It has been estimated that seven billion barrels of oil lie in the Tuscaloosa marine shale formation located 11,000 feet below the ground in southwest Mississippi and neighboring parishes in Louisiana.
Geologists know the oil is there, and that the reserves are huge.
The risk in this play is not in finding the oil the risk is in producing commercial quantities by applying the latest drilling and completion technologies, says Jack Moody, director of the Energy and Coastal Division, Mississippi Office of Geology. Wilkinson and Amite counties and part of Pike County appear at this time to hold the most promise in this play in Mississippi. In it he describes current efforts towards developing the technology for widespread development of this known oil reserve. A 1997 Louisiana State University study estimates reserves for the Tuscaloosa marine shale formation at seven billion barrels of oil. Obviously, that creates great incentive to develop the technology to recover the oil.