Past

Lower 48 and Canadian natural gas production has fallen steadily for the past two years and has become a “shrinking part of the portfolio” for ConocoPhillips, CFO Jeff Sheets said Wednesday.

Natural gas has been the primary target of domestic drilling throughout the past decade, but the focus appears to be shifting to crude oil, according to a report on first quarter well completions issued by the American Petroleum Institute (API). The estimated number of oil wells drilled in the first quarter outnumbered natural gas wells by 5,718 to 3,860, API reported. The figures for oil well completions “show the focus is changing,” the producer group said. While oil and gas well activity was up from the same period in 2010, it was down from 2009, API said. It estimated that 10,431 oil and natural gas wells and dry holes were completed in the most recent first quarter, up 29% from 2010’s first quarter but almost 8% below completions in the first quarter of 2009. API also reported total estimated footage of 75.66 million feet was drilled in the first quarter, a 38% increase from the same period of 2010.

Natural gas has been the primary target of domestic drilling throughout the past decade, but the focus appears to be shifting to crude oil, according to a report on first quarter well completions issued by the American Petroleum Institute (API).

Natural gas exporters, led downward by Canadians, lost nearly one-third of their market share in the United States over the past three years, according to new trade data from the U.S. Department of Energy.

California regulators scolded Pacific Gas and Electric Co. (PG&E) Wednesday for allegedly failing to heed an order to complete a data search on the past pressure testing of all of its natural gas transmission pipelines in heavily populated areas. Instead, PG&E submitted incomplete data on Tuesday that even its president said he was not satisfied with (see Daily GPI, March 17).

Vendors and subcontractors outside of Texas and Louisiana spent $1.8 billion in the past three years to support shallow water energy exploration, according to a study released on Wednesday by the Shallow Water Energy Security Coalition (SWESC).

Wyoming Gov. Matt Mead has been busy in the past few weeks signing a long list of bills into law, including a half-dozen energy measures dealing with a state energy improvement program, microbes use in natural gas drilling, natural gas vehicles (NGV), wind project property owners’ rights, and even a nuclear energy production study.

With more spring-like conditions having replaced the prevalent bitter cold of the past two weeks in many market regions, a majority of points recorded losses ranging from 2-3 cents to about a dime, with only a couple of them being more than single digits. The Northeast, which is getting what is expected to be short-lived return of wintry weather, was home to most of the locations that were flat to about 95 cents higher.

The Gulf of Mexico (GOM), despite the setbacks in the past year, is one of the world’s great producing regions, and an increasing proportion of activity and production will happen in ultra-deep waters, requiring “constant activity, new capital investment and the participation of a set of large and small companies,” PFC Energy said Friday.