US shale patch faces worsening headwinds

Mounting constraints on US light-tight oil only compound the hazardous task of predicting growth

Major oil forecasting organisations, such as the IEA, EIA and Opec, have severely underestimated growth in US light-tight oil (LTO)—and shale-related natural gas liquids (NGLs)—production for much of the last decade. But over recent years, the Big 3 oil forecasters, especially the IEA, have significantly reversed this trend, ramping up their medium-term projections for US LTO growth. Are they about to finally get it right, or have they jumped on the bandwagon just in time for it to lose a wheel?  Growth in US LTO production has dropped like a stone since peaking in August 2018. Increasingly production out of the prolific Permian has been pivotal to US output, in sharp contrast to the Eagle F