Crude oil production leader Permian Basin is expected to add an additional 48,000 barrels of production per day next month to reach 4.742 million barrels of crude oil per day, according to the drilling productivity report of Dec. 16 for seven major regions by the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Because of contractions in most other regions, overall U.S. crude oil production will be up only 30,000 barrels per day in January to 9.135 million barrels per day.
Appalachia continues to lead production of natural gas despite declining by 74 million cubic per day in January to 33.432 billion cubic feet per day. The EIA expects Permian Basin to add 213 million cubic feet of natural gas production per day in January to reach 17.077 billion cubic feet per day.
The count of drilled but uncompleted wells (DUC) declined in five of the seven regions in November. The EIA said there were 7,574 DUC wells in U.S. in November (down from 7,705 in October) and 3,559 DUC wells in Permian Basin in November (down from 3,579 in October). The only gains in DUC wells in November were posted by Haynesville and Bakken.