Welcome to this week’s edition of The Buzz, where Kallanish Energy selects the quartet of stories this past week we feel were the most important – have the chance to make the biggest impact on the oil and gas industry.
This week’s selections include:
* U.S. petro exports may pass Saudi by year-end: Rystad. Just a few years ago, no one foresaw the U.S. not only would be the world’s top oil and natural gas producer, but by year’s end could become the world’s top petroleum products exporter. Just 15 years ago, the U.S. was running out of natural gas.
* U.S. natgas production sets record, led by Appalachia. As mentioned above, the U.S. was running out of natural gas roughly 15 years ago, and liquefied natural gas import terminal could not be built fast enough. Since the shale gale blew through the Lower 48 U.S. states, that truth has been turned 180 degrees.
* Working-rig count falls below 1,000. It wasn’t a huge drop one week, just a handful or so a week, but during the week ended March 8, the number of rigs working in the Lower 48 U.S. states fell below 1,000 for the first time in nearly a year.
* Guaido would open Venezuela’s oil industry. The economic misery which has become the norm in Venezuela could change in a big way, provided the country’s sel-proclaimed president, Juan Guaido, comes to power. Guaido wants to open Venezuela’s oil industry to privatization.
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U.S. petro exports may pass Saudi by year-end: Rystad
The U.S., which not long ago passed Saudi Arabia and Russia as the world’s biggest crude oil and natural gas producer, could become the world’s top petroleum products exporter by year’s-end.
In 2019, the U.S. will add another 1 million barrels a day (Mmbpd) of crude production, after last year’s 2 Mmbpd increase, even as independent operators are cutting capital spending, according to analytics/consulting firm Rystad Energy.
Increasing supply and growing export capacities will push America’s total exported petroleum shipments to equal those of Saudi Arabia before 2020, at roughly 9.5 Mmbpd, Oslo, Norway-based Rystad said
America’s oil industry currently exports 8 Mmbpd of petroleum compared with Saudi Arabia’s 9 million, Rystad data show. Petroleum exports include crude, natural gas liquids and refined products.
U.S. natgas production sets record, led by Appalachia
U.S. natural gas production grew by 10.0 billion cubic feet per day (Bcf/d) in 2018, an 11% increase from 2017 — the largest annual increase in production on record, and a record high for the second consecutive year.
Measured as gross withdrawals, U.S. natural gas production averaged 101.3 Bcf/d in 2018, the highest volume on record, according to Energy Information Administration data.
U.S. natural gas production measured as marketed production and dry natural gas production also reached record highs of 89.6 Bcf/d and 83.4 Bcf/d, respectively.
Appalachia remained the largest natural gas-producing region in the U.S., according to EIA. Appalachian natural gas from the Marcellus and Utica/Point Pleasant Shale plays in Ohio, West Virginia, and Pennsylvania continued to grow, with gross withdrawals increasing from 24.2 Bcf/d in 2017, to 28.5 Bcf/d in 2018.
U.S. working-rig count falls below 1,000
The number of rigs working onshore in the Lower 48 U.S. states for the week ended March 8, fell below the 1,000-rig mark for the first time since late April 2018, data from oilfield services firm Baker Hughes, a GE company, reveals.
At March 8, 997 rigs were working in the Lower 48, just 39 rigs, or 4.1% more, than the year-ago working-rig total of 958, and 257 rigs, or 34.7%, more working pieces of equipment from 740 rigs working two years ago.
Three years ago, just 449 rigs were working in the Lower 48, down 548 rigs, or 122.0% below the most current total.
The last time the working-rig count was under 1,000 was during the week ended April 27, 2018, when 993 rigs were working, Kallanish Energy calculates.
Guaido would open Venezuela’s oil industry
Venezuela’s self-proclaimed president, Juan Guaido, wants to open his country’s oil industry to privatization.
The aim is to restore the country’s major source of revenue, as oil comprises 90% of Venezuela’s exports. There are hopes for foreign investment to help rebuild the economy.
“We need to change the current framework … we need to open up the oil industry to private investment,” Ricardo Hausmann, Guaido’s delegate to the Inter-American Development Bank, was quoted as saying by Reuters, during a conference Tuesday.
Venezuelan crude production has nearly halved since 2014, falling to 1.4 million barrels per day (Mmbpd) last January, according to Opec data. The country’s power grid has been offline since last Thursday, causing significant issues across the country — including access to necessities goods such as food and water for the majority of the population.
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