The key to an energy boom is simple: Build a technology to get at the oil and gas that geologists already know is trapped in various subterranean, or subsea, formations.

The fracking boom in the U.S. is the obvious example. Extracting seabed methane hydrate is another huge bet—energy-starved Japan has made that.

Saudi Arabia could be next to use new technology to get at currently trapped gigantic reserves of oil and gas. A small pilot project about to get under way is the energy market equivalent of a moonshot, but it could allow a Saudi fracking boom to move one step closer to reality.

ll over the world, there are naturally fractured oil and gas reservoirs called carbonite formations, and no region has as much oil and gas trapped in carbonate formations as the Middle East. Carbonates are areas of sedimentary rock—limestone, for instance—that contain many natural cracks inside them.

Carbonite formations are estimated to hold 60 percent of the world's oil and 40 percent of the world's gas reserves. In the Middle East, roughly 70 percent of oil and 90 percent of gas reserves are trapped in the carbonite, according to oil services giant Schlumberger.

In hydraulic fracturing, water and other chemicals are injected underground through a well bore to extract oil and gas. The norm today is to use hydraulic pressure on a huge volume of undirected fluid, mostly water, to actually crack open the earth.

Extracting oil and gas trapped in carbonate formations has been done through a process known as acidization. Water mixed with hydrochloric acid (it's about an 85 percent water solution) is pumped into a well bore and then branches out into the carbonate formation and etches patterns in the rock formation—think of an image of roots underneath a tree.

But the conventional approach has some big problems. The acid may not make contact with areas of the rock formation that need to be dissolved in order to access trapped oil and gas. In other cases, the acid might just wash along the inside of the well bore and not make it out into the rock formation itself.

Higher recovery rate, lower cost

Enter Fishbones, a Norway-based oil services start-up founded by Rune Freyer, a former Schlumberger executive who is considered a technical wizard in the oil business.

"Rune is a genius," said Richard Spears,v.p. at oil and gas services consultant Spears and Associates. "He has an incredible history of developing really cool technology for oil fields," he said.

Over the next six months, Fishbones plans to complete installations of its technology in Saudi Arabia for a client it can't disclose.

Oil services company Baker Hughes estimates Saudia Arabia is fifth in the world when it comes to recoverable gas reserves. Much of that is in carbonate formation. What Saudia Arabia doesn't have is a lot of water, which you need in fracking. Fishbones technology uses 95 percent less fluids and is designed for recovering oil and gas from carbonate formations.

Emma Richards, an oil and gas analyst with London-based BMI Research, said, "Saudi Arabia has an absolute dire need for gas. They want to shift their power more toward gas-based sources so they can free up oil for exports. One of the big areas they're targeting is gas reserves in carbonate formations, and they've been investing quite heavily over the last few years in R&D in different kinds of fracturing technologies."

Source: www.cnbc.com

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