Efficiency and costs are the two magic words of the oil industry today. While just a few years ago the top priority was production growth, followed by more production growth, in the wake of the 2014 price rout everything has changed. It’s all about becoming more efficient nowadays, in order to not just survive but to remain profitable at lower international oil prices. Big Oil is spending a lot of time and money on efficiency. Just the last couple of months saw three separate announcements from Shell, BP, and Baker Hughes, all about lower-cost exploration and drilling. Shell was first when, in late March, the Wall Street Journal published a report about the company’s Gulf of Mexico operations, quoting sources as saying that production costs at its Mars platform could be lowered to less than $15. Shell officials claim that deepwater well drilling in the Gulf now takes 30 […]