Permian Basin

Most of ConocoPhillips’ oil and gas production by the end of the next decade will come from its unconventional operations. But, for the near-term, the Houston independent will rely on conventional assets as it seeks to keep spending in check, decline rates low, and cash flow on the rise.

New research links a rise in seismic activity in West Texas with increased oil and gas development over the past 20 years and, in particular, the past decade.

The volume of flared gas in the US unconventional sector is now 12% of the country’s total gas production. A pair of new reports say that Permian Basin operators account for much of the growth.

Optimizing horizontal well placement is not limited to identifying the most-favorable reservoir, but also involves identifying the ideal target window within that reservoir.

NextDecade and Mubadala Investment Co. have reached agreement for Mubadala to purchase $50 million of NextDecade’s common stock in a private placement. The capital buoys the development of the Rio Grande LNG export solution linking Permian Basin associated gas to the global LNG market.

The time it takes for a shale producer to drill a well has been a major focus for the past decade. A new report says the industry should place equal weight on how long it takes a well to actually deliver first oil.

The move will bolster Austin-based Parsley’s holdings in the Delaware Basin, giving it a contiguous 120,000 net acres opposite of its original Midland Basin focus area.

The Environmental Defense Fund said it is overseeing a year-long program to monitor methane released across the Permian. The project will start measuring emissions in November using towers and mobile readings and will begin publishing data early next year.

The 16-MW solar facility in Ector County, Texas, near Odessa, powers the Goldsmith field through deployment of 174,000 photovoltaic panels.

In 2014, a research and development (R&D) project was initiated to increase the life expectancy of Gulf of Mexico (GOM) Miocene and Lower Tertiary water-injection (WI) wells, several of which had suffered a severe loss of injectivity within only a few years of completion.