Output at every formation is expected to fall in May, with the biggest drop forecast for the Permian Basin, the biggest basin in the country, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) said in a monthly forecast April 13.
Crude oil prices dropped by more than 65% in the first quarter, the most on record, as demand across the world plummeted due to the coronavirus pandemic and as markets faced the prospects of rising supply due to a price war between Saudi Arabia and Russia.
Prices have since found some support after OPEC, along with Russia and other countries—known as OPEC+—agreed at the weekend to cut output by 9.7 million bbl/d in May and June, representing about 10% of global supply.
Production in the Permian basin is expected to decline 76,000 bbl/d to about 4.51 million bbl/d in May, the lowest since September, the data showed.
The second-biggest decline is forecast to come from the Eagle Ford basin, with a drop of 35,000 bbl/d to 1.3 million bbl/d, the lowest since May 2018.
Separately, U.S. natural gas output was projected to drop to 83.2 billion cubic feet per day (Bcf/d) in May, its lowest in a month since August 2019.
That is down 0.9 Bcf/d from EIA’s April forecast, putting production from the big shale basins down for a sixth month in a row.
Output in the Appalachia region, the biggest U.S. shale gas formation, was set to fall 0.3 Bcf/d to 31.9 Bcf/d.
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