URTeC 2026: Second revolution for shale
(WO) - For the opening session of URTeC 2026—hosted this year at the George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston, Texas—U.S. shale was a key point of discussion. EIA estimates over the last few years have consistently predicted an imminent plateau in U.S. shale production, particularly from major basins like the Permian. While slow-but-steady growth has consistently disproved these predictions, more recent datasets seem to suggest slowing production from current inventory. Even so, many panelists outlined that shale still has a production future in the years and decades to come.
Senior VP of Drilling Services at ADNOC, Khaled Abdul Monem Al Kindi, was among the most enthusiastic on the point of continued shale production. “Ten years ago, we had no unconventionals division,” he pointed out, contrasted with ADNOC launching its own dedicated UC services company this year. ADNOC also aims to reach FID on a 300 MMscfd UC gas JV by July 2026, and, according to Kindi, UC gas output outpaced conventional production in Q3 last year.
Unconventionals’ potential. Managing Director at Bernstein, Bob Brackett, echoed this point for U.S. shale output: “We’re producing almost as much from unconventionals as we are from conventionals on a daily basis.” The main concern is resource inventories, and according to Brackett, many U.S. basins still have potential; from 2000 to 2018, he noted a 3.5x increase in resource inventories in the Permian alone, up to 122 Bbbl. “The flat part [of forecasting] is easy. When is the curve gonna go down? We’ve been wrong every time [in forecasting it].” Far from pessimistic, Brackett was confident in shale’s remaining potential. “There’s gotta be more surprises in there, because it’s a volume problem. We know the volume—the problem is how to get it out.”
The issue of access has been a historical challenge for shale. Despite considerable potential, UC output remains constrained to a scant <10% recovered oil in place, per V.P. and Chief Upstream Strategist at S&P Global, Bob Fryklund, and that largely tier 1 inventory was not easy to exploit. “Those early shale wells were not economic; they were science experiments,” he emphasized. “When it comes to limiting factors today, physics are undefeated,” said General Manager of Applied Technologies Solutions at Chevron, Birlie Bourgeois. “It’s in opening up more surface area to the rock, so that everything else falls into place.”
Collaboration’s role. Much-needed innovation in the shale technologies space may come from collaboration between U.S. shale expertise and emerging shale plays across the globe, in Bourgeois’ view. “[In the Permian] you have a really good supply chain and logistics. How do you get that set up really quickly [in other global basins]?” he noted, adding that, in return for such expertise, “the rocks outside the U.S. are different; can we take those learnings back to the U.S.?” Kindi agreed, elaborating that, “when you have an NOC, what is different is…developing a sweet spot…shifting between doing things very well the conventional way and bringing in other partners—like Patterson UTI—for unconventional perspective.”
Above all, the consensus of the panel was that shale sits at a critical juncture, in need of another revolution to meet the demands of an ever-growing energy market. “We need more than incremental improvement to fuel global power demand,” Bourgeois said. “Shale’s next chapter is about durability through innovation.”
