U.S. Exploratory well completions worldwide over the past year. Companies have discovered how to make money at current oil prices by using advances in technology. I believe this is a longterm trend. We will probably never return to the huge demand of the late 70s, however, there will be a continued demand for geoscientists within the petroleum industry. Of late, I ve begun to look at this problem as analogous to farming.
Oil is a commodity like soybeans.
In order to compete in the current market, you need to make a lot of soybeans at a low price. You must always be looking for ways to lower your cost to produce soybeans. One approach is the application of higher and higher technology to survive and profit in an environment where the marginal return on your product is small. The analogy extends to the death of the small farm. As huge agri-businesses form huge farms and apply greater technology and economies of scale, it is increasingly difficult for the smaller farms to survive.