The US and Canada are the only major producers of commercially viable natural gas from shale formations in the world, even though about a dozen other countries have conducted exploratory test wells, the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) said Oct. 23 in a news release, citing a joint EIA/Advanced Resources International (ARI) study released in June.

China is the only nation outside of North America that has registered commercially viable production of shale gas, although the volumes contribute less than 1% of the total natural gas production in that country, the release said. In comparison, shale gas as a share of total natural gas production in 2012 was 39% in the US and 15% in Canada.

Shale gas dry production in the US averaged 25.7 Bcf/d in 2012, while total dry production averaged 65.7 Bcf/d. In Canada, total dry natural gas production from the two major shale plays – the Muskwa-Otter Park shale formation in the Horn River basin of northern British Columbia and the adjacent Montney basin that spreads over British Columbia and Alberta – averaged 2.0 Bcf/d in 2012, while total Canadian production averaged 14.0 Bcf/d, the EIA said. Gross withdrawals from Horn River and Montney averaged 2.5 Bcf/d in 2012, and reached 2.8 Bcf/d by May 2013. The potential for higher production from these two plays is currently constrained by limited pipeline infrastructure.

China was ranked as the largest holder of shale gas resources among the 41 countries assessed for technically recoverable shale resources in the study released by EIA/ARI in June 2013. The Chinese government has not officially reported on shale gas production, but some independent Chinese energy analysts have claimed commercial production of at least 0.003 Bcf/d of shale gas, mainly from the Sichuan basin, the EIA said in the release.