I've got some new Novi poop on Exxon in the Midland Basin I want to share; its Permian production was down 77,000 BOPD 1Q2026 and I thought we might take a look at that. .Its Jefe is always everywhere, on the media, and in the White House, saying how great it is and how many decades of good Permian tight oil wells it has left. Its lying.

First things first.

Folks that never paid any attention to oil and natural gas until the internet made them all experts, and the shale phenomena came along, think debt and oil/gas work well together. It's necessary.

Phfttttt.

Exxon operated for a century with little to no debt whatsoever, then shale came along. Lots of people think that the XTO thing might have been the biggest (pending) blunder Exxon every made...I think not. I think PXD will be a giant blight on Exxon's history.…

Here is a chart that is about 9 months old now and was used in a discussion about parent/child degradation in the Midland Basin and its effect on falling well productivity. 70% or so of these parent wells now operated by Exxon used to be Pioneer wells.

Parent wells are thought to be the better wells in a community because they were, generally speaking, drilled on reasonable spacing, their initial production managed more prudently (GOR, for instance), etc. Child wells in proximity to parent wells tend to be crowded around parents that were good and as they are newer focused on high IP's and optimum cash flow. They tend to be wells walked on a pad crafted to make money. They generally are not as good as parents, particularly now days, because of degradation and pressure depletion. Many studies are underway suggesting child wells underperform parents by as much a…

Here is a chart showing correlation between higher oil prices in the U.S. and increased oil production. You hear this crap a lot all over the internet: the cure for higher oil prices is higher oil prices. Top chart in green is prices, bottom in blue is U.S. C+C production in BOPM.

As you can see there is not much of a correlation at all. Higher oil prices from 2009 to the end of 2014 led to the beginning of the tight oil revolution....or did it? During that same period the industry engaged in tight oil extraction borrowed over $400 B, most of which was lost, in the growth over profit brain fart.

I took the liberty of correcting reasons for declines and increases in U.S. tight oil production from 2009 onward, bottom chart; OPEC gets the blame for a lot of stuff that is simply not true. Lifting the…

I have no earthly idea how the EIA derives these reserve estimates; it essentially can't unless it is getting reserve estimates from operators themselves, in which case they are most likely not very reliable.

Remember, please, proved reserves includes proved, undeveloped reserves (PUD). PUD is some related to volumetric estimates in conventional reservoirs; PUD's in tight oil basins are based on proximity to producing, parent wells. PUD reserves are generally estimated from type curves and internal decline curve analysis by operators and often exaggerated. There is now clear evidence that interference between parent and offsetting child wells is negatively affecting well productivity.

Proven tight oil reserves represent 60% of total U.S. proved reserves and those proved reserves keep rising every year, which I find very hard to believe.

The U.S. consumes 21.5 MM BOPD per day, including condensates, or 7.8 G BO annually. Essentially then the United States had 5.4…