Why so much info. on refineries and not on drilling?

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Refinery news seems to be fairly extensive but nothing on drilling/getting the oil out of the ground. Isn't this as tech heavy as refining? Or is this aspect of the oil industry too far down the food chain to get looked at carefully. Maybe these places are too far out in the boon docks for reporters to get at? Also is crude the raw oil as it comes out of the ground or has it had some refining? Thanks for the info.

-- Gerry (twodt@234.com), January 22, 2000

Answers

Every Saturday the Houston Chronicle and many other papers carry the Hughes Tool Co. Rig count....the number of oil rigs in operation during the preceding week, compared to previous levels.

It's about halfway down in the story at this link:

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/business/436479

The Houston Chronicle Business section carries a decent amount of info on the "awl bidness"....if you back up one level, there are stories on the the price rise, and one on fuel cells.

Hope this helps.

JG

-- John Galt (still@doom.er), January 22, 2000.


Gerry,

Let me take a stab at some of your questions.

Crude = raw oil prior to any refining.

Drilling = digging new wells. Delays in drilling would not be noticed for quite a while.

Getting oil out of the wells is, I think, called "production". If so, it is somewhat ironic, since the result is called crude. The other part of the irony is that the stuff is not called "product" until after it is refined. :-)

As for why there is more news about refineries than there is about getting oil out of the ground, I can only guess. One guess is that refineries are more noticeable; there are fewer of them than there are oil wells, so a few refinery problems would have more noticeable effects than a few oil well problems.

Jerry

-- Jerry B (skeptic76@erols.com), January 22, 2000.


The Drilling Industry here is Canada is in absolute high gear. Needly full utilization. Approxiamtely 500 drilling rigs currently drilling. I have been out to 3 of those in the last 10 days. I work in the drilling department of a major North American oil company. There is not indication of slowing down. The only impact that Y2K had on the drilling industry was the preparation before Jan 1. I was invovled in ensuring that the rigs would have no problems drilling through the rollover. All services remained available. There was only one geologist on site who had a computor that would not boot up.

I percieve a booming good old time here in Alberta when the poorer, less prepared counties cannot supply the good old US of A with black gold. We're here working 24 hours a day drilling and bringing oil to the surface. As a side note, we have not had any shut downs in our large refineries in Edmonton (pop. 780,000).

-- Drilling Guy (Iknow@drilling.com), January 22, 2000.


Thank God for Canada. Are we still friends with you guys up there?

-- nothing (better@to.do), January 22, 2000.

Friends, you bet - make sure you check your side arms at the border though. We use sticks and stones up here. :)

-- Drilling Guy (Iknow@drilling.com), January 22, 2000.


Alberta does\will not have enough production to effect international oil price.

-- Will (righthere@home.now), January 22, 2000.

Drilling isn't really affected. We were drilling several wells over rollover. Not much different than driving a car over rollover. Just a bunch of engines and gears.

Don't worry about the drilling. Worry about the refining and the overseas supply.

-- Dog Gone (dawgawn@yahoo.com), January 22, 2000.


Dog - What about overseas drilling?

-- Mark (me@here.com), January 22, 2000.

My understanding is that there isn't a lot "down-hole" except machined steel, etc.

-- james hyde (hydesci@gte.net), January 22, 2000.

Will,

We may not have enough conventional oil to effect international demands, but the vast amounts of heavy oil could become quite attractive. Suncor will have it's heavy oil production doubled in another 14 months. Maybe they knew something that the rest of us didn't.

-- Drilling Guy (Iknow@drilling.com), January 22, 2000.



I agree that Canada (Alberta/Sask) are flat out drilling, reworking, servicing if my husband's physical condition is any reflection. Long hours, truck/electronics breaking down at all hours - just like the good old days in the '80s, when so many blew their money, but it's 20 years later, 20 years older...and feeling it!

The money from the majors is now trickling down and most of the mergers of the mid/small size companies have been finalised...now it is a race to see who can make the most money.

BTW Canada (1997 figures) provided 1.5 million bb/d of the 8 million that the US had to import (18& or so?). I wonder if the figures have changed much and if natural gas has supplanted some of the crude exports.

-- Laurane (familyties@rttinc.com), January 22, 2000.


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