Where does oil shale occur?
The United States holds more than 50 percent of the world’s known oil shale resource, most of which is contained in deposits found in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming. These oil shale deposits are found within a total area of approximately 16,000 square miles between the three states, with about 72 percent of located on federal lands. The total reserve contained within these deposits is estimated to be 2.6 trillion barrels of in-place oil, and 1.5 trillion barrels of recoverable oil.The oil shale deposits of Wyoming are located predominantly within Sweetwater County, and to a lesser extent within Uinta, Lincoln, Sublette and Carbon counties. The oil shale beds are found almost exclusively in the Upper Eocene Age rocks of the Green River Formation in the Green River Basin, the Washakie Basin and the Fossil Basin of southwestern Wyoming. The beds vary greatly in thickness, ranging from several feet to several hundred feet thick. Quality is also highly variable from area to area, with an overal
