(Bloomberg) -- Production from the world's most prolific oil play is expected to set new records as drillers keep on adding more wells.
The Permian Basin of Texas and New Mexico added 122 drilled-but-uncompleted wells in March, compared with 130 the previous month, according to a report released Monday by the Energy Information Administration. Output is forecast to reach 3.11 million barrels a day in April and 3.18 million in May -- the highest since the EIA began compiling records in 2007.
"The slowdown in legacy production is being offset by new-well drilling,” Andy Lipow, president of Lipow Oil Associates LLC in Houston, said in relation to wells that have already been drilled and are in production.
Drillers are still preoccupied with how they're going to be able to bring new production to market given pipeline constraints. “Existing pipeline infrastructure is rapidly filing up," Lipow added. “The next tranche of new pipelines will only be coming online in 2019.”
Existing pipeline bottlenecks will widen the discount of West Texas crude to the same grade at Cushing, Oklahoma, the delivery point of the NYMEX crude futures contract. The discount is expected to sink toward $6 a barrel later this year from $3.50 at present, he said.
To contact the reporter on this story: Sheela Tobben in New York at vtobben@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editors responsible for this story: David Marino at dmarino4@bloomberg.net, Stephen Cunningham
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