Topic summary
Oil reserves
Extracted from the Wikipedia article Oil and gas reserves and resource quantification.
Reserves growth
Experience shows that initial estimates of the size of newly discovered oil & gas fields are usually too low. As years pass, successive estimates of the ultimate recovery of fields tend to increase. The term reserve growth refers to the typical increases (but narrowing range) of estimated ultimate recovery that occur as oil & gas fields are developed and produced. Many oil-producing nations do not reveal their reservoir engineering field data and instead provide unaudited claims for their oil reserves. The numbers disclosed by some national governments are suspected of being manipulated for political reasons. In order to achieve international goals for decarbonisation, the International Energy Agency said in 2021 that countries should no longer expand exploration or invest in projects to expand reserves to meet climate goals set by the Paris Agreement.