What are "technically recoverable" oil and gas resources?

Probably not. In 2000, the USGS assessed undiscovered, technically recoverable oil and gas resources in Saudi Arabia at 87 billion barrels ( USGS 2000 World Petroleum Assessment) compared to a mean estimate of 4.3 billion barrels of undiscovered, technically recoverable continuous oil in the Bakken and Three Forks formations ( USGS 2021 Bakken and Three Forks Assessment). In addition, Saudi Arabia...

USGS oil and gas assessments are for technically recoverable resources, meaning they can be produced using today’s technology and standard industry practices. However, our assessments do not look at what infrastructure would be required to produce these resources, nor does it look at whether it would be profitable to produce them. In addition, USGS assessments are for undiscovered resources, which...

The USGS regularly re-examines our assessments to see if updated information warrants a reassessment. Sometimes more information is available either from USGS research or industry production, and the USGS decides to conduct a new assessment. Learn more:  USGS Energy Assessments

This question cannot be answered clearly because the methods used by those organizations to estimate oil and gas resource volumes are often not publicly available to compare step-by-step.  One common reason different organizations get different results is based on what the assessments include. USGS estimates are for undiscovered, technically recoverable oil and gas resources. The USGS does not...

Assessments regularly change based on our understanding of geology, as well as advances in technology. As more is learned about the geology of a given formation, both from USGS research and from industry activity, a clearer picture of the potential recoverable oil and gas resources can be created. In some cases, industry activity can show that a rock formation that was previous thought to have...