HOUSTON—What North American giveth, North America taketh away. As the global energy industry grapples with low prices, it need look no farther than North America, and the U.S. specifically, to find a reason for the 55% drop in prices since last July. The shale revolution has positioned the U.S. as the top oil and gas producer in the world, and the increase in supply, coupled with tepid demand, has sent prices plummeting.
This sobering situation was the topic of the Global Energy Outlook session “North America: Challenges and Opportunities” on May 5, in which the panel brought together a variety of oil company and government representatives to look at the current state of the industry in this country and discuss opportunities for the future.
As he introduced the session, Gamal Hassan, CEO of ADH International, said that of the issues that keep industry leaders up at night, energy prices have surpassed climate change as the number one concern. “We’re living in an era of unprecedented uncertainty,” Hassan said. “Critical decisions are made more complex by the economy and the challenges it brings.”
Representing Mexico, Gustavo Hernandez-Garcia, director general of Pemex, commented on the challenges that companies face in a low-price environment. These include cost reductions, reduced access to capital, portfolio optimization, people and strategy reviews. “Every time we have the price going down, it’s the moment to review the things that were attractive when prices were high,” he said. “The focus shifts to value creation from volume.”
He added that Pemex has had to overhaul its management model to prepare for competition with foreign firms amid adverse market conditions. But there are opportunities as well.
“Low prices create the opportunity to speed this up,” he said.
In fact, he added that Pemex, which is a company of more than 100,000 employees, was able to review its portfolio and respond to Round 0 within 90 days, something that ordinarily might have taken two or three years. And it was rewarded 99.5% of the assets it requested.
“Pemex needs to be an agile NOC [national oil company] to compete,” he said.
Paula Gant, deputy assistant secretary for the Office of Oil and Natural Gas in the U.S. Department of Energy, spoke next about how her organization does the necessary R&D to help policymakers enact reasonable laws. She said her office works closely with ministers in Canada and Mexico to maximize regional cooperation and build global leadership.
“The psyche in the U.S. is changing, from one of shortage to one of abundance,” she said. “And we continue to exceed our expectations.”
Due to “technological advances and innovative practices,” she said that the top producing natural gas well in the U.S. in 2004 produced 141.6 MMcm/d (5 Bcf/d). As of January 2015, a well in the Marcellus was producing 849.5 MMcm/d (30 Bcf/d). “This means security for our country,” she said.
It also has created 12.1 million jobs over the past 61 months.
David Ramsay, minister of energy for the Northwest Territories (NWT), Canada, addressed the vast untapped potential in his territory and the opportunities it affords. The Mackenzie River snakes through the NWT. It is the longest and largest river system in Canada and is second only to the Mississippi in North America. The government is building a highway along this route to get production to market, he said.
“What we lack in population we make up for in economic potential,” Ramsay said. He estimates the NWT has 3 Bbbl to 5 Bbbl in onshore resources. Offshore, he said, the Beaufort Sea has the potential to rival the Gulf of Mexico for resources. “The Arctic offers one of the best new and stable sources of energy,” he said.
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