Earth Equity News

The Rush is On for European Shale Gas. By Carola Hoyos, FT, March 8, 2010. "All across Europe big oil companies are scouring millions of acres of countryside and buying up rights to tap the natural gas trapped in prehistoric shale beds thousands of metres below its surface. The shale gas rush has made its way over from the US, where breakthroughs in technology have allowed companies to extract gas from reservoirs previously seen as untouchable. The newly accessible US shale deposits are so big that executives now believe the country has enough gas to last it for a century. This extra supply and the US's new found self-sufficiency has created a worldwide gas glut that has driven down prices. It is a remarkable turnround. Just three years ago, most US energy executives were working out how the US could import enough gas from places as far away as Nigeria, Russia and Qatar, while competing with the demands from China and other energy-hungry developing countries. Now the world's biggest, richest and most sophisticated energy companies believe that they may be able to repeat the American shale gas revolution in Europe, potentially undermining the power of Russia, the region's biggest gas supplier. For companies such as ExxonMobil, Royal Dutch Shell and BP, tapping Europe's shale gas deposits is a way to catch up with what they missed out on in the U.S.."