Argentina’s black gold gamble

A gas flare near the Vaca Muerta shale formation in Anelo, Argentina. — Sarah Pabst/The New York Times

MUCH of the sun-bleached desert in northwest Patagonia looks like it did 100 million years ago: a vast, prehistoric expanse where the world’s biggest dinosaurs once roamed.

But a different kind of behemoth has now come roaring in, with towering rigs advancing across the desert floor and burrowing deep beneath it in a furious rush for oil and gas.