Russia, China to Drill for Shale Oil, Gas in 2014

Hydraulic fracturing of shale in search of oil and gas has hardly started outside the U.S., but that’s changing, Bloomberg has said. 

A record 400 shale wells may be drilled beyond U.S. borders in 2014, with most in China and Russia, according to energy consultants Wood Mackenzie Ltd. While that’s a fraction of the thousands of shale wells drilled in the U.S., the number of rigs used onshore in Europe and the Asia-Pacific region has increased 10 percent over the past year, data compiled by oil services company Baker Hughes Inc. show. Most of those rigs are meant for shale, Bloomberg Businessweek reports in its Nov. 18 issue.

“It’s likely there will be a revolution,” Maria van der Hoeven, executive director at the Paris-based International Energy Agency, said in an interview in London. “But not everywhere at the same time. And you just can’t copy the U.S. experience.”

Copyright: Bloomberg, 2013