American Oil and Gas Reporter - June 2017 - 64

SpecialReport: Permian Basin Profile
Although it has been among North
America's most prolific oil-producing
basins since the 1920s, the sprawling
Permian, which stretches across much of
West Texas and four counties in southeastern New Mexico, is undergoing a revival.
The key to developing the Permian
Basin is to design with the future in
mind, advises Craig Kuiper, Permian operations vice president for Pioneer Natural
Resources Company.
Pioneer holds the most acreage in the
Spraberry/Wolfcamp play in the Midland
Basin, the larger of the Permian's two
major sub-basins. Kuiper says the company has 600,000 acres in the northern
portion of the play in Glasscock, Martin,
Midland, Andrews and Howard counties
in West Texas. It has another 200,000
acres in a joint venture, of which it owns
60 percent, in the southern portion of the
Midland Basin, primarily in West Texas'
Reagan and Upton counties.
"The productivity of the Wolfcamp
wasn't verified until six years ago,"
Kuiper observes. "Horizontal drilling and
fracturing have been game-changing technologies."
How much of a game-changer? The
U.S. Geological Survey, in an assessment
announced last fall, claimed the "Wolfcamp Shale in the Midland Basin portion
of Texas' Permian Basin province contains
an estimated mean of 20 billion barrels
of oil, 16 trillion cubic feet of associated
natural gas and 1.6 billion barrels of
natural gas liquids. This estimate is for

continuous (unconventional) oil and consists of undiscovered, technically recoverable resources."
The estimate of continuous oil in the
Midland Basin Wolfcamp shale assessment is nearly three times larger than the
2013 one USGS performed for the
Bakken-Three Forks, making the assessment the United States' largest estimated
continuous oil accumulation ever.
"The Permian is the gift that keeps on
giving," Kuiper marvels.
One way to illustrate the Permian's
vast potential is by considering the scope
of Pioneer's ambition. The company says
it produces approximately 250,000 barrels
of oil equivalent a day (59 percent of it
oil). The vast majority of this production
comes from Pioneer's 7,000 legacy vertical
wells and 850 horizontal wells in the
Midland Basin, which represents eight
percent of total basin output. But Kuiper
says Pioneer President and Chief Executive
Officer Timothy L. Dove has laid out a
"1 Million-10" plan. He says the company
has embarked toward a goal of growing
to 1 million barrels of oil a day in 10
years. Kuiper adds that the Permian currently is producing "slightly north of 2
MMbbl/d," and industry experts predict
that figure could climb as high as 8
MMbbl/d.
This spring, Pioneer has been operating
18 rigs in the Midland Basin, 14 in its
northern leasehold and another four in its
southern joint venture. The company says
it expects to place 260 gross horizontal
wells on production in the Spraberry/Wolf-

Pioneer Natural Resources has gone from drilling two-three wells a pad to designing 24well pads in the space of only a few years. The company suggests such efficiencies
should help it reach its goal of quadrupling its production in the course of a decade.

64 THE AMERICAN OIL & GAS REPORTER

camp during 2017, and Kuiper contends
Pioneer may have as many as 20,000 potential drilling locations on its existing
acreage, depending on commodity prices
and the viability of other horizons.

Reaching The Goal
So how exactly does Pioneer plan to
expand its production four-fold during
the next 10 years? According to Kuiper,
the company is doing a number of things.
He cites the example of company's pad
drilling approach. Not long ago, he notes,
the company was drilling two or three
wells on each pad. Now it is designing
pads to hold 24 wells.
"The whole idea is to make sure we
have access when we come back in to
drill other zones, while minimizing our
footprint," he explains. "We are looking
at the big picture, designing with the
future in mind."
A second example to which Kuiper
points is the completion optimization
program Pioneer implemented during
2015 in the Spraberry/Wolfcamp. That
undertaking, he explains, combines longer
laterals with completions that aim to
achieve the ideal approach with regard
to stage lengths, clusters per stage, fluid
volumes and proppant concentrations.
The program seeks to improve well
productivity by bringing more rock into
closer contact with the horizontal wellbore,
he says. "We are creating more surface
area that will see a pressure drop," Kuiper
characterizes.
He indicates Pioneer has placed 38
horizontal wells on production in the
Spraberry/Wolfcamp during the first quarter this year using its Version 3.0 completion design. Pioneer has placed 154
Version 3.0 wells on production since
early 2016 (80 Wolfcamp B wells, 57
Wolfcamp A wells and 17 Lower Spraberry Shale wells) compared with 188 wells
that have been placed on production since
mid-2015 utilizing the lower-intensity
Version 2.0 completion design (131 Wolfcamp B wells, 20 Wolfcamp A wells and
37 Lower Spraberry Shale wells).
Pioneer is drilling horizontal wells
with lateral lengths that range from 7,500
to 12,500 feet, he says, and the company's
further-enhanced Version 3.0 completion
designs include proppant concentrations
as great as 1,700 pounds a foot, fluid
concentrations as great as 50 barrels a
foot, clusters spaced as close as 15 feet
apart and stages spaced as close as 100
feet.

American Oil and Gas Reporter - June 2017

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