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Drilling Productivity Report

Release Date: November 13, 2023 Next Release Date: December 18, 2023 full reportPDF
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New-well oil production per rig
barrels/day		 New-well gas production per rig
thousand cubic feet/day
Region November 2023 December 2023 change November 2023 December 2023 change
Anadarko 689 698 9 4,539 4,652 113
Appalachia 191 191 - 25,014 25,019 5
Bakken 1,784 1,811 27 2,654 2,694 40
Eagle Ford 1,529 1,590 61 6,148 6,240 92
Haynesville 18 18 - 12,772 13,001 229
Niobrara 1,460 1,469 9 4,158 4,199 41
Permian 1,289 1,319 30 2,512 2,552 40
Rig-weighted average 1,123 1,153 30 5,571 5,612 41
Oil production
thousand barrels/day 		Gas production
million cubic feet/day
Region November 2023 December 2023 change November 2023 December 2023 change
Anadarko 396 392 (4) 6,587 6,528 (59)
Appalachia 135 133 (2) 35,953 35,764 (189)
Bakken 1,270 1,272 2 3,392 3,405 13
Eagle Ford 1,154 1,151 (3) 7,508 7,457 (51)
Haynesville 32 32 - 16,559 16,428 (131)
Niobrara 691 692 1 5,193 5,198 5
Permian 5,976 5,981 5 24,745 24,858 113
Total 9,654 9,653 (1) 99,937 99,638 (299)
Drilled but uncompleted wells (DUC)
wells
Region September 2023 October 2023 change
Anadarko 719 709 (10)
Appalachia 758 747 (11)
Bakken 368 350 (18)
Eagle Ford 416 399 (17)
Haynesville 749 751 2
Niobrara 763 736 (27)
Permian 843 832 (11)
Total 4,616 4,524 (92)

NOTE: The Drilling Productivity Report (DPR) rig productivity metric new-well oil/natural gas production per rig can become unstable during periods of rapid decreases or increases in the number of active rigs and well completions. The metric uses a fixed ratio of estimated total production from new wells divided by the region's monthly rig count, lagged by two months. The metric does not represent new-well oil/natural gas production per newly completed well.

The DPR metric legacy oil/natural gas production change can become unstable during periods of rapid decreases or increases in the volume of well production curtailments or shut-ins. This effect has been observed during winter weather freeze-offs, extreme flooding events, and the 2020 global oil demand contraction. The DPR methodology involves applying smoothing techniques to most of the data series because of inherent noise in the data.

September 2021 Supplement: Gas-to-oil ratios in U.S. primary oil-producing regions.
January 2021 Supplement: Base production in North Dakota has fully recovered after a significant reduction.
September 2020 Supplement: With low rig counts, the inventory of drilled but uncompleted (DUC) wells provides short-term reserve for completions of new wells.
August 2020 Supplement: Rig counts fall but new-well production per rig rise as new-well production persists.
March 2020 Supplement: Base production accounts for a material share of total U.S. tight oil production.

key tight oil and shale gas regions