US Shale Oil/Natgas Output Set to Fall for First Time Since December

U.S. shale oil and natural gas production will fall in August for the first time since December, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) said in its monthly Drilling Productivity Report on Monday.

Crude output from the seven big U.S. shale basins is set to ease to 9.40 million barrels per day (bpd) in August from a record 9.42 million bpd in July, EIA projected.

In the biggest shale oil basin, Permian in West Texas and eastern New Mexico, output is set to fall to 5.76 million bpd next month, the lowest level since April, the agency said.

Total gas output in the big shale basins will slip by 0.1 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) to 98.0 bcfd in August from a record 98.1 bcfd in July, EIA projected.

In the biggest shale gas basin, Appalachia in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia, output will ease to 35.3 bcfd in August, the lowest since June.

That compares with a monthly gas output record in Appalachia of 36.0 bcfd in December 2021.

Output in Appalachia is expected to decline even though drillers should start getting a little more gas out of each new well in August.

EIA said it expects new Appalachia gas well production per rig to edge up to 23.69 per million cubic feet per day (mmcfd) in August from 23.66 mmcfd in July.

That small increase, however, comes after 28 straight months of declining well productivity and a drop in the number of rigs operating in Appalachia to just 48, the lowest since September.

New gas well production per rig in Appalachia hit a record of 33.3 mmcfd in March 2021.