石油巨头在二叠纪盆地倾注数十亿美元

在2020年石油危机之后，大多数能源公司都避免巨资投入增加生产

大石油公司正在提高2023年在二叠纪盆地的支出

低排放的石油项目被列入许多石油公司的优先名单

据油价网12月16日报道 几个月前，美国政府敦促能源公司停止“战争暴利”，甚至威胁说，如果他们不能将利润投资于降低美国公众的生活成本和增加产量，就要对他们征收暴利税。这些呼吁是在石油巨头在大宗商品和能源价格高涨的情况下创造出利润记录的时候发出的。

在2020年石油危机之后，大多数能源公司都避免投入巨资以增产，而是优先考虑以分红和股票回购的形式将更多现金返还给股东。但有迹象表明，巨头愿意在未来一年（或几年）花费更多，甚至有许多能源公司已经宣布了重大支出和资本支出的增加。

很少有地方比二叠纪盆地更能吸引大石油巨头的注意力。

该盆地的一些最大的石油和天然气生产商已经公布了明年在该地区加强开采业务和投资的计划，因为尽管由于即将到来的全球经济衰退，油价预计将下降，但产量仍将增加。

二叠纪盆地项目

埃克森美孚没有宣布大幅增加支出，但表示其2023年的资本支出将更接近其200亿至250亿美元年度目标的顶端，预计这一水平将保持到2027年。该公司表示，其70%以上的资本投资将部署在美国二叠纪盆地、圭亚那、巴西和全球的液化天然气项目。这些投资将有助于将公司的上游产量提高50万桶/日，到2027年达到420万桶/日，其中一半预计将来自二叠纪盆地和其他高回报地区。埃克森美孚还公布了计划，到2027年将低排放项目的支出提高15%，到2027年达到约170亿美元。

埃克森的同行雪佛龙周三宣布，2023财年的资本支出预算将达到170亿美元，处于其150亿至170亿美元中期范围的顶部，比2022年的预期支出增长超过25%。

该公司表示，上游资本支出包括用于二叠纪盆地开发的40多亿美元；用于其他页岩和致密资产约20亿美元，以及用于降低碳排放或增加可再生燃料产能的项目约20亿美元，是2022年预算的两倍多。尽管雪佛龙2023年的支出将大大高于2020—2021年疫情流行时期的资本支出，但仍远远低于2012—2019年期间300亿美元的年平均水平。

彭博社援引董事长兼首席执行官Mike Wirth的话说：“尽管有通货膨胀，我们的资本支出预算仍然符合之前的指导意见。”

总的来说，越来越多的能源公司对增加支出和产量的想法持开放态度。

加拿大第三大原油和天然气生产商Cenovus Energy表示，预计2023财年的支出为4亿至45亿加元，高于2022年33亿至37亿加元的估计，包括约28亿加元的维持资本，用于维持基础生产和支持运营。Cenovus说，它预计将12亿至17亿加元用于优化和增长，包括在位于大西洋的西白玫瑰项目建设。

Cenovus还将明年的指导产量定为80万至84万桶/日，同比增长超过3%，包括油砂产量为58万至64万桶/日，常规产量为12万至14万桶/日。同时，该公司预计下游原油总产量将达到61万至66万桶/日，同比增长近28%。

三周前，巴西石油和天然气巨头巴国油宣布，它将把2023—2027年的投资支出增加约15%，达到780亿美元。在780亿美元的资本支出计划中，83%或640亿美元被指定用于勘探和开采活动，而67%的勘探和开采资本支出预算将用于盐田前活动。该公司还计划将减少碳排放的支出提高到总额的6%，而之前的计划是4%，并且其脱碳基金将比目前的2.48亿美元增加一倍以上。

曹海斌 编译自 油价网 

Big Oil Pours Billions In The Permian Basin

The majority of energy companies have avoided spending big to expand production in the aftermath of the 2020 oil crisis.

Big oil is raising spending in the Permian in 2023.

Low-emissions oil projects are on the priority lists of many oil companies.

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A couple of months ago, U.S. urged energy companies to stop ‘war profiteering’ and even threatened to slap them with windfall tax if they failed to invest their profits in lowering costs for Americans and increasing production. The calls came at a time when Big Oil has been posting record profits amid high commodity and energy prices. 

The majority of energy companies have avoided spending big to expand production in the aftermath of the 2020 oil crisis, prioritizing returning more cash to shareholders in the form of dividends and share buybacks. Well, but there are signs that companies are willing to spend more in the coming year(s) even as a raft of energy companies have announced major spending and capex hikes.

And few places have captured the attention of Big Oil more than the Permian Basin. 

Some of the basin’s largest oil and gas producers have unveiled plans to ramp up extraction operations and investments in the region next year as production was forecast to increase despite oil prices projected to dip due to an impending global recession.

Permian Projects

ExxonMobil Corp. (NYSE: XOM) has not announced a drastic increase in spending, but has said that its capital spending for 2023 will be closer to the top end of its annual target of $20B-$25B, a level it expects to maintain through 2027. The company said more than 70% of its capital investments will be deployed in the U.S. Permian Basin, Guyana, Brazil and LNG projects across the globe. These investments will help increase the company's upstream production by 500K boe/day to 4.2M boe/day by 2027 with half of that expected to come from the high return regions in the Permian Basin and other high-return regions. Exxon also unveiled plans to boost spending on lower emission projects by 15% through 2027 to ~$17B through 2027.

Exxon’s peer Chevron Corp. (NYSE: CVX) announced on Wednesday that FY 2023 capital spending budget will clock in at $17B, at the top end of its $15B-$17B medium-term range and up more than 25% from expected spending in 2022. 

The company said that upstream capex includes more than $4B for Permian Basin development; ~$2B for other shale and tight assets and ~$2B to go into projects that lower carbon emissions or increase renewable fuels production capacity, more than double the 2022 budget. Although Chevron’s spending for 2023 will be considerably higher than capital spending in the 2020-21 pandemic years, it’s still much lower than the $30B annual average of the 2012-19 period.

"Our capex budgets remain in line with prior guidance despite inflation," Chairman and CEO Mike Wirth said, as cited by Bloomberg. 

Overall, more and more energy companies are opening up to the idea of increasing spending and production.

Canada's third-largest crude oil and natural gas producer Cenovus Energy (NYSE: CVE) has said it expects to spend C$4B-C$4.5B in FY 2023, higher than estimates of C$3.3B-C$3.7B for 2022, including ~C$2.8B of sustaining capital for maintaining base production and support operations. Cenovus said it expects to direct C$1.2B-C$1.7B towards optimization and growth, including construction of the West White Rose project in Atlantic Canada

Cenovus has also guided for production of 800K-840K boe/day next year, an increase of more than 3% Y/Y, including oil sands production of 582K-642K boe/day and conventional output of 125K-140K boe/day. Meanwhile, the company expects total downstream crude throughput to clock in at 610K-660K bbl/day, up nearly 28% Y/Y.

Three weeks ago, Brazil’s oil and gas supermajor Petróleo Brasileiro S.A. or Petrobras (NYSE: PBR) announced that it will increase 2023-2027 investments by about 15% to $78 billion over the company’s 2022-2026 projected spending. Of the $78 billion planned for capex, 83% or $64 billion is earmarked for E&P activities while 67% of the E&P capex budget will go to pre-salt activities. The company also plans to boost spending to reduce carbon emissions to ~6% of the total compared with 4% in the previous plan, and will see its decarbonization fund more than double the current $248M.