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Rig hands in short supply Frantic hunt for gas drives Canadian well completions, licenses to new heights, but worker shortfall as high as 3,000, drillers group says Gary Park Petroleum News Calgary Correspondent
Canada’s drilling sector still has unused capacity, despite a torrent of records in rig utilization, well completions and well permits.
By mid-March, the drilling fleet of about 680 rigs ended two months above the 90 percent utilization rate, while 84 percent of 892 service rigs were active.
For January and February, the industry completed 3,130 wells — none of them in Northern Canada — compared with 2,437 in the same period last year.
New well licenses tallied 5,211 for the two months, easily eclipsing the previous highs of 4,829 in 2003 and 4,730 in 2001.
But drilling contractors continue to scramble for rig hands, with the Canadian Association of Oilwell Drilling Contractors estimating the shortfall at about 2,500 to 3,000, while Precision Drilling, which controls about one-third of the drilling jobs in Canada, would like to boost its crews to about 9,500 from 9,000. Gas drilling dominates The feverish activity is dominated by the hunt for natural gas, which claimed close to 69 percent of completions to the end of February and a similar share of the licenses issued by regulators.
Alberta easily led the provincial counts, with 2,364 well completions, including 1,683 gas wells as E&P companies chased shallow prospects to take advantage of high commodity prices.
That pattern reached across Western Canada, with Saskatchewan recording 367 gas completions in a total of 613 well completions and British Columbia racking up 91 gas wells in an overall count of 134. But oil also figured in the British Columbia picture, with 30 completions (the highest total in 19 years), because of Nexen’s development drilling in the Hay area.
Gas exploration wells for all of Canada totaled 507, compared with 115 oil exploration wells.
New well authorizations for January and February included 3,236 gas-targeted wells, with Alberta’s coalbed methane total climbing rapidly to 137 from a mere 16 a year ago.
EnCana is the pacesetter, logging 1,178 permits, more than double the two closest contenders, Canadian Natural Resources at 424 and Husky Oil at 410.
The big Canadian independent had 89 rigs at work in mid-March, ahead of Canadian Natural Resources’ 58 and Devon Canada’s 47.
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