By John P. Tretbar
Eagle Communications
U.S. crude prices hovered near $90 per barrel on Monday, after settling above that mark on Friday. By midday Monday, WTI for November delivery was fetching $89.94 per barrel. London Brent was trading over $93 by lunchtime. Kansas Common crude at CHS in McPherson starts the week at $80.25 per barrel after gaining 25 cents on Friday.
Baker Hughes reported a big drop in drilling activity. The Rotary Rig Count dropped by eleven rigs last week, eight oil rigs and three gas. Texas was down five; New Mexico and Oklahoma were each down two.
The Kansas Rig Count from Independent Oil and Gas Service was unchanged from a week ago, down five percent from a month ago, and down 39% from a year ago. Drilling was underway Friday on leases in Barton and Ellis counties, and operators were about to spud a new well in Russell County. State regulators okayed ten new drilling permits last week, all of them in western Kansas including one in Ellis County. Operators completed 34 wells last week according to Independent Oil & Gas Service. There was one in Barton County and one in Stafford County.
The government said U.S. crude-oil inventories dropped by more than two million barrels from the ten-month low reported last week. The current tally from the Energy Information Administration is 418.5 million barrels, not including the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. That's about three percent below the five-year average for stockpiles at this time of year. U.S. production dropped slightly last week but remains in record territory, over 12.9 million barrels per day for the second week in a row.
Energy Information Administration said U.S. refiners imported an average of 6.5 million barrels per day last week. That's down 1.1 million barrels per day from the week before. Over the last four weeks, imports averaged nearly eight percent more than in the same four-week period last year.
California officials are touting their new gasoline-marketplace oversight with the discovery of a questionable transaction in the gasoline-futures market two weeks ago. Officials say one transaction spiked gasoline prices by half a dollar, at a time when they were already rising. The state's Division of Petroleum Market Oversight also places some of the blame on refiners' planning failures during maintenance, as well as rising crude prices.
The United States is setting export records for propane. The government reported record U.S. exports of petroleum products during the first half of this year. The Energy Information Administration said propane and other hydro-carbon gas liquids set the pace, driving a two-percent increase in total product exports. Exports of gasoline, diesel and jet fuel were all down compared to a year ago.
The government said U.S. crude-oil inventories dropped by more than two million barrels from the ten-month low reported last week. The current tally from the Energy Information Administration is 418.5 million barrels, not including the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. That's about three percent below the five year average for stockpiles at this time of year. U.S. production dropped slightly last week but remains in record territory, over 12.9 million barrels per day for the second week in a row.