April 19, 2009 04:32 PM UTC

About Those "Vanishing Drill Rigs"

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• by: Colorado Pols

Kind of interesting, all these stories coming out about why drill rigs counts have really dropped in Colorado over the last year–now that the ugly fight over new rules to protect wildlife and private property near drilling activity is over. Just how divorced from reality did the GOP’s gloom-and-dooming get, you ask? The Grand Junction Sentinel reported Friday on another piece of the puzzle:

On a well pad near Rulison stands yet another reason for the reduction in drilling rigs in the region. But energy companies aren’t complaining about this one.

A high-efficiency drilling rig is operating on a Williams Production RMT pad and recently drilled Williams’ 3,000th well in Colorado there. Such rigs do their job more quickly than traditional ones, and as Williams uses more of them, it needs fewer rigs to meet its drilling goals.

Spokeswoman Susan Alvillar said Williams will be able to drill 300 wells this year using nine to 10 rigs, compared to 600 wells with as many as 25 rigs last year.

Williams and other companies have either reduced or suspended drilling this year for reasons such as lower natural gas prices, limits in pipeline capacity for locally produced gas and concern over Colorado’s new oil and gas rules.

But Williams isn’t the only company saying increased drilling efficiency also is contributing to the rig drop.

“I think there’s some truth to that,” said EnCana Oil & Gas (USA) spokesman Doug Hock. Like Williams, EnCana has been switching to new, “fit-for-purpose” rigs that can drill wells faster.

“That benefits in terms of reduced cost, and it also means that if we have a smaller drilling program and we’re drilling them faster we may not have a need for as many (rigs) for as long a period of time,” he said.

Obviously it doesn’t account for the whole drop in active rigs, but as we’ve explained repeatedly that drop is in line with–or not as severe as–equivalent declines in neighboring states. Just another bit of evidence showing the drop had nothing to do with the new rules, determination of certain lawmakers to make contrary stuff up notwithstanding.

Let’s review: chances that energy-industry friendly Republicans like Minority Leader Josh Penry knew about new, more efficient drill rigs that can sink as many wells with fewer rigs: let’s be generous, say 90%.

Odds that Penry might possibly have mentioned this little fact during one of his  endless pearl-clutching “obviously the new rules are driving energy companies out” monologues in the Senate? Zero, baby. This, like so many other pesky “facts,” just didn’t fit the narrative.