Of course, there are many who would disagree with that assessment. It’s all relative, of course. And highly subjective.
For industry professionals right now, things are looking very good, indeed. Plenty of work for everyone, and lots of companies putting out shoots in a growth spurt. For mineral rights and landowners, the doorbell (or phone) is ringing much more often today with landmen on the other end. Owners are being approached for new leases in ever-increasing numbers, certainly more than they were this time two years ago.
Putting some numbers to it, and using Texas as the benchmark only because Texas still is the #1 producing state in America today, the statistics are eye-openers.
Just last month, January 2019, a whopping 1,585 permit applications to drill, recomplete, or undertake some other well operation were filed with the Texas Railroad Commission. Of those, 1,453 were for New Drills. The same time, January 2017, only 1,169 permit applications were filed for any type of well work. Of those, only 1,025 were for new drills. Folks, we’ve turned around!!
Granted, the vast majority of those New Drill permit applications are in Districts 8 and 8A, comprised mostly of Sprayberry Trend (Delaware Basin) wells, but the permit activity for all of the other Texas districts increased substantially, compared to January 2017. (see Texas Railroad Commission website, the source of this information.)
We no longer need to beat the drum to end America’s dependency on foreign oil. In fact, we not only produce enough domestically now to meet all of our gasoline and diesel needs, but we actually are exporting oil to other countries!
That said, we need to keep a close eye on the energy competitor, Venezuela, while they endure a death struggle to free themselves of socialism. The vast oil fields controlled by the once-wealthy Venezuela could too easily fall into the hands of America’s enemies. Worse yet, Venezuela could become home to mortal enemies of America, putting them within stone-throwing distance of our shores, if the cards are not played right.
