ExxonMobil released its updated corporate plan on Tuesday, wherein it upgraded its 5-year outlook. Exxon expects earnings to increase by more than $14 billion at constant prices through 2030 from 2024 levels, $5 billion above its previous forecast by ramping up output in its Permian Basin assets and Guyana, as well as expanding natural gas and LNG production.
But Exxon isn’t just drilling more–the company is also changing the industrial process of shale extraction. In effect, the Oil & Gas giant is using “stackable technologies” to improve the economics of unconventional drilling by applying a large number of incremental innovations that collectively aim to double resource recovery in the Permian Basin.
These technologies are “stacked” or integrated to create cumulative efficiencies and values that are greater than the sum of their individual parts.
The “stackable” concept extends beyond the well site. Exxon’s approach is not about a single breakthrough but a combination of over 40 different proprietary technologies being developed and tested. The company is integrating its entire operations, from wellhead to refinery to chemical plants, to capture value at every stage.
The Permian Crude Venture is an example where managing the full value chain is expected to generate significant business value, demonstrating how stacked integration enhances overall profitability. The Permian crude venture is anchored by Exxon’s $60 billion acquisition of Pioneer Natural Resources and its extensive operations in the basin in 2023, which position it as a dominant producer in the top U.S. oilfield.
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Petcoke proppant: ExxonMobil’s petcoke proppant is a proprietary, lightweight material made from refinery petroleum coke, designed to travel further and keep fractures open in hydraulic fracturing, significantly boosting oil recovery in the Permian Basin. This patented innovation uses a low-cost byproduct, offers deeper fracture reach than sand, and is being rapidly deployed across its unconventional wells, providing a major competitive advantage by increasing output and efficiency. Field trials have demonstrated significant oil uplift of up to 20% and increased conductive fracture area compared to sand-only completions.
Well-spacing optimization: Exxon’s new well-spacing optimization strategy involves using data analytics, diagnostic pilots, and integrated modeling to find an optimal balance between maximizing single-well productivity (wider spacing) and maximizing total resource recovery in a given area (tighter spacing). Exxon runs diagnostic pilots and collects high-resolution data during drilling and completion phases to quantify fracture size and shape.
This data, combined with production history from existing wells, helps inform optimal development plans.The company is leveraging multi-bench co-development, or “cube” development, to extract resources from multiple layers simultaneously. By optimizing the spacing for multi-zone designs, they have increased the Net Present Value (NPV) of projects compared to developing single zones.While tighter spacing can lead to higher overall hydrocarbon recovery, wider spacing often yields better individual well returns. Exxon Mobil analyzes both optimal return and recovery for an entire section to determine a reasonable well spacing, considering that aggressive downspacing can lead to diminishing returns and well interference issues (“frac hits”).
Multipad, multizone “manufacturing-style” execution: Exxon Mobil employs a “manufacturing-style execution” in its Permian Basin operations, which involves using multipad, multizone drilling to achieve economies of scale and improve efficiency. This approach treats drilling and production as a streamlined, repeatable process, similar to a factory production line. The company drills multiple wells from a single surface location or “pad”. This minimizes surface disruption and allows for efficient movement of drilling rigs and associated equipment between well locations on the same site. The Permian Basin is known for its “stacked pay” potential, meaning there are numerous oil- and gas-bearing rock layers (zones) stacked vertically. ExxonMobil targets several of these zones from the same well pad, maximizing resource recovery from a single location.
Cost-per-foot and cost-per-barrel reductions: By applying consistent processes and technologies (such as its licensed Fast Drill™ technology), Exxon aims to reduce drilling time and lower costs per barrel of oil equivalent. The company is focused on achieving significant cost-per-barrel reductions, targeting a global breakeven oil production cost of $30 per barrel by 2030. Over 50% of the company’s oil and gas production currently comes from low-cost advantaged assets, which have breakeven costs well below $40 per barrel. Exxon Mobil has surpassed $14 billion in cumulative structural cost savings since 2019 and achieved an additional $2.2 billion in 2025 alone. The company is now on track to achieve $20 billion in total cumulative structural cost savings by 2030.
By Alex Kimani for Oilprice.com
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