Infill Thinking Lifting the O&G knowledge curve

Predicting the rig count is hard to do… here’s a brief recap of some notable recent predictions and how they are evolving as the oilfield activity cycle enters a more stable phase. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and …

Who controls the nameplate capacity in the Lower 48 local sand market? We quantify share and share some observations about the supply stack’s ownership. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a …

Next week, we’ll put our necks on the line by publishing predictions for the shale outlook in 2023. Admittedly, the outlook is a bit ho hum this year by oilfield standards. That’s not to say we won’t have some fireworks though. So to spice things up a bit before the 2023 …

As most of you reading this know, EOG is critical to the addressable market in oilfield service. In this update we go asset by asset and digest the management’s development philosophy and perspective on their different plays. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  …

On Monday in the Permian,… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill Thinking, or your membership has expired, please email us to discuss our …

A question we get from industry contacts from time-to-time is “what’s the price spread between wet and dry Permian sand.” So here we did some math and reverse engineered a wet/dry price spread… interesting exercise, and we share it plus some implications. There’s a lot more to this story… Login …

Login for the details on a new bankruptcy happening in frac sand well past the industry’s bankruptcy cycle of 2020… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are …

A variety of interesting shale datapoints and anecdotes popped up in our research this week that didn’t warrant a full Infill Thinking write-up but are none-the-less worthy of a mention. Here are several of them: There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read …

After canvassing quite a few contacts in the supply chain this week, it appears to us that the… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to …

Our most read research update in 2022 (here’s a link to the top updates list) was titled “Who Else Is ProFrac Buying?”. Since that was written back in October, ProFrac announced three more acquisitions (two in sand – Monarch, Performance Proppants – and one in frac – Rev). Will ProFrac …

Here’s our take on the latest ProFrac acquisition in frac sand… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill Thinking, or your membership has expired, …

2022 was a busy year and a good year in shale all around. E&Ps and OFS verticals in most basins enjoyed growth. With 2022 drawing to a close, here are some statistics on the member resources Infill Thinking provided during 2022 followed by a list of the most popular research …

One year ago, we made 10 predictions about 2022 in this update. In this “post mortem” report, we hold ourselves accountable for the hits and misses… how’d we do? Hint, if this were an exam in school, we’d have scored a 90%! There’s a lot more to this story… Login …

The very latest on a big 4Q22 development in the Eagle Ford sand supply stack… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill Thinking, or …

The Gardendale Seismic Response Area appeared to be working… until last Friday. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill Thinking, or your membership has …

Re-wording and recording the holiday classics to reflect the latest oilfield trends is a Christmas tradition as old as Infill Thinking itself. For the past six years, we’ve re-written a holiday classic (or two) to reflect the spirit of the season and shale trends. Part market research, part holiday cheer …

After covering a radical project’s announcement and contracts last week, we have a few more details now… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill …

This is, without any doubt, the most radical logistics concept that we’ve ever seen move off the drawing board in the frac supply chain. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a …

A small local sand plant in the Eagle Ford about 40 miles south of San Antonio down 37 that never really did much. Is that about to change under new ownership? There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive …

In total, we estimate that ~X% of new gen systems are now 6+ years old, while another X% are 5 years old. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If …

It’s hard to believe that it has been 6 years since this happened: A Frac Sand Mine Lands In The Permian. This Could Transform The Competitive Sandscape [Exclusive Details] July 2022 was the 5-year anniversary of the opening of the Permian Basin's first local sand plant. While some other basins …

We estimate there is about X-X mm hydraulic horsepower (HHP) available in the U.S. market. Here’s how it stacks up by age….   There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. …

Together we estimate Chevron and Exxon are running X frac crews and X rigs in the Lower 48. We dig into their budget and production outlooks given this week. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research …

We think E&P behavior on capex this year exhibits signs of reversion to historical norms, albeit with less leverage than in the past, which is a positive sign for OFS firms because their price increases are translating to more capital not lower activity. There’s a lot more to this story… …

We update members on market conditions for sand in the Eagle Ford, where frac jobs have been delayed. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to …

Four unrelated quick hits of interest in shale today are summarized below. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill Thinking, or your membership has …

We discuss how aggressively Publics acquired Privates in shale E&P this year… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill Thinking, or your membership has …

The wait is over to see who one of ProFrac’s M&A targets is. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill Thinking, or your membership …

Although E&P management teams continue to spike the football about their capital discipline on earnings calls, capital budget and spending data tell a different story in shale. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you …

How much sand is moving these days? A lot – find context and timeline for shale consumption over a decade long view here… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. …

A massive highway improvement project in the Permian could create times of havoc for oilfield traffic over the next several years, potentially resulting in downtime, decreased efficiency, and higher well costs. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive …

We have refreshed our Permian frac sand mine data (download link for latest database). Here are a few data takeaways from this update… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. …

Over the past couple weeks, the Eagle Ford frac sand market has gotten tight. Real tight. In fact, it is so tight that…. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. …

We very much enjoyed interacting with everyone in San Antonio for the Petroleum Connection’s sand conference this week. Congrats to the organizers on another great event and we look forward to seeing you at the next one… here are a few quick thoughts from our time here this week. There’s …

Developing news about a big issue for the Eagle Ford sand supply stack… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill Thinking, or your membership …

While OFS is getting credit for being disciplined and many companies across the oilfield value chain are echoing a chorus of “we are sold out”, some fleet expansion is still happening. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive …

We had a chance to get to know the latest new entrant in the Permian frac sand market a little better. Here’s what we learned… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be …

Over the past month or two, we’ve been writing about a new mini frac sand plant in the Midland Basin. Although we haven’t been able to get into contact with the plant’s owners, we have managed to… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  …

We look forward to meeting up with industry friends later this week in San Antonio at the big sand conference hosted by the Petroleum Connection. Here’s a quick event preview… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our …

Over the past couple of weeks, posts have surfaced on LinkedIn showing a novel approach to wet sand container management from PropX (like this one, this one, and this one). Below is a slideshow with some of the videos and still shots we have seen surfacing online, followed by the …

We digested new datapoints from ProFrac this morning… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill Thinking, or your membership has expired, please email us …

More sand hyper-local sand capacity is in the works, but it might stay in the works for a while… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new …

EOG’s entrance into the Appalachian market could help to tighten proppant market conditions in a railed sand stronghold. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to …

Last week, we published two datapoints separately. Today, new revelations show that they go together… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill Thinking, or …

How do the inflation expectations being outlined by E&Ps this earnings season compare to our recent survey results? We discuss along with company-specific datapoints in the full update… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, …

We have rounded up a series of operator-by-operator fleet data…. There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must be a member. If you are new to Infill Thinking, or your membership has expired, please …

Over the past week, multiple datapoints materialized in our channel checks, online, and in the news that extend threads begun in previous Infill Thinking research reports. We dig into some of these with quick hits here… Some, like the evolving Pioneer fleet turnover situation (which we predicted in advance) were …

Headed into 2023, the big fleet turnover changes we wrote about earlier this week have subsequently been announced. Now who will fill the void? We discuss our channel checks on the transition and why the hard part is just beginning here… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to …

Headed into 2023, big changes are brewing in the 6-frac crew fleet that XYZ pumper runs for ABC operator (read full post for names and analysis)… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full update…  To read this update and receive our research newsletters, you must …

A big article on wet sand and “mini-mobile mines” in the press this week drove inbound from Infill Thinking members seeking data clarification on the trends. Some context on mobility and adoption rates / volume is needed here… There’s a lot more to this story… Login to see the full …