Rig Count Update

Back in December of 07, I put up a post called "Energy Incongruity" where I talked about the number and distribution of drilling rigs in the U.S. Here is a quick update for anybody who is interested.

There are, currently 1957 drilling rigs working in the U.S., 1864 land based and 67 in the western Gulf of Mexico. Here they are, by state, in descending order for the major producing states. Texas-926, Oklahoma-207, Louisiana-187, Colorado-110, New Mexico-84, Wyoming-76, North Dakota-70, Arkansas-57, California-44, Alaska-7. (these numbers represent land based rigs only)

Keeping in mind that oil and gas are not evenly distributed, it is still somewhat striking that the largest state, Alaska(over twice as big as Texas), has only 7 rigs drilling. There is a LOT of oil and gas in Alaska but only 7 rigs. Hmmmm. Dare I say that the record oil prices have more to do with the liberal congress and the environazis than with a big oil/speculator conspiracy?

How about California, an historically productive area and the third largest state(over twice as big as Oklahoma), but only 44 rigs drilling. Could it be that the tender sensibilities of the beautiful people are offended by the sight of derricks and roughnecks? Could it be that they prefer that the oil that makes the fuel to power their jets and limos be extracted from flyover states where the hicks don't know any better?

I won't even go into how ALL of the offshore rigs are crammed into the western half of the Gulf of Mexico, leaving the eastern half and both coasts unexplored. Maybe we should install some type of identification machine at the pumps so that liberal democrat nutjobs have to pay $10 per gallon for their gas and sensible Conservatives pay $2 per gallon. I say let the people who are doing the crying do the paying.