The total number of active drilling rigs in the United States rose by 1 this week after rising by 3 last week, according to new data that Baker Hughes published Friday.
The total rig count rose to 626 this week. Since this time last year, Baker Hughes has estimated a loss of 158 active drilling rigs. This week’s count is 449 fewer rigs than the rig count at the beginning of 2019, before the pandemic.
The number of oil rigs fell by 2 to 503. Oil rigs are now down by 122 compared to this time last year. The number of gas rigs rose by 3 this week to 119, a loss of 34 active gas rigs from this time last year. Miscellaneous rigs stayed the same.
The rig count in the Permian Basin fell by 1 rig this week, and is now 37 rigs below this same time last year. The rig count in the Eagle Ford rose by 2 rigs, to stand at 52—or 20 fewer than this time last year.
Primary Vision’s Frac Spread Count, an estimate of the number of crews completing unfinished, fell by 5 in the week to November 29 to 276, down from 281 in the week prior. The frac spread count is 18 more than where it started the year.
Oil prices were trading up on Friday. At 12:36 p.m. ET on Friday, the WTI benchmark was trading up $1.54 (+2.22%) on the day at $70.88. While this was up on the day, it is still down more than $5 compared to this time last week. The Brent benchmark was trading up $1.51 (+2.04%) at $75.56, also down more than $5 per barrel from a week ago.
By Julianne Geiger for Oilprice.com
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