Energy & Science
Drilling Sinks to Record U.S. Low With Oil Sector in Retreat
- American oil exploration at lowest since birth of shale boom
- U.S. shale ‘forever altered’: EOG Resources CEO Bill Thomas
An active oil drilling rig in Midland, Texas, on Thursday, April 23, 2020.
Photographer: Matthew Busch/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
Oil and natural gas exploration plunged to an all-time low as the economic and industrial dislocations from the Covid-19 pandemic snuffed out the remnants of the American shale boom.
Drilling in U.S. oil and gas fields retreated by 34 rigs this week to 374, led by a precipitous drop in crude exploration that sank to levels not seen since before the shale-oil revolution kicked off at the beginning of the last decade.