Full Title: Booming Shale Gas Production Drives Texas Petrochemical Surge
Author(s): Jesse Thompson
Publisher(s): Southwest Economy
Publication Date: October 1, 2012
Full Text: Download Resource
Description (excerpt):
Advances in the exploration of shale, the source rock from which oil and gas have seeped for millions of years, have brought to market new sup- plies of oil, natural gas and natural gas liquids (NGLs) such as ethane, a key petrochemical feedstock or input. This modern-day gusher was made possible by hydraulic fracturing (also known as fracking) and horizontal drilling in the United States. These technologies have helped reduce the price of natural gas, which was once in line with oil, and led to the production of lower-cost NGLs (Chart 1). Because U.S. petrochemical firms commonly use NGLs for feed- stock, their input costs have fallen and they have gained an export advantage over competitors in other parts of the world that heavily rely on much pricier oil-based naphtha.