The King of Frakk: Shale gas pioneer proud

George Mitchell is an old Texas oilman whose technology appears to have seriously shaken up the market for natural gas, in the US and across the globe.

A piece on GreeningOfOil.com profiles the 91-year-old shale gas pioneer, who knows he and his team have drastically increased natural gas supplies in the US, but also recognizes the potential dangers of hydraulic fracturing or “frakking.” Mitchell says he believes that the industry will take the proper measures to avoid those risks.

Today, Mitchell is very hopeful about shale. He believes natural gas can be developed across more than half of Pennsylvania, home to part of the Marcellus Shale formation. He expects shale developments to spring up across Europe and Asia in the next five years. He gleefully takes credit for bringing down natural gas prices by increasing supply.

The report recalls how, despite much scepticism, Mitchell and his team spent over two decades trying out different techniques for coaxing natural gas from shale rock. He eventually discovered that a combination of water and sand – called “slick water” – was the best compound for cracking underground shale rock formations and releasing the gas within them.

Hydraulic fracturing combined with horizontal drilling, which allows a well to touch more of the flat shale than vertical drilling, is credited with increasing domestic gas reserves by 35 percent between 2006 and 2008, according to the Potential Gas Committee.



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