Lower 48 cost curve: comprehensive oil supply coverage

The L48 liquids cost curve reached a floor in the previous two years, and now it’s moving upward. Levers that historically drove improvement like well productivity gains, cost concessions, and structural OFS improvements are exhausted. In this update on the cost of L48 drilling inventory, we use asset-level modelling to detail how a mature curve now shifts with costs, and how consolidation has changed the undrilled landscape. The Permian will have an outsized impact to any future changes as the region holds most of the low-cost resource. As the Permian goes, so goes the marginal cost of tight oil supply.