As of 2013 the Cline Shale, also referred to as the "Wolfcamp/Cline Shale", the "Lower Wolfcamp Shale", or the "Spraberry-Wolfcamp shale", or even the "Wolfberry", is a promising

Pennsylvanian Pennsylvanian may refer to: * A person or thing from Pennsylvania * Pennsylvanian (geology) The Pennsylvanian ( , also known as Upper Carboniferous or Late Carboniferous) is, in the International Commission on Stratigraphy, ICS geologic timesca ...

oil play east of

Midland, Texas Midland is a city in and the county seat of Midland County, Texas, United States. A small part of Midland is in Martin County. At the 2020 census, Midland's population was 132,524. It is the principal city of the Midland, Texas metropolitan ...

which underlies ten counties: Fisher, Nolan,

Sterling Sterling may refer to: Common meanings * Sterling silver, a grade of silver * Sterling (currency), the currency of the United Kingdom ** Pound sterling, the primary unit of that currency Places United Kingdom * Stirling, a Scottish city w ...

, Coke, Glasscock, Tom Green,

Howard Howard is an English-language given name originating from Old French Huard (or Houard) from a Germanic source similar to Old High German ''*Hugihard'' "heart-brave", or ''*Hoh-ward'', literally "high defender; chief guardian". It is also probabl ...

, Mitchell, Borden and Scurry counties. Exploitation is projected to rely on

hydraulic fracturing Fracking (also known as hydraulic fracturing, hydrofracturing, or hydrofracking) is a well stimulation technique involving the fracturing of bedrock formations by a pressurized liquid. The process involves the high-pressure injection of "frack ...

an organic rich shale, with Total Organic Content (TOC) of 1-8%, with silt and sand beds mixed in. It lies in a broad shelf, with minimal relief and has nice light oil of 38-42 gravity with excellent porosity of 6-12% in thickness varying 200 to 550 feet thick.

The total recovery was estimated to 30 billion barrels in 2012, and United States Geological Survey estimated the technically recoverable reserve to 20 billion barrels in 2016, the largest USGS estimate ever and nearly three times larger than that of the 2013 USGS Bakken- Three Forks resource assessment in North Dakota. The field also seems to contain 16 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. This is the first assessment of continuous resources in the Wolfcamp shale in the Midland Basin portion of the Permian. During the 1980s, vertical wells produced oil in the Wolfcamp area. However, since 2000 in North America, horizontal drilling or porpoising along with hydraulic fracturing have grown tremendously and are tapping the continuous oil reserve. In Odessa, Chris Schenk, a Denver-based research geologist and assessment team member, told KWES, "This oil has been known there for a long time -- our task is to estimate what we think the volume of recoverable oil is." According to Morris Burns, a local oil expert and former president of the Permian Basin Petroleum Association, 50% to 60% is recoverable beginning at a price range of $60 to $65 per barrel. This area is the largest continuous oil discovery in the United States and encompasses the cities of both Lubbock and Midland which are 118 miles apart. The Cline Shale is more generally referred to as the Lower Wolfcamp Shale. The Cline is a small part of the greater Wolfcamp Shale Formation.

Notes

References

External links and further reading

Cline Shale Central - Online Guide to the Cline ShaleUSGS maps of the continuous oil locations of Wolfcamp shale within the Permian Basin
{{coord missing, Texas Oil fields in Texas