The debate continues.

http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSTRE56S5TY20090729

Eric’sWeb

Oil prices back on track.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20602099&sid=aAL96CU5bAvs

Eric’sWeb

Oklahoma relies heavily on the Gross Production Tax to fund its government. The tax is a percentage of gross revenues which are woefully low this year.

http://www.istockanalyst.com/article/viewiStockNews/articleid/3377907

Eric’sWeb

Another source of info for you shale players.

http://oilshalegas.com/fayettevilleshale.html

Eric’sWeb

A long-held discussion for which there is still no definitive answer.

http://geology.com/press-release/mantle-hydrocarbons/

Eric’sWeb

Some very interesting graphs to help predict the price of oil.

http://omrpublic.iea.org/

Eric’sWeb

Once again the Catch 22 of the exploration business: success spawns lower prices.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/18/business/energy-environment/18gas.html?_r=1

Eric’sWeb

If true, a plot befitting a prime-time TV series.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=apaHKiMnL4Qk

Eric’sWeb

Here is a recipe that tastes much better it sounds.  Yes it's Cajun!  Remember that New Orleans is a melting pot.  There are many people of German heritage there, and Irish, African, etc. - I could go on but you know what I mean:

2           pounds squash

1           small chopped onion

3           tablespoons butter

1/4 lb    ground sausage

             cracker crumbs

             water

In a skillet mix squash, chopped onion, sausage and a small amount of water.  Cook until squash and onion are tender.  Brown sausage and then combine with squash and onions.  Season to taste with salt and pepper, and then transfer to 1 quart greased casserole.  Cover with cracker crumbs and cook at 350 degrees in oven until brown.  Enjoy.

Eric’sWeb

Let’s hope he is wrong.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/energy/6537491.html

Eric’sWeb

An interesting article for all of you sedimentary petrologists out there.

http://geology.com/press-release/age-of-the-amazon-river/

Eric’sWeb

Wind presently delivers only 2% of the U.S. electricity, but it is growing rapidly.

http://newscenter.lbl.gov/press-releases/2009/07/16/new-wind-power-market/

Eric’sWeb

More good news for US oil producers.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20602099&sid=axKEKWw9txfQ

Eric’sWeb

How sweet it would be.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20602099&sid=aPn_MSUByx6A

Eric’sWeb

Demand drops more than a million barrels a day.

http://www.reuters.com/article/ousiv/idUSTRE4AB76220081112

Eric’sWeb

I am always looking for tasty recipes that are also healthy. I found this recipe in an insurance company’s member update brochure, the author or authors not credited.  It sounds so good, and healthy, that I am sharing it.

Lemon Vinaigrette Grilled Chicken with Arugula

Ø      4 packed cups baby arugula leaves

Ø      2 packed cups baby spinach leaves

Ø      6 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice

Ø      ½ tsp salt

Ø      ¼ tsp ground black pepper

Ø      1 Tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil

Ø      1 lb. skinless and boneless chicken breast, cut into 4 pieces

Heat grill to medium-high heat.  If using a ridged grill pan indoors, set over high heat until very hot.  In large mixing bowl, combine arugula and spinach. Cover and refrigerate

In small mixing bowl, whisk lemon juice and salt until salt dissolves.  Add ground pepper and whisk in oil until combined.  Set dressing aside.  One at a time, place each piece of chicken breast between two pieces of wax paper.  Using the flat side of a meat mallet, pound chicken until evenly 1/8-inch thick.  If chicken pieces are thick, turning over several times may be necessary.  Coat chicken lightly on both sides with cooking spray.  If desired, season lightly with salt and pepper.

Grill chicken until white in center, turning once, about 3 minutes each side.  While chicken grills, pour dressing over greens.  Using tongs, turn until well coated.  To serve, place one piece of chicken on each of 4 dinner plates. Mound ¼ of salad on top of each. Makes 4 servings.

170 calories, 5 g. total fat per serving

Louisiana Mystery Writer

The future looks rosier for the natural gas industry.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20602099&sid=aOQq3vVlpKaI

They say that life goes on.  Yes, it is true.  Shortly after the passing of my wife, I headed north to Garfield County where I had a well drilling.  My heart was sad but it felt good to be away from the sterile hospital walls I had haunted for the past fourteen months.  I spotted the derrick ten miles before I actually reached it on the flat Oklahoma plain.

We had a drilling break earlier in the day and I had called a drill-stem test for the elusive 1^st Wilcox Sand zone that we had encountered.  They were pulling the pipe as I drove up on the location.  Bill met me as I drove up on location.

Bill was the crusty completion man for the company to whom I had sold the prospect – the best completion man in the business, I heard.  He did not seem so crusty when he greeted me.

“Steve told me your wife just passed away.”

“Last week,” I said.

Bill slapped me on the back.  “Hang in there, Pardner.  It’ll all get better.”

It was a glorious early spring day, a slight nip still in the air.  We stood in the doghouse, fifteen feet off the ground, watching as the roughnecks yanked stand after stand of drill pipe.  The diesel engine groaned every time it pulled the heavy steel pipe toward the crow’s nest.

“I was about your age when my first wife died,” Bill finally said.

“You had a wife that died?” I asked, suddenly interested.

“She had cancer, just like your wife.”

The sun was beginning to set and the roughnecks had most of the pipe out of the hole and still no show.  I was beginning to get discouraged but Bill said, “We’re going to get oil on this test.”

“How do you know?” I asked.

Bill pointed at the swarm of flies, by now almost covering the rig floor.  “They smell it,” he said.  “It’s coming.”

The next stand of pipe the roughnecks pulled proved him correct.  Black gold poured onto the rig floor when they broke the joint between the two stands.  We were four stands off bottom, every stand filled with oil.

“How long did it take for you to get over the death of your wife?” I asked as they pulled the last stand of pipe from the hole.

“Never,” he said, “But it gets easier with every passing year.  I am remarried now. Oil wives have to be understanding and my wife is the best person in the world.  Someday soon you’ll find some one too.”

“But why us, Bill?”

“Unless they die in a car or plane crash, every couple, sooner or later, will have to face what we’ve already faced.  You might say we’ve got a leg up.”

We sat pipe on the well with high hopes.  The 1^st Wilcox Sand, it turned out, was depleted and we came up the hole to another zone that made a commercial, although marginal well.  I thought of this story when oil topped first topped a hundred-ten dollars a barrel for the first time ever.

Ninety percent of all the wells in the United States produce less than ten barrels of oil or ten MCFG per day.  Most of the majors left the country a decade or more ago.  What are left are mostly mom and pop oil companies drilling a few wells every year for the dregs of the keg.

Do not hate the oil industry.  For every billionaire like Boone Pickens there are a thousand, nay a million, Bills out there, and two thousand roughnecks toiling from dawn until dusk, often seven days every week.  If it were not for them, oil would already be two-hundred dollars a barrel.

Eric’sWeb

No expectations here, it is reality.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/14/AR2009071402525.html

Eric’sWeb

Natural gas prices trying to move upward.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20602099&sid=aV6rbyhW8XZ0

Eric’sWeb

Yes, but does anyone believe Morgan Stanley anymore?

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20602099&sid=aZhHgwSywEl4

An interesting article from the AAPG Explorer.

http://www.aapg.org/explorer/2008/08aug/woodford.cfm

Eric’sWeb

Commercial coal-bearing sediments are located at or near the earth’s surface in many parts of eastern Oklahoma. Coal, first mined in Oklahoma in 1873, resulted in miners from many European nations immigrating to Oklahoma. They brought their culture and cuisine with them.

These German, Italian and eastern European immigrants adapted their culture and cuisine to the lifestyle of eastern Oklahoma, its people and its food sources. They learned how to brew Choc (short for Choctaw) beer from the Indians, and adapted their native cuisine to fruits, vegetables, etc. grown in Oklahoma.

The largest Italian population west of the Mississippi once resided in western Arkansas, eastern Oklahoma, and many wonderful restaurants such as Venetian Inn, Mary Meister’s, Pete’s Place, Isle of Capri and Roseanna’s still serve authentic Arkansas/Oklahoma-influenced Italian fare. Here is an Italian pasta sauce recipe with an eastern Oklahoma/western Arkansas flare.

v     28 oz whole tomatoes

v     12 oz tomato paste

v     1 med onion, chopped

v     1 to 2 cloves garlic, minced

v     ¼ tsp black pepper

v     ½ tsp thyme

v     1 tbsp parsley

v     1 tbsp oregano

v     1 ½ c Arkansas red wine (yes, grown from native grapes)

v     2 tsp salt

v     1 tsp sugar

v     1 tbsp olive oil

v     ½ c chopped green pepper

v     ½ c mushrooms

Use a 6-quart stew pot to sauté onion and green pepper in olive oil.  When onion is soft and clear, add remaining ingredients, except the mushrooms. Stir well. Simmer over medium-low heat for at least an hour (longer is preferable). Add mushrooms 15 minutes before turning off heat. Buon appetito, pardner!

Fiction South

Rigs drilling for natural gas drop to 672.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20602099&sid=aaqiXX3EQBRk

Exploration Push in British Columbia's Horn River Basin Produces Encouraging Results

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124716768350519225.html

New research results surprise everyone on the potential of this well-known Devonian black shale.

http://geology.com/articles/marcellus-shale.shtml

Eric’sWeb

Always interesting Boone Pickens.

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/business/2009/07/08/nr.pickens.oil.addiction.cnn

Eric’sWeb

Several years ago, I serialized a story called Chicken Fries. It is a semi-fictional account of my experiences during a well I sat (watched) in the late seventies in Grant County, Oklahoma.  While fictionalized, the reality of the story is almost as strange as make believe.

If you can imagine the wild days of the California or Alaska gold rushes, then you can picture how wild Oklahoma was during the late seventies, mid-eighties. The state abounded with wild men, wild women and wildcatters.

People poured into Oklahoma from all parts of the U.S., and the world to cash in on the boom. Former used car salesmen began reaping the windfall profits encompassing the State, many selling multi-million dollar drilling deals that they couldn’t comprehend themselves.  Soon, there were shady promoters driving Ferraris and flying to Vegas in their own jet planes. Everyone in the State was getting rich and people all over the world wanted to get in on the action.

As a deal-generating geologist during this time, I sold a viable drilling prospect to a legitimate oil and gas company. Part of my agreement was that I would sit (monitor) the well from start to finish.  Anne, my deceased wife, and I rented a recreational vehicle to accomplish the task.  According to the man from whom we rented the RV, Wanda Jackson, Oklahoma rockabilly superstar, once owned it. Not only was Jackson a star in her own right, she dated Elvis Presley during his early years.

The RV was large, almost too large for the narrow Grant County roads, and well appointed.  A close friend Ray, also in the oil and gas business at the time, accompanied us on the trip north of Oklahoma City.  We parked the behemoth at the site of the drilling wildcat, soon learning there was no place close to get a meal. The nearest restaurant, the Curb Café, was twenty miles east.

The sheriff of Grant County owned the café and he was somewhat of a celebrity.  During the last real oil boom, crop circles and cattle mutilations dominated the news on many a day. No one really knew what caused the anomalies but much of the population suspected Satanists or extra-terrestrials.  The sheriff of Grant County was an expert on both and the person news agencies called whenever there was an incident.  During the late seventies and early eighties, there were incidents almost every week.

A well site geologist studies sample cuttings washed up from the borehole of the well.  This well had enough positive indications of success that everyone was prematurely counting their money. Despite the positive indications, the well ended as a dry hole, just one of the many strange occurrences during the ten days Anne and I “sat” the well.

Chicken Fries is a fictionalized account of our adventures in Grant County that summer. Truth, as they say, is often stranger than fiction. As I recall stopping on the country road, wondering about the flashing lights and the troopers in the adjacent field, gazing at a dead, mutilated cow, I understand the reality of that statement.

Eric’sWeb

A welcome prediction for oil producers (but what about natural gas?)

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20602099&sid=aa3Y_P95wJ70

Eric’sWeb

Here is a PDF map of the Gulf of Mexico with lots of detail.

http://downloads.pennnet.com/os/posters/0109_gom_os_map.pdf

Eric’sWeb

While this isn’t about energy, per se, it is about one of the most important energy-producing regions in the U.S.

http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/population/013960.html

Eric’sWeb

Something old explorers only dreamed of.

http://geology.com/nasa/world-topographic-map/

Eric’sWeb

My Brother Jack was born on July the Third and he and I loved fireworks.  We both wanted to be soldiers and we practiced war our entire childhood.  Because of our obsession my favorite holiday, and my Brother Jack’s, was and is the Fourth of July and the one I remember best is the first one that I can remember.

While growing up in small town Vivian, there were no City ordinances barring the use of fireworks.  Every manner of explosives was sold including M-80s and Two-Inchers.  Jack and I are both lucky to have all our digits as we later experimented with everything we could strike a match too.

My buddy Timmy Jon and I even mixed our own batch of gunpowder and almost burned up the house with it.  The first Fourth that I can remember, however, we made do with firecrackers, bottle rockets, sparklers and Roman candles.

On the Fourth of July my Mom and Dad would buy us about ten dollars worth of fireworks.  Ten bucks doesn’t sound like much but you could pop lots of firecrackers for that amount in the sixties.  We always began the fireworks as soon as it was dark enough.

I don’t remember my age but I was old enough to feel the excitement of impending danger.  With our Dad’s help we began lighting sparklers, popping firecrackers and launching one bottle rocket after another.  We soon got down to the good stuff.

‘Hold it in the air and shake it,” My Dad directed as he lit my first-ever Roman candle.

I can still remember the percussion and slight recoil as incandescent flame burst from the coiled-paper barrel of the explosive device.  I couldn’t count at the time but I had a seat-of-the-pants feel for how many fiery rounds the candle contained.  When it was over I held the warm rod in my hand, inhaling acrid smoke and burned powder.  It was an odor I will never forget.

My red-headed Brother Jack was next at bat and he had mischief in mind before my Dad ever lit the candle’s fuse.  My Mother was standing behind us in the open door of our house.  Soon as the candle started spitting fire, Jack began pointing it at anything that caught his fancy - a tree, the family car, me, and finally toward the open door of the house.

Dodging the oncoming fireball, my Mom screamed and jumped off the porch.  Jack put at least three fireballs through the house, luckily catching nothing on fire.  When he finally threw down the spent Roman candle my Dad just shook his head, grabbed the remaining fireworks and walked into the house.  Mom followed him, but not before unloading verbally on Jack.

Nothing much else was ever said about the incident, Mom and Dad giving Brother Jack the benefit of the doubt that what he did was caused by inexperience and lack of good sense.  After living in close proximity to him until I was fifteen, I know better.  He went to sleep that night giggling about scaring my Mom and Dad and getting away with it.

The Fourth of July means a lot more to me than just fireworks and hot dogs and we should all reflect on the sacrifices this wonderful holiday immortalizes.  Still, my favorite holiday remains the Fourth of July and the one I remember best is the first one that I can remember.

http://www.EricWilder.com

I found a treasure trove of my Mom’s old cookbooks when my Brother jack and I finished packing the last of Mom and Dad’s possessions before selling the house.  She was always trying new recipes and used brother Jack and me as test subjects (I won’t say guinea pigs).

We liked almost everything she cooked – except the prune pie she once made for us.  She had a tendency to pencil a little check mark beside recipes she particularly liked.  Here is one that had two check marks beside it:

Oatmeal Crispies

• 1 c. margarine (or butter)
• 2 c. brown sugar, packed
• 2 c. flour
• 1 tsp. salt
• 2 eggs
• 2 c. rolled oats
• 1 c. raisins
• 1 tsp. soda

Mix butter, sugar and eggs.  Mix in baking soda, salt and flour.  Mix in rolled oats and raisins.  Drop dough by spoonfuls onto baking pan.  Leave room for cookies to spread.  Bake at 375 degrees for 10 to 12 minutes.  Enjoy.

Eric’sWeb

An interesting article, especially for a Louisiana boy like myself.

http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/06/090629-mississippi-river-sea-levels.html

Eric’sWeb

      Here a couple pics of a well in Logan County, Oklahoma.  It must not be very good because the buzzard in the second picture is roosting nearby.

Eric’sWeb