Free Republic

The hunt for new stores of oil and gas has been dramatically curtailed amid a global crude slump, with exploration budgets at the largest oil companies cut in half from their peak levels in 2013, according to a new analysis. Investment banking firm Tudor, Pickering, Holt & Co., which tracked exploration capital spending at integrated oil companies and major exploration and production companies, forecast that spending will fall to $25 billion next year, down from the $50 billion these same companies spent three years ago. Oil companies are spending less in part because service costs have tumbled alongside oil prices,...

Cam Hewell runs Premium Oilfield Technologies, a small company that makes equipment and spare parts for drilling rigs from North Dakota to Texas. Like his rivals, he is trying to withstand the worst oilfield downturn in six years, but they face a vexing obstacle: cannibals. In a bid to save cash, rig owners are cannibalizing parts such as motors and drill pipe from idled rigs to fix 800 active ones in the U.S. when stuff breaks. In good times, they would buy new equipment from companies like Hewell's or industry leader National Oilwell Varco Inc when parts fail. Now, they...

In a shift reminiscent of the freefall that occurred earlier this year, the overall US drilling rig count plunged 29 units during the week ended Oct. 2 to a total of 809, the lowest since May 3, 2002, according to data from Baker Hughes Inc. The count has now fallen in 6 consecutive weeks, giving up 76 units during that time. The recent decline follows a small summer rebound in which the total climbed 28 units over a 9-week period from a nadir of 857 to a plateau of 885. The count is now down 1,113 units year-over-year and 1,122...

At the beginning of this week, oil major Shell announced that it will indefinitely postpone (read: completely abandon) its Arctic drilling operations in the Chukchi Sea offshore Alaska. The company stated: "Shell will now cease further exploration activity in offshore Alaska for the foreseeable future. This decision reflects both the Burger J well result, the high costs associated with the project and the challenging and unpredictable federal regulatory environment in offshore Alaska." This retreat will result in Shell losing its $7 billion investment, a bitter pill to swallow for the oil major. While Shell and many others have given up...

Along with oil prices and the rig count, the issuance of new drilling permits has dropped off dramatically in the last 12 months, according to numbers from the Texas Railroad Commission report of 864 permits issued in August. The commission, which regulates oil and gas activity in the state, said in a release that the issuance of drilling permits declined 65 percent year-over-year in August 2015. Among the 864 permits, the breakdown for August this year included 222 oil wells; 59 for gas; 518 for oil or gas; 54 injection wells and 11 other permits. Total well completions for 2015...

The Environmental Protection Agency’s long-awaited report on fracking dismayed liberal green groups Thursday while pleasing the oil and gas industry — the latest episode in both sides’ fraught relationship with President Barack Obama. The study, more than four years in the making, said the EPA has found no signs of “widespread, systemic” drinking water pollution from hydraulic fracturing. That conclusion dramatically runs afoul of one of the great green crusades of the past half-decade, which has portrayed the oil- and gas-extraction technique as a creator of fouled drinking water wells and flame-shooting faucets. The report also jibes with Obama’s global...

Saudi Arabia’s unwillingness to follow its longstanding policy of propping up oil prices means North Carolina might have to wait for offshore energy exploration. That’s the assessment of Daniel Fine, associate director of the New Mexico Center for Energy Policy and project leader of a group developing New Mexico’s state energy policy. Fine described a Saudi-led oil “price war” during a presentation to the John Locke Foundation’s Shaftesbury Society. In the video clip below, Fine explained how falling oil prices tied to Saudi Arabia’s new policy affect North Carolina’s energy options.

Abandoning years of official skepticism, Oklahoma’s government on Tuesday embraced a scientific consensus that earthquakes rocking the state are largely caused by the underground disposal of billions of barrels of wastewater from oil and gas wells.The state’s energy and environment cabinet introduced a website detailing the evidence behind that conclusion Tuesday, including links to expert studies of Oklahoma’s quakes. The site includes an interactive map that plots not only earthquake locations, but also the sites of more than 3,000 active wastewater-injection wells.The website coincided with a statement by the state-run Oklahoma Geological Survey that it “considers it very likely” that...

The U.S. energy industry dramatically increased the pace at which it’s slowing activity, laying down 42 oil rigs this week after several weeks of more conservative numbers. There are 760 oil rigs operating in the U.S. currently, down from 802 last week, according to data published Friday by oil field services company Baker Hughes. The decline was the largest one-week drop in the count in a month. Last week, the oil rig count fell by just 11, and the week before it was down by 12. Those were the smallest week-over-week declines in 2015 and may have suggested the oil...

Grand Rapids Mayor George Heartwell has become a hero to the global warming movement with his anti-oil comments. The mayor has said, “Our planet is sick and it is we who have infected it.” In a January speech, Heartwell called for an end to hydraulic fracturing (commonly known as “fracking”) and said he would ask the county and governor to do the same. However, Heartwell appears to have no problem with taking money collected from oil companies for using hydraulic fracturing when drilling on state land to fund city government spending. MLive reported that Grand Rapids plans to request a...

President Obama will open parts of the Atlantic and Arctic oceans to new oil and gas drilling under a plan unveiled Tuesday. The Interior Department's five-year lease plan would allow drilling in three areas off the coast of Alaska and one in a portion of the Atlantic for the first time in nearly four decades. The dramatic shift in policy comes as gas prices are at new lows and as Obama has sought to burnish his legacy as a president who has worked to stop climate change. The plan angered green groups who have supported Obama's decision to restrict other...

President Obama announced Sunday that he’ll use his executive authority to designate 12 million acres in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) as wilderness, walling it off from resource development. This abrogates a 1980 deal in which Congress specifically set aside some of this acreage for future oil and gas exploration. It’s also a slap at the new Republican Congress, where Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski has been corralling bipartisan support for more Arctic drilling.

On Sunday, President Barack Obama released an anti-oil drilling environmental video shot aboard Air Force One–an aircraft that has a 53,611 gallon fuel capacity. The video, which shows Obama aboard Air Force One, is interspersed with scenes of arctic animals and wildlife landscapes, reports National Public Radio (NPR). It’s all part of Obama’s ANWR (Arctic National Wildlife Refuge) newly proposed plan to ban roads, permanent structures, vehicles, drilling, and mining on 12.28 million acres in ANWR. On Saturday, Obama flew Air Force One over 8,000+ miles to India to discuss global warming and other issues.

When a massive truck slams on the brakes to avoid a crash, it takes awhile for it to get back up to highway speed again. That, in essence, is the problem oil companies will face when they want to increase production if supplies start to fall short. The selloff in crude oil has put drilling on hold. Unless more drilling resumes soon, a surplus of 1 million barrels a day will be exhausted. John Hofmeister, a former president at Royal Dutch Shell , predicts that will happen by the summer and will send prices up to $80 a barrel. "When that cost correction...

The White HouseÂ’s Troll Fest, 2015 continues apace. In fact, if you are getting the impression by now that the Obama administration has no higher priority than provoking fights with Republicans, youÂ’re probably right. On Sunday, the White House leaked a proposal to The Washington Post in which the administration revealed plans to make the 1.4 million-acre Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) and parts of the Arctic Ocean off limits to drilling. Some of this can be accomplished via new regulations administered by the Department of the Interior, but not entirely. They have also proposed additional restrictions on oil...

#1 It is being projected that the U.S. oil rig count will decline by 15 percent in the first quarter of 2015 alone. And when there are less rigs operating, less workers are needed so people get fired. #2 Last week, 55 more oil rigs shut down. That was the largest single week decline in the United States in 24 years. #3 Oilfield services provider Baker Hughes has announced that it plans to lay off 7,000 workers. #4 Schlumberger, a big player in the energy industry, has announced plans to get rid of 9,000 workers. #5 Suncor Energy is eliminating...

<p>President Barack Obama announced Tuesday that he's removing more than 52,000 square miles of waters off Alaska's coast from consideration for oil and gas exploration or drilling.</p> <p>The president said in a video announcement that Bristol Bay and nearby waters, covering an area roughly the size of Florida, would be withdrawn from consideration for petroleum leases. He called Bristol Bay one of the country's great natural resources and a massive economic engine.</p>

"It means that anyone who tells you we can drill our way out of this problem doesn’t know what they’re talking about – or isn’t telling you the truth. The United States consumes more than a fifth of the world’s oil. But we only have 2% of the world’s oil reserves. That means we can’t just rely on fossil fuels from the last century. "

Gasoline prices are plummeting as U.S. oil production from shale formations booms, reaching more than nine million barrels per day through Nov. 28. Gasoline is now hitting four-year lows and oil prices are hitting five-year lows. But it was just two years ago that President Obama said “we can’t just drill our way to lower gas prices” in a speech bashing Republican calls for more drilling. “And you can bet that since it’s an election year, they’re already dusting off their three-point plans for $2 gas,” Obama continued. “I’ll save you the suspense: Step one is drill, step two is...

Colorado's growth in crude oil reserves ranked third behind North Dakota and Texas in the latest survey of the amount of oil buried in fields across the United States, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Nationally, crude oil reserves — oil that can be pumped from the ground under current economic conditions using existing technology — grew by 9 percent, or 3.1 billion barrels, in 2013 compared to 2012, the federal agency said. It's the fifth year in a row the U.S. oil reserves have grown, the EIA said, evidence that the proliferation of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing...