Ah yes, the infamous decline rates of unconventional wells — the pet obsession of analysts who think geology writes the final chapter of the shale story. Important, yes, but perhaps it’s time to view the entire shale oil complex through a different lens. By all conventional logic, shale should have been stone-dead years ago, lying inert like a fossil in some Antarctic valley. Yet here it is, defying both gravity and OPEC+, keeping Europe warm and North America nearly energy independent.
OPEC+ has pulled every trick in and out of the book to kill this creature — floods of cheap oil, cartel theatrics, quiet sabotage — and yet the beast refuses to die. It just keeps chugging along, zombie-like, powered by technology, debt, and sheer American obstinacy.
The real marvel isn’t the volume, though. It’s the price. Oil has been cheap — absurdly so — for years now, even as the world convulses through wars, pandemics, and every conceivable form of geopolitical lunacy. Adjusted for inflation, it’s practically a bargain-bin commodity. And still, the shale producers — supposedly unprofitable, unviable, unsustainable — remain standing. Leaner, harder, meaner.Write as many obituaries as you like. Shale has survived every funeral thrown its way. Whatever’s coming, they’ll find a way to solve it — they always do. The geology may be finite, but the audacity clearly isn’t.