Frac fleet shortage slows US shale growth

Frac fleet shortage slows US shale growth

London, 25 April (Argus) — Shortfalls in hydraulic fracturing capacity, needed to bring new wells on stream, will hamper efforts to raise US shale oil output this year.

Rising costs, supply chain bottlenecks and a lack of investor capital are impeding a faster recovery in US tight oil production despite very high oil prices and government pleas for firms to boost supply. "I understand the desire to find a quick fix for the recent spike in gasoline prices," Pioneer Natural Resources chief executive Scott Sheffield told the House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee on 6 April. "But neither Pioneer nor any other US producer can increase production overnight by turning on a tap."

"The process of planning, permitting, drilling and safely completing new wells, with the associated construction of facilities and connection to third-party infrastructure, takes 18-24 months for our company," Sheffield says. "It used to take less time in the past — in some instances, only 6-12 months — but this timing is especially negatively impacted today, in the midst of increasing cost inflation, the loss of thousands of experienced oil field workers over the past several years, the decommissioning of rigs and frac fleets when oil prices were low