The Telegraph: Russians keep their eye on the shale revolution
There has been an influx of Russians into Texan courthouses, is the whisper.
Why? Because the officials in these buildings handle the stream of paperwork around the new energy industry in which the region is a leader.
That is the shale oil and gas industry, which through technological developments – notably fracking – is now able to tap vast reserves held deep in shale rock under America.
Russia’s volumes of conventional gas means it has little impetus to start fracking itself, though it is thought to have significant shale reserves – but there can be no harm in watching the competition. “Russia has massive deposits, but feels the need to understand unconventional [gas] – so you have Russians sitting in South Texan courthouses,” says Bobby Tudor, chief executive of energy-focused investment bank Tudor, Pickering, Holt and Co, based in Houston.
This marks just one of the ways in which the shale revolution under way in the US – but not confined to it – is reverberating around the world. MORE