil reservoirs is an every day affair ,
snooping around existing exploited reservoirs usually can find some more , sometime even bigger
finding a new oil field is a once a year event
finding a new province is each decade at best

most oil provinces have been discovered ,
the newest ones are the East Africans fields ,
there is conjecture about the South Atlantic ,

The oil-men will probably correct this soon enough , to the greater benefit of all of us

g - "my poor English skills are due to my nationality, sorry!)". You do quit well...better then some of our illiterate Americans on the site. LOL. For instance you understand the language well enough to immediately recognize how smart the Rockman is.

Don't be a stranger.

If you are a natural born Texan Rockman, I might give you some leeway.

Cog - Just yesterday I had to explain to an Okie the common use of somewhat derogatory acronym "TBC" by native Texans when I moved here 38 years ago. TBC = Texan By Choice. With the increased traffic, inflating home prices, etc. the migration (especially that of Yankees) to Texas annoyed many of the native born. LOL.

Hello all,

I m still seeking those information about oilfields discoveries by year and by countries my google researches have not been successful.

Thanks everyone for their answers

g - Here's a lot of details for Deep Water Gulf of Mexico. Granted it's not global but represents a lot of new reserves. And given, as you've discovered, is one of the few tabulations out there:

https://www.data.boem.gov/homepg/data_c ... eptbl2.asp

That's just the list of discovery dates. But you can mine the site for Mucho reserve and production data. But search "Gulf of Mexico oil field size distribution" and you'll find enough data to keep you busy for days. LOL.

Or if you just want to save a lot of tyime and just want to see the general trend:

http://www.ogj.com/articles/print/volum ... rowth.html

Global: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_oil_fields

.
there are two sites which I check regularly , they are considered the mainstream media of the industry

even if you are not a paying customer ,the tittles of the articles give you a lead for googling

the oil and gas journal
http://www.ogj.com/index.html

Platts
http://www.platts.com/

And then of course there's always this.
catalog-of-recent-oil-discoveries-pt-3-t69215-80.html

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@ copious-abundance
Good to read you , I for one missed your acerbity !