Department of Energy awards $30 million to support unconventional oil, natural gas recovery

The Department of Energy (DoE) awarded a total of $30 million to six projects on Wednesday that will help promote research and development of unconventional oil and natural gas recovery.

The funds will be administered by the Office of Fossil Energy’s Advanced Technology Solutions for Unconventional Oil and Gas Development funding opportunity. DoE fielded proposals from projects in unconventional plays with less than 50,000 barrels per day of current production.

“The newly selected projects will help us master oil and gas development in these types of rising shales, along with bolster DoE efforts to strengthen America’s energy dominance, protect air and water quality, position the nation as a global leader in unconventional oil and natural gas resource development technologies, and ensure the maximum value of the nation’s resource endowment is realized,” DoE stated in a release.

C-Create Technologies was awarded $1.5 million for the development of hexagonal boron nitride reinforced multifunctional well cement for extreme conditions, the Institute of Gas Technology was awarded $7.9 million for hydraulic fracturing well completion and design optimization experiments, Eagle Ford Shale Laboratory was awarded $8 million for a study on stimulated reservoir volume, In-Situ Applied Coatings was awarded $1.49 million to minimize gas hydrate deposition in deepwater rigs, the University of Louisiana was awarded $3.68 million to close knowledge gaps in Tuscaloosa Marine Shale, and Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University were awarded $3.14 million to study multi-play production in emerging unconventional reservoirs.

Each of the six projects, the department said, represent critical areas of DoE efforts to advance the economic and environmental viability of unconventional and natural gas resource development.