Natural gas production in the United States will peak later this year or in early 2007, an industry observer says.
Unless energy companies find new gas fields or new drilling techniques to improve extraction, natural gas supplies will peak at more than 52 billion cubic feet per day and then begin to decline, said David Reimers, senior U.S. data specialist with IHS Energy.
And that will push up prices even higher.
"It is a concern," Reimers said Monday at the IHS Energy Regional Roundup in downtown Denver. "We need energy for the industries, for our economic base.
"Gas production will peak and start declining next year, and unless we find new plays, or new technologies, we are going to be in a bind."
IHS Energy bought Cambridge Energy Research Associates - a consulting firm founded by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Daniel Yergin - in 2004. The firm is owned by Arapahoe County-based IHS Inc.
Reimers said the Rocky Mountains, which contain huge natural gas reserves, could be the answer to America's hunger for gas. The gas here is trapped between layers of either shale, tight sands or coal beds, and it requires unconventional drilling techniques to pry it out.
Unconventional gas wells were 14,386, or one-third, of the gas wells completed last year. According to Reimers, the share of unconventional gas - especially from the Rocky Mountains - in the future will account for more than the current 28 percent of total U.S. production.
Unlike other areas in the U.S. where production has declined, the Rocky Mountains have produced a steady supply of gas. But there's a need for more wells to maintain that supply, Reimers said.
