美國石油生產商面臨新挑戰，頂級油田面臨衰退（2/2）

 Recently Yahoo News on-line picked up the following:

US oil producers face new challenges as top oilfield flags (2/2)

Reuter - By Shariq Khan and Georgina McCartney

Updated Thu, March 27, 2025 at 8:12 a.m. PDT·6 min read

(continue)

The Permian's geology adds another layer of complexity: drilling in the basin on average produces four barrels of water for each barrel of oil, while in other basins the ratio is closer to one-to-one, oilfield water analytics firm B3 Insight data showed.

The water-to-oil ratio can rise to as high as twelve-to-one from wells drilled in the fringes of an oilfield, said Christine Guerrero, a veteran petroleum engineer who is a strategic advisor to asset manager Octane Investments.

"The Permian is much of a water and gas business with oil as a secondary product there," Chris Doyle, CEO of Civitas Resources, one of the newest entrants to the Permian basin, said on the company's fourth-quarter earnings conference in February.

Producers dispose of the water by pumping it back into the ground, but regulators in recent years have cracked down on reinjection due to its links to increased seismic activity.

The issue has not yet forced producers to abandon drilling plans, but will ultimately drive costs higher, said Shannon Flowers, director of crude and water marketing at producer Coterra Energy.

"There are only so many places to drill, inject and frac, and as that goes down, you still have to find a home for the rest of your produced water," he said.

At a four-to-one water-to-oil ratio, that translates to water disposal costs of about $2 for each barrel of oil produced in the basin. At 12-to-1, it would be nearly $8 a barrel.

Breakevens to drill a new well in the Permian averaged $65 a barrel in 2024, up $4 on the year, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

Less desirable acreage breakevens can hit $96, per Novi Labs, some $26 above where a barrel of crude is trading.

NEVER BET AGAINST THE PERMIAN

The shale revolution has beaten expectations for growth again and again as new techniques and technologies allowed producers to wring more oil out of the same rock.

Now, executives are talking about the potential for artificial intelligence to cut drilling costs further and fuel new gains in production.

The Permian has produced more than could ever have been imagined when the first well was drilled more than a century ago. Conventional production peaked in the 1970s, nearly 30 years before the shale revival.

Even as producers face higher gas and water output, the sheer volume of oil they can pump justifies production, said Clint Barnette, director of geology at Indigo Energy Advisors, a unit of advisory firm Efficient Markets.

"It's how the Delaware basin stays economic even though those wells produce six to seven times the amount of water as they do oil," he said, referring to the Permian's second biggest sub-basin.

Producers such as Chevron and Coterra have been recycling their produced water for future fracking, helping to reduce transportation and other disposal costs.

And in mid-March, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) said it will look into ways to ease recycling of produced water for artificial intelligence data center cooling, irrigation, fire control, and other needs.

"I would never bet against the Permian," Barnette said.

Translation

美國石油生產商面臨新挑戰，頂級油田面臨衰退（2/2）

（繼續）

二疊紀盆地的地質情況又增加了一層複雜性：油田水分析公司 B3 Insight 的數據顯示，在該盆地鑽探平均每生產一桶石油就會生產出四桶水，而在其他盆地中，這一比例接近一比一。

資深石油工程師、資產管理公司 Octane Investments 的策略顧問 Christine Guerrero 表示，在油田邊緣鑽井的水油比例可高達 12:1。

Civitas Resources 執行長 Chris Doyle 在二月份的公司第四季財報會議上表示： "二疊紀主要是水和天然氣業務，石油是其次要產品”; 他是進入二疊紀盆地的最新企業之一。

生產商將水泵回地下，但近年來監管機構嚴厲打擊回灌行為，因為回灌與地震活動增加有關。

生產商 Coterra Energy 的原油和水行銷總監 Shannon Flowers 表示，這個問題尚未迫使生產商放棄鑽井計劃，但最終將推高成本。

他說： “可供鑽井、注水和壓裂的地方是有限的，隨著這些地方的減少，你仍然需要為剩餘的採出水找到一個歸宿。”

以四比一的水油比計算，這意味著該盆地每生產一桶石油，水處理成本約為 2 美元。以12比1的比例計算，油價將接近每桶8美元。

根據達拉斯聯邦儲備銀行的數據，在 2024 年，二疊紀盆地新井的盈虧平衡平均為每桶 65 美元，較前一年上漲 4 美元。

根據 Novi Labs ，不太理想的面積盈虧平衡價格可能達到 96 美元，比每桶原油交易價格高出約 26 美元。

永遠不要押注二疊紀失敗

頁岩革命一次又一次超越成長預期，因為新技術和新製程使得生產商能夠從同一塊岩石中開採出更多的石油。

現在，行政高層正在討論人工智能進一步降低鑽井成本和推動產量成長的潛力。

二疊紀盆地的產量超越了一個多世紀前第一口井鑽探時人們的想像。傳統產量在 20 世紀 70 年代達到頂峰，比頁岩油復興早了近 30 年。

顧問公司 Efficient Markets 旗下子公司 Indigo Energy Advisors 的地質主管Clint Barnette 表示，即使生產商面臨更高的天然氣和水產量，但他們能夠抽取的石油數量也足以證明生產的合理性。

他表示：「這就是 Delaware 盆地保持經濟效益的原因，儘管這些油井產出的水量是產油量的六到七倍」; Delaware 盆地是二疊紀盆地的第二大子盆地。

Chevron 和 Coterra 等生產商一直在回收其採出水以用於未來的水力壓榨，以幫助降低運輸和其他處理成本。

3月中旬，美國環保署（EPA）表示，將研究如何簡化採出水生的回收，以滿足人工智慧資料中心的冷卻、灌溉、消防和其他需求。

Barnette 表示： “我絕對不會打賭二疊紀盆地會失敗。”

              So, the Permian basin has been the centerpiece of the shale revolution that began nearly two decades ago and propelled the U.S. into the world's top oil producer, now U.S. oil producers are dealing with geological limits in production growth as the country's top oilfield ages and produces more water and gas and less oil. Apparently, the US needs to look for new locations to get more oil to safeguard its supply chain and national security.