Infill Thoughts

Hard to believe, but there are only six weeks left in the first half of the year. And what a first half it has been for the Permian Basin frac sand story. This year, the Permian Basin sand land grab burst on the scene like TNT, capturing the entire industry’s attention and …

On Wednesday this week, Halliburton announced that COO Jeff Miller will replace outgoing CEO Dave Lesar. In early March, Weatherford announced the hiring of then Halliburton CFO Mark McCollum as their new CEO. These two announcements may be more related than first meets the eye. There’s a lot more to …

Although the drilling rig itself is only about 10% of total onshore well costs these days, it has become the epicenter of the industry’s latest technology craze: automation, digitization, and big data. As market leaders embark on a new technology cycle, drilling days/well are poised to keep trending down. One day …

About a month ago, we noticed a material spike in permitting activity for horizontal wells in the Permian Basin. Based on historical data, the March spike suggested that the Permian horizontal rig count could increase further 25%. We look at what’s happened since then, and update our permitting analysis for April data in this …

Two months ago, we published an in-depth report on Encana’s 64-well monster pad, Davidson, in the Permian Basin. At the time, 19 new wells were being drilled on the pad. Those wells have now been completed. In this update, we explore the very latest details on their production, status, and Encana’s large …

The oilfield service IPO surge this year has been met with a hostile energy tape. Over the past week, two oilfield service IPOs attempted to cross the finish line: Liberty Oilfield Services and Solaris Oilfield Infrastructure. Both were met with pushback. But Solaris got done and Liberty didn’t. Here’s why and what it …

Smart Sand Inc., the newly public Northern White producer (February IPO), announced another Oakdale plant expansion on Thursday. This is the second expansion announced already this year and the latest example of the kind of brownfield expansion that is conspiring with regional sands to make operators happy and sand investors nervous. …

We have uncovered two more future frac sand mines in the heart of the Permian. These sites take our “confirmed planned site” count up to 6 in the area – a figure that could easily be 10 by the end of May. Although the market is aware that Permian sand mines …

Last week after scouring air permit data, we identified a new sand mine site in Culberson County Texas In conversations with readers offline, the potential mine’s location has come up several times as a sticking point. Could this sand be stranded if indeed it is pointed at the frac industry? (questions …

The impact of in-basin sand on the US supply stack is not only the key debate in the silica industry today. It is the single most important debate in the entire US oilfield at present. Today, three-fourths of US frac sand is sourced north of the Mason-Dixon line, but there are …