texas-driller-speaks-miracle-one-americas-largest-oil-fields

Texas Oil Exec Makes Case for Drilling in US: ‘It Creates American Jobs’

Rest assured, Texas oil is flowing. With gas prices skyrocketing, one field in the Permian Basin is increasing production and wages. Michael Oestmann, the chief executive officer of Tall City Exploration company, told Fox Business that his people will double production by the end of the year. They’ll go from 10,000 barrels a day to 20,000, he said. Wages are going up as well. “It’s right here, and it’s good for America,” Oestmann told FOX Business. “It creates American jobs.”

Texas Oil: At a Glance

  • State is the largest oil producer in the United States.
  • As of Friday, the rig count was up to 320, a 58 percent increase from March, 2021. It’s still down from the March, 2020 level of 408.
  • Permian Basin in Texas is at nearly full employment
  • There’s not much federal land in Texas, so oil leases are on private acreage.

The Fox Business reporter called it a “miracle” that the oil is flowing, making reference to the fields in New Mexico that are on federal land. People there told her they had to wait for about nine months to receive drilling permits on federal land.

Of course, New Mexico is about a four-hour drive from this area of Texas. As oil prices escalate, especially after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, American consumers want to know why there isn’t more domestic production. The oil companies bring up the fact that President Joe Biden halted new leases on federal land when he took office in January 2021.

Biden’s order did impact a state like New Mexico, which has 24 million acres of federal land. That’s almost one-third of the state. Almost half of Wyoming is federal land.

As for Texas, the largest oil producer in the country, not much of the Lone Star State is federal land. Try three million acres, which represents about 2 percent of the state. About half of all that is managed by the U.S. National Park Service. Texas oil does have a piece of federal land, coming in with leases for 185,000 acres as of 2019.

The pandemic did play havoc with the Texas oil sector. But according to state officials, those jobs are back, particularly in the Permian Basin in far west Texas. Last month, when oil was at $90 a barrel, the Texas Workforce Commission said that the state is anticipating 1.7 million more good-paying jobs by the year 2028. Midland and Odessa, the two major hubs of the Permian Basin, were almost at full employment. The unemployment rate for Midland was 4.1 percent, with Odessa at 5.9.

“We actually saw the growth actually beginning and before the last quarter of last year,” said Willie Taylor, who is CEO of the Permian Basin Workforce Board.

Taylor told reporters: “We’re still slightly behind the pandemic as far as our civilian workforce population, but we are seeing that growth really beginning to pick up.”

Another good way to measure Texas oil production is by counting the rigs. As of Friday, there were 320 rigs in Texas. That’s a 58 percent increase from this time a year ago. When the pandemic started in March, 2020, Texas had 408 rigs.