E&P

Recently announced rollbacks of Obama-era methane controls for the oil and gas industry appear destined for a legal and political onslaught, particularly if Joseph R. Biden Jr. is elected president. In a two-part rulemaking, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) last week rescinded the regulations enacted under the 2016 Oil and Natural Gas New Source Performance…

The U.S. Department of the Interior on Monday signed off on a plan that would allow oil and gas leasing in a swath of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) in Alaska, a move that invited praise from proponents but swift vows of legal action from environmentalists. Interior Secretary David Bernhardt said officials were acting…

Efforts to buffer California residents from oil and natural gas wells hit a logjam earlier this month in the legislature, leaving the issue to Gov. Gavin Newsom, who last year promised to fix what some view as a problem. Assembly Bill 345 failed passage in the state Senate to establish minimum distances between wells and…

Weakened commodity prices and lower production volumes dragged EOG Resources Inc. into the red in the second quarter, as the super independent pulled back on drilling and slashed capital expenditures (capex) in response to the demand destruction created by the coronavirus pandemic. The Houston-based company, which works in the Lower 48, Trinidad and China, said…

Permian Basin heavyweight Pioneer Natural Resources Co. is raising its 2020 oil production guidance by 2.5%, but it is keeping most of the oil volumes curtailed during the second quarter offline until commodity prices improve, management said Wednesday. The Irving, TX-based independent curtailed about 7,000 b/d of net oil production during 2Q2020 and said it…

Editor’s Note: NGI’s Mexico Gas Price Index, a leader tracking Mexico natural gas market reform, is offering the following column by Eduardo Prud’homme as part of a regular series on understanding this process. Prud’homme was central to the development of Cenagas, the nation’s natural gas pipeline operator, an entity formed in 2015 as part of…

Mexico’s Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex) held steady its oil and gas production in the second quarter despite major upheaval in oil markets caused by the coronavirus pandemic.  Liquid hydrocarbons production was 1.693 million b/d in the second quarter, flat compared with year-ago output of 1.690 million b/d.  The figure included the 100,000 b/d of output shut-in…

A federal judge has vacated the Trump administration’s attempt to rescind an Obama-era rule governing associated natural gas flaring and venting on public and tribal lands, citing “myriad inadequacies” on which the rescission was based, including violating National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) regulations.  A coalition of environmental and citizens’ groups had argued that the move…

The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies, aka OPEC-plus, has agreed to ease coordinated oil production cuts to 7.7 million b/d from the August-December period from the May-July amount of 9.7 million b/d. The decision announced Wednesday to start turning the taps back on comes amid a tightening of the global supply/demand…