Collapse Of Shale Gas Production Has Begun

This is a guest post by Steve St. Angelo of SRSroccoReport.Com. All opinions expressed in this post are his and do not necessarily reflect those of Ron Patterson.

The U.S. Empire is in serious trouble as the collapse of its domestic shale gas production has begun.  This is just another nail in a series of nails that have been driven into the U.S. Empire coffin.

Unfortunately, most investors don’t pay attention to what is taking place in the U.S. Energy Industry.  Without energy, the U.S. economy would grind to a halt.  All the trillions of Dollars in financial assets mean nothing without oil, natural gas or coal.  Energy drives the economy and finance steers it.  As I stated several times before, the financial industry is driving us over the cliff.

The Great U.S. Shale Gas Boom Is Likely Over For Good

Very few Americans noticed that the top four shale gas fields combined production peaked back in July 2015.  Total shale gas production from the Barnett, Eagle Ford, Haynesville and Marcellus peaked at 27.9 billion cubic feet per day (Bcf/d) in July and fell to 26.7 Bcf/d by December 2015:

Steve 1

As we can see from the chart, the Barnett and Haynesville peaked four years ago at the end of 2011.  Here are the production profiles for each shale gas field:

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Is Non-OPEC Beginning Serious Decline?

The EIA’s Monthly Energy Review just came out. They have the U.S. production numbers through December along with World, OPEC C+C, Non-OPEC and selected Non-OPEC nations through October. All EIA data is in thousand barrels per day.

Notice: When I use the term “peaked” below, I am referring to the most recent peak, not the all time peak and not necessarily the final peak. 

USA

United States C+C production peaked in April at 9,694,000 bpd and has dropped half a million barrels per day by December to 9,191,000 bpd.

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A Closer Look at OPEC

Taking a closer look at OPEC. All OPEC and price data below is through December. All production data is in thousand barrels per day.

Iran and Libya have had serious political disruptions in their production numbers. Simply adding them to the OPEC numbers distorts the picture. To try to figure out what has been happening to OPEC we need to look at OPEC without Iran and Libya.

OPEC Less Iran and Libya

Here is OPEC less Iran and Libya, or the OPEC 10 if you will. I have marked August 2012 as what I call the “Price Peak”. Not the peak in oil prices but the production peak that was brought about by the increase in the price of oil. That price increase began in early 2009 and by March 2011 was well above $100 a barrel. And the price of oil did not drop below $100 a barrel until late August 2014.

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OPEC, except for Iran, Has Peaked

The OPEC Monthly Oil Market Report is out. OPEC took a hit in December, down 205,000 barrels per day. After examining the past and present production numbers, I believe that OPEC, except Iran, has peaked. That is, the combined production from all the other OPEC nations, has peaked. And any additional production from Libya is likely to be in tiny increments that won’t make much difference in the big picture. Other OPEC nations may show a slight increase from their current level. But the combined production from all the other 11 OPEC nations, 12 if you count Indonesia, has peaked.

Of course there will be some small increases from the other 11 OPEC countries from time to time but overall, in 2016 and beyond, I believe it will OPEC will be from flat to down, with a greater chance of being down. That is we are at, or near, the peak right now. There might be a slight uptick of their combined production in the coming months but not enough to get excited abut.

All Data in the charts below is through December and is in thousand barrels per day.

OPEC 12

OPEC production, in the chart above does not include Indonesia. OPEC 12 was down 204,000 barrels per day.

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Texas Oil and Gas Production Declining

The Texas RRC Oil and Gas Production Data is out. This data is  always incomplete. But we can get some idea of what the trend is by comparing it with previous months. This is what I have done in the charts below. If the latest months data is below the previous months data then the trend is down. But if the latest months (incomplete) data is above the previous months (incomplete) data the trend is up.

All RRC data is through November 2015 but the EIA data is only through October. The oil data is in barrels per day.

Texas C+C

The trend is definitely down. The scale makes it difficult to gauge the month to month change but I have the exact month to month change here in barrels per day. Of course this only gives you a general idea of what is happening. The final change could be either less or greater than the numbers indicate here. But the EIA data should be very close.

Jun. to Jul.  7,245
Jul. to Aug. -63,827
Aug. to Sep. 34,507
Sep. to Oct. -33,486
Oct. to Nov. -52,802
Jun. to Nov. -108,363

EIA Dec. to Oct. -121,000

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