Tight oil production to rise to 6 million barrels per day

U.S. tight oil production is expected to rise to more than 6 million barrels per day over the next decade and will account for most of the total U.S. oil production, according to U.S. Energy Information Administration’s Annual Energy Outlook 2017. “After 2026, tight oil production remains relatively constant through 2040” as development goes into less productive areas and productivity falls. This projection, the reference case, is just one of several cases that are included in the energy outlook, and other cases “with different resource and technology assumptions result in different tight oil and total U.S. oil production projections.”

In 2015, tight oil production hit 4.9 million barrels per day and accounted for more than 50% of total oil production. Tight oil production has “increased significantly since 2010, driven by technological improvements that have reduced drilling costs and improved drilling efficiency in major shale plays such as the Bakken, Eagle Ford and the Permian Basin,” according to EIA. The Permian and Eagle Ford regions are two major oil-producing regions in Texas, the largest oil-producing state. The Bakken region is in North Dakota and Montana.

In the reference case, tight oil production and overall U.S. oil production should rise through about 2030. But “tight oil production from Eagle Ford and Bakken begins to decline after 2020 and 2030, respectively. Production in the Permian Basin remains relatively high through 2040.” This basin offers more drilling opportunities “for continued long-term development” because it “contains multiple stacked plays” and “has more geographic extent” compared to the Eagle Ford and Bakken plays.