The U.S. Energy Information Administration reported nearly half of the oil pumped in the lower 48 states last year flowed from wells that were drilled sometime after the start of 2014, showing the reach of short-cycle shale production and technological advances in the U.S. oil industry, according to FuelFix.
The EIA expects average U.S. production this year to come down 7.4%, or roughly 700,000 barrels a day. The nation’s shale oil production has come on rapidly over the past few years but individual wells have steep decline rates, losing some 70% of the initial production in the first year.
“Constant drilling and development of new wells is necessary to maintain or increase production levels,” the EIA said. “Oil production from new wells has so far been able to keep U.S. crude production from falling significantly below its level in late 2014.”
The agency said it expects U.S. oil production to keep falling in 2017, ending up 1.2 million barrels a day lower than the 2015 average at 8.2 million barrels a day.
The portion of U.S. onshore production coming from new wells — those wells that were drilled within a two-year period — shot up 48% last year from 22% in 2007, according to the EIA.
