{"id":95555,"title":"Baker Hughes: The third week in succession, U.S. drillers added oil and gas rigs","publisher":"Share Talk","author":"sharetalk","published":"2022-04-09T13:18:27+00:00","modified":"2022-04-09T14:30:37+00:00","canonical_url":"https://www.share-talk.com/baker-hughes-the-third-week-in-succession-u-s-drillers-added-oil-and-gas-rigs/","markdown_url":"https://www.share-talk.com/baker-hughes-the-third-week-in-succession-u-s-drillers-added-oil-and-gas-rigs.md","json_url":"https://www.share-talk.com/baker-hughes-the-third-week-in-succession-u-s-drillers-added-oil-and-gas-rigs.json","category":"Blogs","categories":["Blogs","Energy"],"tags":["Baker Hughes","count","crude","gas","oil","production","RIG","Share Talk","USA","wellpad"],"featured_image":"https://i0.wp.com/www.share-talk.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Stencil-Google-Chrome-2023-04-19-at-2.47.43-PM.jpeg?fit=1231%2C615&quality=89&ssl=1","format":"news","language":"en-GB","content":"The federal government sought more production in order to aid its allies in their transition from Russian oil and gas.\n\nThe Kremlin describes its actions in Ukraine as “special military operations.”\n\nIn Friday’s closely watched report, Baker Hughes Co stated that the oil and gas rig count, which is an indicator of future output, rose 16% to 689 during the week to April 8. This was its highest level since March 2020.\n\nBaker Hughes stated that this brings the total number of rigs up to 257, or 59%, compared to last year.\n\nU.S. oil production rose 13 to 546 this week, its highest level since April 2020. Meanwhile, gas rigs rose three times to 141, their highest levels since October 2019.\n\nMore than half of U.S. oil rigs are located in Permian Shale in West Texas and Eastern New Mexico. Total units increased by nine to 332 this week, the highest increase since April 2020. This was the largest weekly increase in the basin since Jan 2021.\n\nThe rig count has increased for a record 20 consecutive months through March. However, weekly increases have mainly been in single figures and oil production remains far below pre-pandemic records levels. Many companies are more focused on returning money to investors and reducing debt than increasing output.\n\nAccording to federal energy data, U.S. crude oil production was expected to increase from 11.2 million barrels per day in 2021 to 12.0million bpd by 2022 and 13.0million bpd by 2023. This compares to a record 12.3million bpd in 2019.\n\nHowever, oil prices are up 29% this year after rising 55% in 2021. A growing number of energy companies said that they will increase spending in 2022 for the second consecutive year. This follows a reduction in drilling and completion costs in 2019 and 2020.\n\nHowever, the 2021 spending increase was modest and most of it went towards completing wells that were drilled in the past. These wells are known as DUC (drilled but not completed) wells.\n\nAnalysts believe the industry needs to drill new wells as the supply of DUCs is rapidly decreasing.\n\nAnalysts at Mizuho, an institution, stated in a note this week that the inventory was at historically low levels.\n\nThe Mizuho analysts stated that they expect drilling activity in the Permian to increase slowly, and high prices will encourage continued drawdowns of low inventory (DUC).\n\nIn a recent report, the U.S. Energy Information Administration stated that the number DUCs found in the largest shale basins decreased to just 4,372, the lowest level since December 2013."}