American Drilling Rig Count Falls Below 1,000 — Texas Down by 513

The “Baker Hughes Rig Count” shows the oil & gas drilling rig count has plummeted in the past year. The month April is the first time in 25 years the North American oil and gas drilling rig count has fallen below 1,000 rigs. The price of crude oil in the past year had fallen as much as 50%. Many expensive shale oil wells have become uneconomical at current crude oil prices. Much of the US crude oil increased production comes from shale oil formations with expensive horizontal drilling. Shale oil formations often must be fracked several times; consequently, productions costs are high.

Here are the following drilling rigs statistics as of May 8, 2015:

US                      One year ago        Rigs idle      

894                        1,831                         -961

North America

969                        2,017                       -1031

International (April)

1,202                   1,349                           -147

Texas   (May 8)          

379                         892                           -513

North Dakota

80                         176                              -96

Oklahoma

102                        195                              -93

Louisiana

70                          110                              -40

The drop in US drilling rigs will result in a drop in US crude oil production. There are 1031 drilling rigs idle in North America. The drop in Texas drilling rigs is dramatic in terms of jobs lost, service equipment loss, and oil royalty income. The issue is where is the bottom of oil and gas rigs being idle?

Peter Maffitt is a news contributor for Breitbart Texas.