The Largest US Shale Companies Increase Production, Media Reported
Key U.S. shale companies are ramping up production, extracting more from each well, but are in no hurry to bring in significant new production capacity. This is evidenced by the analysis of the reporting of these companies conducted by Reuters.
Companies that turned the world oil and gas markets over a decade ago and turned the United States into a major oil exporter have in recent years preferred to maintain their production levels rather than intensively increase it.
Opting for profit over higher production allowed US companies to make good money with relatively small increases in production. OPEC+ production cuts have helped keep prices above $70 a barrel for most of the year.
Judging by the forecasts made in the reporting for the 2nd quarter, American oil companies expect to slightly increase production until the end of this year, extracting more oil and gas from each well. This will give an additional 850,000 barrels per day of US production.
Representatives of the management of the largest shale companies indicate that by improving production techniques, they will increase it by 2% in the next six months without much difficulty.
“We have a very efficient mechanism … we will see growth, we are waiting for this even without the commissioning of new production capacities,” says Dominique Maclon of ConocoPhillips.
Since January, ConocoPhillips has raised its annual production forecast by 30,000 barrels per day to 1.81 million barrels per day. HessCorp raised its production forecast for the Bakken formation by 10,000 barrels per day or 6%.
PioneerNaturalResources raised its full-year production forecast by 3% despite a cut in its capex budget. Pioneer also said it expects to operate an average of 23-25 horizontal drilling rigs this year in the Midland Basin, rather than the previously expected 24-26.
