Mexico Says Cantarell Field To Begin Decline In 2005 - Bloomberg

[hatrack]

March 1 (Bloomberg) -- "Petroleos Mexicanos, Mexico's state oil monopoly, said it expects production at its largest oil field to decline this year, earlier than previously forecast, and plans to boost investment by more than $1 billion from 2004 to make up for the shortfall at other fields.

Cantarell, which accounted for more than 60 percent of oil production last year, will produce an estimated 2.02 million barrels of oil in 2005, down from 2.11 million barrels per day in 2004, Vinicio Suro, planning director for Pemex's production and exploration unit, said on a conference call with investors.

``That means that we're going to begin the decline of production in Cantarell by around 80,000 or 90,000 barrels of oil'' per day, Suro said.

Pemex plans to invest as much as $11.5 billion this year, up from $10.1 billion in 2004, to boost production in other fields, including exploration of deep-water deposits for the first time, to make up for the Cantarell decline. Pemex has doubled its debt in four years to $45 billion to finance annual investments of about $10 billion."

EDIT

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000086&sid=aPgrH2d7FvKQ

[cthrumatrix]

1. Peak Oil and the war for resources is played in front of our eyes

why is it that we always seem to want war or destablize countries that have Oil under thir feet?

[hatrack]

2. Shameless self-kick - this is important, folks!

Of course, it's not nearly as important as the Jacko Trial . . .

[calimary]

3. Kick.

It IS important.

[happyslug]

4. Today it is NOT important, Tomorrow it will be..

Like the invention of the Percussion Cap about 1810 and the transistor in 1947, the full effect will not be known for years. Fundamental inventions and fundamental changes are almost never noticed by the people it will most affect. They only see the results years later in the form of the Machine Gun (in case of the Percussion cap) and the personal computer (in the case of transistors).

The same with this report, it is one of many showing the decline in ALL OIL FIELDS outside the Persian Gulf. The real problem will be when the Persian Gulf fields start to decline.

[RedCloud]

5. Better technology is available

The bastards just want to squeeze out every drop and dollar they can before THEY tell US what new form is permissible.

We should already have subterranean cross Continental magnetically lifted trains. The idea was proposed around the Civil War, but it was thought that people would not pay even a penny since gravity is free!

[happyslug]

6. Mag-lift, the dream that will never die

And should. Every time I do research into Mag-lift I always come across two insurmountable problems. First is between 20 and 200 mph the most energy efficient method of transport is steel wheel on steel rail. Mag-Lift only beats out Steel at speeds over 200 mph. Thus any Mag-Lift to be more practical than Steel Wheel on Steel Rail has to go faster than 250mph, if it goes less you should used Steel Wheel on Steel Rail for it is not only cheaper to install, but cheaper to operate.

The Second problem is spacing the stops so that you can slowly ease the Mag-Lift to full speed and than back to a stop. This is easier if you use small trains (easier to speed up or slow down) but if you go to small you lose whatever operating efficiency you can get. Once you look at the potential train size (i.e something bigger than a bus) you quickly find out that if you restrict stops to lets say, one stop in Boston, New York City, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington, by the time the train gets up to speed (i.e. over 250mph) it has to start to slow down for the next stop. Thus high speed rail makes more sense in the North East Corridor AND ALMOST EVERY OTHER CORRIDOR WHERE MAG-LIFT HAS BEEN PROPOSED.

Now Mag-Lift makes sense on longer runs, i.e. New York City to Chicago, or Washington to Chicago, or even Washington to Orlando (or for the West Coast San Francisco to Los Angles), but this assumes NO STOPS IN BETWEEN THE TWO NAMED CITIES. Once you make a stop between the two named cities the same problem arises as in the North-East Corridor. This is do the the simple fact Mag-Lift is to inflexible compared to Steel Rail to really be an option. In the test beds built (including one in Birmingham England) this problem was one of the reasons the test beds were never expanded (and since all of these Mag-Lifts are custom built after a few years it gets harder to find spare parts).

Now Japan has a Mag-Lift in operation as does Shanghai China, both are used to get to an Airport and were built to show case the technology more than as the best solution to the transport problem their were built to address (mostly getting from Downtown to the Airport). These tend to be two stop Mag-Lifts, the Shanghai does get to 286 mph but on a Bus size car not a full size train so that the car can get up to speed and back down in the length o the track. In my opinion a LRV system could have done the same job, at less cost and without the potential problem that killed the Birmingham Mag Lift (lack of spare parts for the custom made system, an LRV could used parts made by various LRV makers, something to think about when discussing this technology).

In the coming energy crunch people are going to have to learn to slow down. With that the need to go faster than what a Steel Wheel on Steel Rail train can do will disappear. Thus These Mag-Lifts will die long before either Heavy Rail systems (Conventional Trains as most people know them to be) or Light Rail Systems (LRV, or Trolley or Streetcar systems) disappear.

For more on the Birmingham Mag-lift and its replacement by a more reliable bus:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/488394.stm

More on Mag-Lift:
http://www.qhappy.com/wms/pr02.htm
http://www.faculty.rsu.edu/~clayton/presson/paper.htm
http://encarta.msn.com/text_761579465__1/Magnetic_Levitation_Train.html
http://cem.colorado.edu/archives/fl1997/thor.html
http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blrailroad2.htm#TOP

On The Shanghai Mag-lift:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/2616339.stm
It gets up to 287mph in its 20 miles trip but it is an bus size car NOT a full size train and only has two stops.

[reprobate]

8. In short, you mean Mag Lev is the perfect replacement.....

...for intercity airliners. They could carry about the same number of passengers, the same distances, at almost the same speeds and at much greater efficiency.

Thats exactly what some of us have been saying for years.

Thank you.

[happyslug]

10. My point was High Speed rail could do the Job NOW

Now you will have to purchase new Right of Ways (ROW) so that you can speed up the Rails, but almost everything you can do with Mag-Lift you can do with high speed rail. Mag-Lift can provide quicker long distance travel, but once you decide to go with rail, running locals and expresses on the same track is possible with High Speed Rail. For example you can set up your stations so that all trains stop at the important stops, but Expresses speed by less important stops. This is Aleda done with the Acela service on the Northeast Corridor.

Here are the Stops between Boston and Washington DC (I Marked the stops served by Acela with the word Acela): Notice over Acela does NOT stop at 1/2 of these stops already:

Boston, South Station (BOS) (Acela)
Boston, Back Bay (BBY) (Acela)
Westwood, Route 128 Station (RTE) (Acela)
Providence (PVD) (Acela)
West Kingston (KIN)
Westerly (WLY)
Mystic (MYS)
New London (NLC) (Acela)
Old Saybrook (OSB)
Springfield (SPG)
Windsor Locks (WNL)
Windsor (WND)
Hartford (HFD)
Kensington, Berlin Train Station (BER)
Meriden (MDN)
Wallingford (WFD)
New Haven (NHV) (Acela)
Bridgeport (BRP)
Stamford (STM) (Acela)
New Rochelle (NRO)
New York, Penn Station (NYP) (Acela)
Newark (NWK) (Acela)
Newark, Airport Stop (EWR)
Iselin (MET) (Acela)
New Brunswick (NBK)
Princeton Junction (PJC)
Trenton (TRE) (Acela)
Cornwells Heights (CWH)
Philadelphia, North Philadelphia (PHN)
Philadelphia (PHL) (Acela)
Wilmington (WIL) (Acela)
Newark (NRK)
Aberdeen (ABE)
Baltimore, Penn Station (BAL) (Acela)
Baltimore, BWI Airport Rail Station (BWI) (Acela)
New Carrollton (NCR)
Washington, Union Station (WAS) (Acela)

Basically you can gt on a "Regular" train to the next Acela stop and catch the Acela at that stop. This is a variation of the old Local and Express railroad service. The local would stop at every whistle-stop on the line. Most people would take it to the next big stop where they would catch the express. Most of these whistle stops were on sidings so the Express (like the Acela) just passes them by. The local train would pick up the Passenger and then get back on the main track. You can do this with rail, you can NOT with Mag-Lift.

Now you could set up a separate Mag-Lift system to do express service to the local service done by steel rail, but that means two sets of tracks along the same corridor, and if we go by the North East Corridor one of the busiest in the World. I do not know if you could set up a new rail corridor for Steel rail let alone Mag-Lift.

Now for express passenger Service for the Northeast Corridor you are looking at exclusive right of ways anyway (Just to reduce delays caused by Fright trains on the same line), but in some locations on the Northeast you just will NOT be able to run such exclusive Right of Ways, and it is these locations that you have the greatest tie ups (For example getting into New York City). Thus I do not think Mag-Lift would be a good mix in the Northeast.

Now lets look at the next corridor, Washington DC (or Philadelphia) to Pittsburgh than to Chicago. Both of these lines go through the Appalachian Mountains. The Trains Amtrak runs stop in every city between the Northeast Corridor Cities and Pittsburgh (and continues this to Chicago). You would have support for increase local service but not an Express that bypasses these cities. It will NOT happen. Some sort of Local Service would have to be provided. Once you provide the local Service you could than also use the line for an Express but this time you are stuck with a Steel Rail System.

Thus my point is the need for High Speed Rail system in the US. We do need it but it has to be Steel Rail. The North-East Corridor is just to packed for anything else to be added and the Route via Pittsburgh to Chicago has to many stops for Mag-Lift to get up to speed and provide the local service that is going to be demanded.

Notice my problems with Mag-Lift is NOT with the technology but how that technology actually will be used in real life. In real life you have to have some sort of High Speed rail (with a local feeding system) before you can install a Super High Speed Mag-Lift System. The gains from going to Mag-Lift are to small given what you can do with Steel rail. Steel Rail is not Glamorous but it is effective.

[reprobate]

11. I see what you mean now. And agree 100%, with modifications.

I can see a three legged rail system.

Local and express high speed rail, as you suggest.

I can also see a replacement for the airlines, which are the most inefficient and insecure means of long distance travel. And by extension the most expensive in terms of both fuel and infrastructure.

I don't know what the trade of point between airline and mag-lev would be, but off the top of my head, I would think that anything less than about a one hour flight should be left to the high speed rail, with mag-lev taking over for more than that. Thus the NE corridor would be HS rail, and NY-ATL would be mag-lev.

I disagree that steel rail is not glamorous. I'm old enough to remember when rail travel was not only fun, but an adventure. There is something very social about rail travel. You have the opportunity to meet and exchange views with people you wouldn't have met otherwise. That is not possible with airliners, and I think we are the less for it.

[chlamor]

7. Cantarell The Worlds Second Largest Oil Field Is Dying

Here are some specifics on Cantarell:

"The second largest producing field in the world is the Cantarell complex in Mexico. It lies 85 kim from Ciudad del Carmen.   The field was discovered in 1976 and put on production in 1979.  This is one of the geologically interesting oil fields because the producing formation was created when the Chicxulub meteor impacted the earth.  The upper reservoir is a brecciated dolomite of Uppermost Cretaceous age. The breccia is from a shelf failure (underwater landslide) when the meteor hit.  This 950 foot thick rubble became the reservoir for one of the biggest fields in the world."
<snip>
"Originally the field had 35 billion barrels of oil in place.  Now, in place oil is not reserves.  They expect to get around 50% of that oil out of the ground to market. The field reached an early peak in production of 1.1 million barrels per day in April of 1981 from 40 oil wells. By 1994 the production was down to 890,000 barrels of oil per day.  At that time, cumulative production was 4.8 billion barrels.  In 1995 it was producing 1 million barrels per day and the Mexican government decided to invest in that field to raise the production level.  They built 26 new platforms, drilled lots of new wells and built the largest nitrogen extraction facility capable of injecting a billion cubic feet of nitrogen per day to maintain reservoir pressure.  Doing this raised the oil production rate in 2001 to 2.2 million barrels per day.  Today the field produces 2.1 million barrels."
<snip>
 A couple of weeks ago I ran into this from the oil industry rags I read. It is a chilling thought since this is the 2nd biggest producer of oil on earth. Ghawar produces 4.5 million bbl/day, Cantarell, 2.2 million bbl/day, Da Qing and Burgun around 1 million per day.

       "Supergiant Cantarell continues to be the mainstay of Mexican oil production, with 2.1 MMb/d of output in 2003 up from 1.9 MMb/d in 2002. However, Cantarell is expected to decline rapidly over the next few years, falling as far as 1 MM b/d by 2008. This has given particular urgency to Pemex's efforts to develop other fields and move into deepwater." For now, Pemex's best alternative project is the heavy-oil complex known as Ku-Maloob-Zaap, in Campeche Bay close to Cantarell. Output from this complex was 288,000 b/d in 2003 and is expected to rise to about 800,000 b/d by the end of the decade." 
<snip>
And one must remember that all oil fields which are producing today, are in the process of declining.

"The implications of this upcoming decline are tremendous to the world. This field produces half of what Ghawar does and it won't be doing that much longer.  The effect on the energy supply will be felt and there is no way for that not to happen.  On Aug. 3, 2004, the OPEC president stated that OPEC has no more spare capacity.  They are pumping all out and can't satisfy the demand for oil.  If fields like Cantarell begin declining, the problem of supplying the world with oil will only get worse."
Link:
http://home.entouch.net/dmd/cantarell.htm

[buzzard]

9. Maybe now there will be an impetus for developing greener alternatives.

[NYC]

12. Greener alternatives would make the price of oil go down.

I don't see the powers that be allowing that to happen.