2015 Oil Bust In The Permian Basin
Drilling 2015 ?
2015 Permian Basin Drilling Basically Haulted
Having lived here in the Midland area for over 40 years , we have seen the second boom and bust since the 1980s. There is virtually no activity in the oil fields except for service personell to keep control over the previous wells that were drilled in the last few years. The Permain Basin is not like it was back in the 1980s bust as the area still flourishes with traffic and people have stayed.
Maybe the people who have stayed see a new oncoming of drilling activity coming on. It reminds one of Gold Diggers, where you strike it rich then there is no gold left and you move on to another location. The downfall of the oil prices has nothing to do with local people , however, and there is plenty of oil in the basin area, just not enough money to drill a well and make a profit. Everything has gone up in prices now, except for the gasoline, where we once payed about 3.20 a gallon during the boom and no place to live . Did Midland do this to themselves again, or is this just the history of how the oil flows in and out of the Permian Basin.
With no controll over oil prices locally , we are at the mercy of OPEC and the Saudi Arabian output and pricing . I thought this was America? Well, that being true we are in AMerica, why can we not put a price on our own oil? The contracts are decided upon the free market and the government not of our own.We rely upon OPEC to decide what and how much oil we produce and this has happened for so many decades. We have enough oil to supply AMerica in the USA and Midland and Odessa produce 1/3 of the oil for the country, and then we rely upon 2/3 of the oil from other countries.
Prices are still dropping per barrel and no end in sight , but there is an upswing to all this, and that is when the prices will start going back up.
When will this happen, too many speculations to make clear sense of this fact. Fracing is the new waty in which to recover oil in the West Texas area and even though the Frac oil drilling concept is not new, the equipment to drill is very expensive to utilize.The service trucks are still running water and oil from the leases and that is the only activity we see around here.
The crime rate has also blossomed and the drugs are prevalent in the city to keep some of the residents high, but that is the dark gloomy side of the area. This exist in every area of the country.
However can Midland and Odessa recover again, it would seem as though something is happening in the area as we have new businesses and schools are full with children from all walks of life. The retirement community is growing as the aging oil boomers are not leaving and they were the smart ones that did not borrow for their drilling escapades. The companies that hurt the most from oil price drops are those that borrowed money from banks at 90.00 a barrel and now they have to pay back the loans. That has taken a good percentage oif the local oil service and drilling companies out of town and broke. This is no different than the years of the 1980s boom and bust.
