Tests deflate Karoo fracking boom hopes

THE first measurements of shale gas in the Karoo have deflated hopes of a world-leading fracking bonanza.

Instead of an initial estimate of 485 trillion cubic feet (13.7 trillion cubic metres), which would have been the world’s fourth largest, scientists now say 13 trillion cubic feet (0.4 trillion cubic metres) is the most realistic amount of gas trapped in shale hundreds of metres beneath the surface of the Main Karoo basin.

But they says this still represents a large resource with development potential for the South African petroleum industry, and is 13 times bigger than the offshore gas deposits that sparked the construction of Mossgas in the Southern Cape.

A team led by Michiel de Kock, from the University of Johannesburg, took samples of rock from three boreholes – in the Tankwa Karoo (Western Cape), Willowvale (Eastern Cape) and Philippolis (Free State).

The samples were put through a battery of tests at laboratories in South Africa, Germany, Poland, the US and India.

“Our results indicate that carbon content is very variable, even within the same locality within the basin,” the researchers report in the South African Journal of Science.

“The original resource estimates are thus likely highly inflated.”

Further testing within a “sweet spot” will follow, the report says.