Exxon Mobil, the nation’s largest oil company, said the tripling of oil and natural gas production would bring its output in the Permian Basin to 600,000 barrels a day. To support that increased production, it said, it will invest more than $2 billion to expand a recently acquired transport terminal and other production infrastructure. It noted in a statement that “recent changes in the U.S. corporate tax rate create an environment for increased future capital investments.”
It also said that “reduced drilling costs, technology improvements and expanded acreage” gave the company the opportunity to produce efficiently in the Permian.
Newsletter Sign Up
Continue reading the main story
Thank you for subscribing.
An error has occurred. Please try again later.
You are already subscribed to this email.
Energy companies are quickly building pipelines to move Permian oil and gas to Gulf of Mexico ports for export as well as pipelines to Mexico, where natural gas from the United States is replacing oil and coal to remake the country’s electricity system and clean up urban air.
On Monday, Exxon Mobil said it would spend $50 billion on United States operations over the next five years. Much of that spending had been previously announced, but it highlighted the company’s continued shift in preference to operations in the United States and the Western Hemisphere, after decades of searching to replace reserves in far-flung regions that are frequently unstable.
With the price of West Texas intermediate crude oil rising to around $65 a barrel from below $40 in recent years, the Energy Department predicts that daily domestic oil production will increase to an average of 10.3 million barrels a day this year from an average of 9.3 million in 2017 — setting a production record and surpassing the output of Saudi Arabia. The department projects an additional 500,000 barrels of production in 2019.
But not all oil companies have prospered. Some of the smaller independent companies that pioneered the shale boom borrowed heavily and suffered when oil and gas prices swooned in recent years. There have been scores of bankruptcies.
Chesapeake Energy, based in Oklahoma City and once an active driller in the Permian, laid off roughly 400 employees on Tuesday, about 13 percent of its work force, after selling off about a quarter of its wells over the last three years.
Continue reading the main story
Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/30/business/energy-environment/exxon-shale.html?partner=rss&emc=rss
Speak Your Mind
You must be logged in to post a comment.