07/24/2026
I'm happy to announce that I'll be speaking at the International LPG Seminar organized by the Energy Institute and Universidad Austral (Argentina) in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on September 10, 2026. The theme of the seminar will be "From Argentina to the World," and the title of my presentation will be "From War Zones to Kitchen Cylinders: The Fractured Flow of Global LPG Trade."
This marks the Energy Institute and Universidad Austral's premier LPG seminar and is designed to introduce the vast potential of future LPG exports from Argentina's massive Vaca Mu**ta shale formation to key LPG importers throughout Latin America and the Asia-Pacific region.
Vaca Mu**ta features both shale oil and shale gas production, as it is a giant formation with varied hydrocarbon windows. Its technically recoverable reserves include approximately 16 billion barrels of oil and condensate and 308 trillion cubic feet of gas, composed of 194 Tcf of dry gas, 91 Tcf of wet gas, and 23 Tcf of associated gas. The LPG will be produced from the wet gas and associated gas regions of the Vaca Mu**ta.
I'm thrilled to be a part of this seminar, as it was 32 years ago that several of my colleagues and I at Houston-based Purvin & Gertz, Inc., held the first-ever Latin America LPG Seminar in Buenos Aires when we convened at the Jockey Club de Buenos Aires.
In those days we had never heard of the Vaca Mu**ta, and it would be three more years before a brilliant U.S. petroleum engineer named Nick Steinsberger, an employee of Houston-based Mitchell Energy, would invent a "slickwater" fracturing process in 1997. Mitchell Energy successfully employed Nick's fracturing technology in the Barnett Shale Basin near Justin, Texas, in 1998, officially proving commercial viability.
The success of Mitchell Energy's horizontal drilling and fracking technologies was the key factor that flipped the United States from being a net importer of crude oil and LPG to becoming the world's largest exporter of both products. Argentina's successful implementation of these technologies and the overwhelming size of the Vaca Mu**ta have the potential to one day make Argentina one of the largest energy-exporting countries in the world. Granted, more investments and development of infrastructure will be needed, but the country is headed in the right direction. LPG exports alone could grow 4 to 5 times higher than 2025 export volumes (1.6 million metric tons) by the 2034/2035 time period.
🏛️💻 Format: Hybrid (In-Person & Live Streaming) 🗓️ Date: Sept 10th | 08:15 AM (ART / UTC-3)
Online Benefits:
📹 Recording: Full access within 48h post-event.
🤝 B2B: 1-on-1 meeting with the Energy Institute Director.
📄 Agenda & Speakers: https://trb.ai/gLE9Av
📝 Register here: https://trb.ai/FoDCaN
