On the oil wagon: A tricky time for oil producers

Print section
Print Rubric: 


The industry is already suffering upheaval, but part of it is in denial




Print Headline: 


On the oil wagon




Print Fly Title: 


Producers








UK Only Article:  standard article




Issue: 


Breaking the habit




Fly Title: 


On the oil wagon






Main image: 


Putting the wind up oil






Putting the wind up oil

SOME CALL IT “Texarabia”. In Midland, West Texas, every bare 40-acre plot of land appears to have a pumping unit on it, drawing oil from the shale beds of the Permian Basin up to 12,000 feet (3,700 metres) below. One is toiling away in the car park of the West Texas Drillers, the local football team. The Permian Basin Petroleum Museum, on the edge of town, has an exhibition of antique “nodding donkeys” dating back to the 1930s. In a lot behind them a working one is gently rising and falling.
Drive 20 miles north, though, and the pumpjacks are overshadowed ...