It’s the time of the year when oil companies start announcing their budgets for next year and besides a steady albeit guarded optimism, one thing stands out: oil majors are doubling down on their shale endeavors. Chevron, ConocoPhillips, and Hess Corp all announced their capex plans for next year in the last few days and all three have big plans for U.S. shale. In fact, Conoco said it would allocate half of its budget on onshore operations in the United States, while Hess Corp said the bulk of its US$1.89 billion production growth budget, or US$1.425 billion, would be poured into the Bakken play. Chevron has earmarked US$3.6 billion for expanding its production in the Permian and another US$1.6 billion will be invested in other shale plays in the United States. That makes a total of US$5.2 billion for U.S. shale, which is substantially higher than this year’s budget […]