US drilling rig count down by 73 to 529

Kristen Nelson

Petroleum News

Baker Hughes reports the number of rigs drilling for oil and natural gas in the U.S. April 16 was 529, down by 73 rigs from the previous week, and down 483 rigs from a year ago.

The count continues the steep drop of recent weeks, declining by 62, 64, 44 and 20 rigs respectively in the previous four weeks.

In its weekly rig count the Houston oilfield services company said 438 rigs targeted oil, down 66 from the previous week and down by 387 from a year ago, while 89 targeted natural gas, down seven from the previous week and down 96 from a year ago. There were two miscellaneous rigs active, unchanged from the previous week and up by two from a year ago.

The company said 28 of the holes were directional, 483 were horizontal and 18 were vertical.

Pennsylvania was up by one rig to 25 from the previous week.

Rig counts were unchanged in California (8), Colorado (16) and Ohio (9).

The rig count in Texas, which at 262 has the most active rigs, was down by 40 from the previous week and down by 238 from a year ago.

New Mexico (84) was down by nine rigs and North Dakota (34) was down by seven.

West Virginia (10) and Wyoming (6) were each down by four rigs.

Alaska (3) was down by three.

Louisiana (41) and Oklahoma (24) were each down by two rigs; Utah (5) was down by one rig.

Baker Hughes shows Alaska with three active rigs, down by four from a year ago.

The largest rig count drop by basin was the Permian, which also has the most active rigs at 283. The count in that basin was down 33 from the previous week and down 180 from a year ago.

The U.S. rig count peaked at 4,530 in 1981. It bottomed out in May 2016 at 404.

- KRISTEN NELSON