What's New In Energy - Shale Gas

Have you heard the buzz about shale gas? A recent Wall Street Journal article, "How Shale Gas is Going to Rock the World" by Amy Myers, highlights several benefits related to this new form of energy. "We've always known the potential of shale; we just didn't have the technology to get to it at a low enough cost. Now new techniques have driven down the price tag — and set the stage for shale gas to become what will be the game-changing resource of the decade," the article states.

Shale is a fine-grained, rock composed of mud that is a mix of clay minerals and tiny fragments of other minerals, especially quartz and calcite. Shale gas is natural gas produced from shale. It is very cost effective when compared to other forms of energy and is quickly becoming the next big thing. Shale gas is breathing new life into the natural gas industry.

AEP CEO Mike Morris also has called shale gas a "game-changer" for the utility industry. During his keynote address at the Renewable Energy Finance Forum, Morris discussed challenges facing renewable energy and specifically mentioned shale gas. "The natural gas supply model was a dwindling resource base that was going to price itself out of the electrical generation market," Morris said. "The impact of shale gas [is] on everything that we do in the energy production business."

Shale is abundant in the United States. Target areas of exploration or active wells of shale gas can be found in Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, Louisiana, Michigan, New York, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma and Texas. Shale also is located in Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky and Pennsylvania. To date, all successful shale gas wells have been in rocks of Paleozoic and Mesozoic age. North America has been the leader in developing and producing shale gas. The great economic success of the Barnett Shale in Texas has spurred the search for other sources of shale gas across the U.S. and Canada.