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EIA 2019 reserves report shows Alaska proved reserves up 259M
Kristen Nelson Petroleum News
Alaska had the largest annual net increase of proved reserves of crude oil and condensate of any state in 2019, 259 million barrels, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said in its annual proved reserves report for 2019, released Jan. 11.
The total includes both producing and proved nonproducing reserves.
EIA has this information because of a requirement under the Federal Energy Administration Act of 1974 that operators sampled by the EIA fill out Form EIA-23L, reporting annual domestic oil and gas reserves.
Proved reserves, EIA said in the 2019 survey year report, “are the estimated volumes of all liquids defined as crude oil, which geological and engineering data demonstrate with reasonable certainty to be recoverable in future years from known reservoirs under existing economic and operating conditions.”
Nonproducing reserves, also included in the total, are defined as “Quantities of proved liquid or gaseous hydrocarbon reserves that have been identified, but which did not produce during the last survey year regardless of the availability and/or operation of production, gathering or transportation facilities. This includes both proved undeveloped and proved developed nonproducing reserves.”
Volumes for proved reserves of crude oil and condensate in Alaska have been: 2014, 2.857 billion barrels; 2015, 2.104 billion barrels; 2016, 1.574 billion barrels; 2017, 2.016 billion barrels; 2018, 2.421 billion barrels; and 2019, 2.680 billion barrels.
Barrels of proved nonproducing reserves for Alaska, which are merged into the total, are: 2014, 548 million barrels; 2015, 412 million barrels; 2016, 216 million barrels; 2017, 317 million barrels; 2018, 387 million barrels; and 2019, 395 million barrels.
US volumes EIA said proved U.S. reserves of crude oil and lease condensate grew by 0.1% in 2019, with Alaska having the largest year-over-year increase.
Texas has the most reserves, almost 20 billion barrels, followed by North Dakota, the Gulf of Mexico, New Mexico and Alaska, with Oklahoma and California rounding out the EIA’s list of top seven U.S. oil reserves states for 2015-19.
Proved reserves are operator estimates, the agency said, and for the United States the total was 44.2 billion barrels in 2019, up 0.8% from a 2018 total of 43.8 billion barrels.
The annual average West Texas Intermediate spot price was down 15% in 2019, from $65.66 in 2018 to $55.77 per barrel in 2019. “Lower WTI prices caused many operators to decrease previous proved reserves estimates, which offset increases from extensions and discoveries,” EIA said.
Including lease condensate with crude oil raises the estimate to 47.1 billion barrels in 2019, up 0.1% from a 2018 total. Natural gas reserves were 494.9 trillion cubic feet in 2019, down 1.9% from a 2018 total of 504.5 trillion cubic feet.
EIA said proved reserves of oil and natural gas in the U.S. rose annually by at least 9% in 2017 and 2018, “a trend interrupted by relatively low oil and natural gas prices.”
The reserves increase for Alaska, 259 million barrels of crude oil and lease condensate, was followed by New Mexico with 226 million barrels and Texas with 179 million barrels.
“The largest increase in crude oil and lease condensate reserves in New Mexico and Texas resulted from the development activity in the Permian Basin,” EIA said.
The largest year-over-year decrease in proved reserves of crude oil and lease condensate was in Colorado, down 154 million barrels, followed by Oklahoma, down 142 million and Utah, down 134 million barrels.
The annual Henry Hub natural gas price decreased by 21% from $3.35 per million British thermal units in 2018 to $2.63 per million Btu in 2019. The largest 2019 net decrease in natural gas reserves was in Texas, down 12 trillion cubic feet.
- KRISTEN NELSON
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