The key to a recovery in U.S. oil output this year is continued growth from the Permian Basin. Even after nearly 100 years of production, the U.S. Geological Survey estimates the basin contains 60-90 million more barrels of crude oil and 280 trillion cubic feet of natural gas to be produced. Current Permian oil output accounts for almost 50% of total U.S. production, with plans by major oil companies and lease holders ExxonMobil and Chevron to boost their production by 25% and 10%, respectively, in 2022. However, many independent producers have more modest output increases planned, more in the range of 5%.

The most recent boom for the Permian came when horizontal drilling of oil wells proved successful about a decade ago. Not only did horizontal drilling change the Permian’s fortune, but horizontal wells also changed the way the oil industry approached growing its output. Lateral wells began to lengthen and lengthen, as producers discovered they could improve well economics by opening more of the basin’s formations to wellbores and increased fracking intensity. Producers soon recognized that lengthening well laterals, the key to improved economics, was hampered by lease boundaries. You could not drill across a neighbor’s lease. Acreage consolidation became the new dynamic driving industry growth and U.S. oil and gas output gains.

With the realization that consolidation needed to happen in the Permian, regardless of whether it was via acreage purchases or company M&A activity, operators were suddenly faced with not only having more data to manage but often data from different providers. In some cases, the data came from data collectors the new owner did not use. Thus, the data was often collected, analyzed, and displayed in different ways. Capitalizing on this diverse collection of well data became a challenge, something producers realized would impede their ability to rapidly translate their investment in the additional acreage into profits.

Once again, we find ourselves highlighting the importance of data, and the role digitalization has and will continue to play in the industry’s success. Developing systems that can take data from various sources and in different formats and turn it into a useful tool was a challenge. Fortunately, with data and digitalization, the challenge was only a matter of time and effort by technologists to create software to handle the disparate formats of well information. Another tool in the toolbox to unlock the hydrocarbon potential of the Permian Basin.

For this Company Spotlight, we interviewed Well Data Labs’ Founder and CEO (Joshua Churlik) about how the company is optimizing the way the oil and gas industry collects, models, and utilizes real-time data to enhance completions and drilling operations to maximize production. Well Data Labs is a leading data analytics and machine learning software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform that helps upstream operators and service companies use data to identify and solve efficiency and technical challenges.For more information on Well Data Labs, please visit welldatalabs.com.

Background: After working at a large public exploration & production company in the Rockies for several years and noticing inefficiencies in the data analytics process, Josh co-founded Well Data Labs in 2014 to help operators streamline the collection and data normalization of oilfield data for use in their decision analysis. Oil and gas operators need data streams to best determine how to maximize their wellbore value, so Well Data Labs created a……..…..READ MORE

Founded in 2009, EIV Capital is a Houston, Texas-based private equity firm specializing in providing growth equity to the North American energy industry. EIV Capital focuses on investments in businesses that create value through infrastructure, innovation or efficiency. This most recent fund will primarily focus on midstream infrastructure, including gathering, processing, distribution, storage and marketing of oil, natural gas and refined products, as well as growth renewable projects, including waste to energy, renewable natural gas, renewable chemicals, and businesses providing resiliency and reliability to the electric grid.

Related Press Release: EIV Capital Closes on $702 Million

H2scan was founded in 2002 and provides hydrogen sensors for electricity utilities and industrial markets. H2scan’s hydrogen sensing products are used to improve electrical distribution reliability and are ideal for monitoring and measuring hydrogen concentration in fuel cells, hydrolyzers, and hydrogen distribution pipelines to reduce carbon emissions. H2Scan’s sensors also serve in a wide variety of hydrogen economy applications. H2scan will use the funds raised to expand manufacturing, expand auto calibration capabilities, add additional sales offices around the world, enhance marketing capabilities, and fund further R&D projects.

Related Press Release: H2scan Announces Successful $70 Million Capital Raise

Iron-IQ is a cloud-native IIoT SCADA Platform allowing customers to remotely monitor and control any device from anywhere in the world. Iron-IQ continues to gain traction in the SCADA race with new features and economically sound solutions for any size of operation. Iron-IQ’s platform recently updated its core experience to an enterprise offering, challenging the old guard that has dominated SCADA. This funding will be used to further expand Iron-IQ’s offerings to oil and gas operators.

Nth Cycle is a metal processing technology company that works with recyclers and miners to install onsite customizable and clean electro-extraction technology that recovers critical minerals from separated e-waste and low-grade mine tailings. Since the company's initial seed financing in 2021, Nth Cycle has scaled its technology 100x and has already begun efforts to commercially deploy systems in 2022. Funds from this financing will be used to deploy the first commercial units at recycling facilities in 2022, as well as to expand Nth Cycle's technical and development staff in 2022.

Utilidata is a leading energy technology company that is digitizing the grid edge to unleash the full potential of clean energy. Utilidata's patented real-time machine learning software leverages data from every point on the distribution grid to enhance visibility, optimize operations, detect anomalies, and integrate distributed energy resources. This round follows an $8.25 million raise that closed in July 2020, which enabled Utilidata to accelerate the development of its meter-based software solutions. Utilidata is now bringing an advanced software platform to devices at the edge of the system which will leverage real-time data and machine learning to enhance grid resiliency, integrate distributed energy resources — including solar, storage, and electric vehicles — and accelerate the transition to a decarbonized grid.

Energy Technology Musings

Helping the Permian Basin to Drive U.S. Energy Self-Sufficiency