Shale oil is very marginal.
Here is a joke about shale oil:
[i]A man was desperately thirsty for a beer. He went into the pub and asked for a beer. The bartender looked very glum and said: Look I’m terribly sorry mate. We’ve completely run out of beer! It’s a terrible situation. All I can give you is a glass of water.
The man was deeply shocked but still accepted the glass of water.
He tipped the glass of water on the ancient filthy stained carpet around the bar then fell on his knees and started groveling around licking up the filthy water.
“There’s been so much beer spilled here over the years I can extract some of it from the carpet” he explained to the bartender.[/i]
That is about what an oil supply based on shale oil is like.
BHP has made a US$4.7 billion deal for a foray into US shale gas in an Arkansas shale gas deal.
As the world’s oil and gas energy supplies progress further and further beyond peak we will see the deals that are done to get the remaining poor quality supplies get progressively more and more desperate and marginal.