First Friday Q&A | June 2025 | Ep 381

You're listening to the Oily Gas This Week podcast with Mark LaCour and Paige Wilson. This is the show for busy oil pros who quickly want to keep their finger on the pulse of the industry. You're listening to the Oil & Gas This Week podcast brought to you by Cognite, AI for the industry. This is the show for busy oil pros who want to quickly keep their finger on the pulse of the industry. So thanks for joining us for episode 381.

Please save the day for Impact Cognite's annual user conference happening October 13th through the 16th in Houston, Texas. And it's first Friday Q&A for June. You know, we're creeping up on episode 400. Yeah, I know. We're going to end up having to do something. We say this every time we hit 100 and we haven't done it. And we did it once. Remember we had the dinner at the restaurant and we had all of our sponsors and everybody there? That was fun.

Yeah. Was that like 200? That was before the pandemic. No, that was during the pandemic. So that was the only way we were able to get together. That's right. And I think that was episode, was that 300? No, it had to have been. Was it 200? I don't remember. I don't know. I don't know. Somebody told me.

You may write it and tell us because I might. There's 2 million of y'all that listen to this show. One of y'all should be the official fact checker. Let us know about our details. We'll make you an honorary member. We have a couple of those just on different topics. Yeah. Make you an honorary member of the team. Speaking of podcasts. We got a bunch of new shows launching. I do want to talk about two real quick.

So Global Energy Recon, which is a veteran show. This has been something I've been wanting to do forever. And we finally got it launched. Big shout out to Daniel for hosting that show. If that name sounds familiar, he also runs our marketing department. If you would see our marketing team, it looks like a...

Bunch of guys that have done a whole bunch of close-quarter combat. Oh, wait, they have. Yeah. So we have. It's all veterans. I've never felt so safe with a marketing team. Yeah. I'm a Marine, then Daniel's Army, and then Derek's Air Force. And they're just doing great jobs. But Daniel's hosting our veteran show, Global Energy Recon. It just launched a literally soft launch this morning.

We're helping veterans transition back into civilian life. And we're also dealing with some of the dark stuff that veterans have to deal with, suicide, post-traumatic stress disorder. And at the same time, we also want to help our armed services recruit. So if any of that stuff sounds like something you're interested in, go listen to the show. The link will be in the show notes.

Also, if you're a car guy and if you listen to us or any length of time, you know I am. We're launching a podcast called High Octane Life, which is all about the luxury car market, but it's going to be fun. And Paige, I wanted to do that show so bad myself, but I have a company to run. You don't have time for that.

So we did a little contest on LinkedIn. I say a little contest. I did one post looking for a host. We had over 200 people apply for the position. I already had people call me personally about that. Speaking of Cognite, we don't want to mention who that person's name is, but it's very smart.

Mr. Cognite salesperson. That was a sign of a great salesperson going wide quickly in a new account if you look at it that way. However, stay tuned to High Octane Life. It is literally going to be a blast, no pun intended.

Reviews. Man, we haven't got a review. We had one last time. It's okay. All right. Come on, people. Leave us a review. We love to read them on the air. And actually, our existing listeners like to hear them as well. Let's go ahead and get into questions. As always, starting off with Ludwig.

What is that of the Gulf of America and the Gulf of Mexico stuff? Something I don't understand from the Trump administration, worrying about names. I don't think it's my priority, but hey, it's your administration. My administration is still missing one. Thousand kids in trial protection. Oh, crap. Damn, that doesn't sound like a good story, Luthwig. Well, that was...

Basically what happened is President Trump renamed it to the Gulf of America, but unless you recognize it as the Gulf of America, it doesn't really matter. But it's a federal change name, so... all governments that have anything to do with like Bessie and Boehm, it's all Gulf of America now. And I sort of like it. Well, I mean, if you look at the stickers we had made, that was pretty great. So nothing to do with this show. Do you know how somebody reach out?

from our sales and marketing audience wanting one of those stickers, so I'll mail him one. So for some reason, I'm so sorry I can't remember your first name, listener, but if you're listening to this show as well, just know that you're getting one of the Gulf of America stickers. Get in the first question. Oh, I'm sorry. Second question. Yeah. I already turned a certain age and can't count. Shut up.

All right. Next up, we got Jacob Weston. Hi, OGGN team. My name is Jake Weston. I am the owner of an industrial fastener house that specializes in petrochemical applications. I found myself in the industry a bit more around about way than most after spending some time in army special operations community. I'm a big fan of the show and would love to explore advertising options. I'm not going to read his cell phone.

number, but he says, thanks a million. Yeah. Jacob, thanks for writing. And I actually sent up a call with him a while ago, had a great conversation. and told him that, quite frankly, we're probably not a good resource for him right now. We may be in the future. So he does a lot of work around turnarounds. planned maintenance, unplanned maintenance. And because of how old fashioned the culture is, especially around fuel refineries and existing petrochemical plants.

I told him he should try a billboard, 100% seriousness. Find a billboard that's on the main route into the plant, run an ad on it about your fasteners, and then see what type of return you get on that.

Thank you, Jacob, for reaching out. But one of the reasons I left this in here is that if you reach out to us and you want to advertise with us and we don't think you're a good fit, or if we don't think we can help you, I will tell you, or my sales team will tell you, just like we did Jacob. And Jacob, if you're listening to this, just remember, we just launched our...

veterans podcast. You may have an interest in that. Also give it some time and let me know if you did the billboard idea. I would love to know if it worked. Yeah. Okay. So this is going to be a really long one. I'll stop, I guess, after the first question. Are you good for that? Yeah. We actually used this a while back because it's a review. Yes. And then questions. So maybe skip the review. Okay. Actually, just rehash the review, then do the first question. Okay.

Frack completion price war. First, I absolutely love listening to the show. I wish it was longer. LOL. Yeah, yeah, this does sound familiar. Learned so much about the industry just by listening to y'all.

Always thrilled when a nude episode drops. I recommend y'all to everyone that asks for a good podcast. I have so many questions to ask, but my question is about the current price were with service companies making 50% less. or so that they did

seven, ten years ago. For example, conventional frack fleets are making barely enough to stay afloat. Natural gas or electric fleets aren't making much more either. With all that consolidation and massive buyouts, the frack service side has lost more than 200% of its horsepower, which is like 485 fleets in 2018.

versus 195 fleets in 2025. The advancement technology in the past just a few years alone has been insane. Now companies are beginning to frack three wells at a time, and officially standards are very high, 22 hours a day. of pump time. With that being said, why haven't the few remaining service companies raised prices? Two reasons.

Don't confuse gross price with margin. What's happened is, you're right, we've driven a whole bunch of efficiencies in the service side, the upstream service side of the industry, and their margins have shrunk. Sometimes those margins were shrunk on purpose because they just want to keep their people working in a low crew price environment and try to hang on to their talent and pay for their equipment. Other times it was a competitive choice. So if I'm SLB and I've been...

on a job and I want to win it, maybe I have to lower my margins. But the other thing is, and you touched on this a little bit, this part of the industry is maturing. And as any industry matures, you have the bigger players gobble up the smaller players. You have the less efficient. players disappear and what you're left with is a very efficient low margin business that eventually becomes a commodity and i know that people in the frack side especially on the pressure pumping side

Don't want to hear this, but somewhere in the future, relatively soon, pressure pumping or fracking will 100% be a commodity. We headed there now. You can see it. You can see the right on the wall. You can look at the numbers. You can look at the margins. What does that mean? It means one of two things. Anytime an industry matures like this and you have everything driven to the point that it becomes a commodity where you have to be a low price leader to win.

then that industry either stagnates or somebody comes out and innovates. Great example of that, if anybody has ever heard of a Yeti cooler, 10 years ago, if you would have told me somebody was going to pay $500 for an ice chest, I would have told you, you're insane.

But a couple of brothers said, you know what? We can build a better ice chest, charge a premium for it, and people will buy it. And they were right. I think you see the same thing happen in the frack fleets. It's definitely being driven to be a commoditized industry. It's going to be low margin. People are going to win mostly on price.

But I do believe somewhere in the future, a disruptor will come in that will make high margins and have a totally different way to do this type of work. What that is, I have no idea. I also think that the pressure pumping market will truly become global. Right now, it's mainly here in North America.

There is some work going on like in Argentina and in China and a few other spots in the Middle East a little bit. But I think you could see it truly become global like the major operators are. So I think that's a change you could see in the industry. Hopefully it answered your question. What's this other question?

What is your outlook for the future of the service company pricing? Well, I think I just covered that. So it's basically, it's not going to go up unless there's a disruptor coming in. Oh, and then he has a bonus question. Do you predict a major frack service company buying out somebody here in the U.S.?

or another frack service company major joining the U.S. shale play? Ooh, that's a hard one. Both of those are in the realm of possibility. I think what's more likely to happen is you're going to have a... Another company from somewhere outside the U S that.

understands the fracking process, the pressure pumping process, and decide to invest resources and come into the U.S. and probably buy one of the smaller companies, not that there's any really true smaller, but one of the smaller companies that are left to get some market share out of the gate.

that happened a lot in the North Sea. If you look at over the last 20 or 30 years, a lot of the technology that's used in conventional reservoirs offshore, a lot of it came out of the North Sea and some small company from Norway that's done it in North Sea for years came to the U.S. and then grabs more.

market share and brings in new processes and new technology. I think you can see the same thing happen there. Yeah. Thanks. Frack dog, Danny. Yeah. What's some great questions mixed with the review. Yeah, absolutely. This one's from HK Leandry.

who is an individual laborer. You've had three podcasts since April 22nd, Liberation Day. No mention of the tariffs. You're as quiet as Speaker Johnson. Why do you just sit there and say nothing? Let me answer that. Okay. I don't think we have, HK. HK, you've written in a whole bunch, and I love the fact you're a listener to the show, so thank you.

We've talked about the tariffs. I just don't go into detail because quite frankly, there's no detail to go into yet. You have a lot of people that have opinions about this tariff versus that tariff, how it helps, how it hurts. And I still see all this stuff, all this tariff wars going on as simple, high-level negotiation. And what's happening is our current administration, specifically President Trump,

is negotiating at a very high level some major stakes with the entire world and countries and companies involved. He only has so many levers to pull, and one of those levers is... tariffs. So I think we have talked about it. I haven't went deep in it yet because we can't. Let's see where all this stuff goes. I fully suspect

As I'm watching this unfold in front of me in real time this year, you're seeing a current administration impose a tariff, and then you're seeing that other country at some point eventually give in and come to the negotiation table. And the whole point of all this is to renegotiate trade agreements that has...

Historically, we're not favorable to the U.S. So I support what he's doing, but it's just too many moving parts for me to comment on how it affects the oil and gas industry. Now, when it settles down, we absolutely will go into it in detail. Second question, on your LinkedIn, your show notes to leave a rating on your show are only there for four links to a podcast that I would have to download to leave a rating.

Why ask for a review and then limit the way to make the review just for podcasts? I'm a long-term listener and I don't appreciate your silence on tariffs. like i said hk we haven't been silent on there i just haven't went deep as far as the reviews we don't control that i wish we did i would have the build it leave a podcast review on every social platform facebook x

Reddit, whatever, but those platforms don't take podcast reviews. And the four links that you saw, there's only two places you can leave a review for any podcast has nothing to do with us. This is any podcast in the world by anybody. You can leave a review on Spotify or Apple podcast.

And that's it. I'm sorry that there's not more options for you to do that. And when you say you had to download something, I suspect that you would have either had to download Spotify or Apple Podcasts. What I'm getting is he listens to it on the web. Yeah, if you're listening to it in real time, not on a mobile device, on the web, once again, we don't have any control over...

how the different platforms allow you to leave a review. If you want to leave a review and you don't want to download something, do what you did here. HK, just go to the website and fill out a form and say, this is a review. All right. Anyway, one more thing, but thank you HK for being a listener. Cause I've known you've been a listener for a very long time.

Next up, we got Matt. Mark Page, what skills should early to mid-career professionals in the oil and gas industry develop to stay relevant in the next decade and beyond? I recognize Matt Silva's name. He's a longtime listener too. He's written in several times. Well, he didn't put his last name, but you sure did give that away. It's in his email address. Yeah.

So what skills should early to mid-career professional, I guess, stay relevant next day? Ooh, I don't have a crystal ball. People think I do. Sometimes I don't. Let me tell you what I think. So a couple of things that I think everybody should be focusing on in their career, whether they're right out of college or mid-career, even senior career. First one, and you can't hide from this, data literacy and analytics. You're going to have to understand a little bit about how to use AI tools.

how it works how to do analytics and it's getting much easier there's a whole bunch of classes out there you can take it's something you should do all the time we actually are pretty hip deep into some AI stuff right now. I can't talk about it yet, but we're just trying to stay current. But bigger than the actual technology tools, I think moving forward, and I've seen so much research about this. Number one, you need cognitive skills, the ability to problem solve, to think critically. basically.

Because so much of our information now is fed to you. You can measure critical thinking. And here in Europe, the ability to think critically has gone down every year for the last 20 years. If you're one of those people, and you can train yourself. Critical thinking is like mathematics. You can learn it even if you're not a natural. at it. The next thing is all the social and people skills. Forget the technology, focus on that. That's important, like I said, but

People skills are disappearing. There are several large oil gas service companies that when they're hiring salespeople measure their ability to have conversations with other people. Where the hell have we got to as a society when our salespeople can't talk to somebody in real life? There's emotion, intelligence skills. Once again, you can learn that.

Learn to be a better communicator. I just listened to Mike Howard on Page's podcast earlier today. And one of the things that Mike brought up that was so true, but it took him a long time to realize it, is just because you know what you're saying doesn't mean other people understand it the way you're thinking about it. So you have to learn how to be effective communicator. And that being a good communicator is on your shoulders, the communicator shoulders, not the listening shoulders. And then.

There's other things I would look at. I think the entrepreneurial mindset is something that's coming back in corporate America, which is good. Having a kind of a customer-centered mindset, I think, is also something that's starting to disappear because so many transactions are done online. And I think that'd give you a competitive...

differentiator. But I bet, Matt, you were thinking I was going to give you a bunch of technology things to learn. And I really think the soft skills are probably more important. And it's things that companies measure for now. So that would be my advice on what should you look at for mid-career professionals.

Yeah, you covered everything I was going to say based off of my interview with Mike Howard. Which is a great interview, by the way. Yeah, thank you. I appreciate that. Next up, we've got Steve.

A relative passed away several years ago and had three wells. They were capped for a while in the Unitan Basin area of Utah. Just recently in January, we were getting check payments as we heard they started drilling and doing horizontal drilling again. How does the drilling look in that area? And was this expected to be a short burst of results? And will they cap again? Or do we think they will drill for a while? Just curious what the industry thinks is happening in the United Basin area.

Yeah, so I don't know why I was about to say it's an older basin. They have to be older if they're a basin. It's not like there's a new basin, maybe newly discovered. Anyway, basin's been around for a while. And to answer your question, Steve, I think you're almost looking at it the wrong way. If you're worried about... checks. If you're worried about being paid for the ownership of these wells, it really doesn't have anything to do with drilling. It has way more to do with actual production.

I think maybe that's where you need to focus. So this basin is a stacked basin like some of the other ones. And it's experienced a little bit of a boom. I know SM Energy and I think Chevron are both there. Those stacked.

plays always have high potential, high investment. And the good thing is that most of the infrastructure you need to get those hydrocarbons to market is existing, which means they don't have to build it. So the production should go up in that basin. However, the problem with the oil in that basin... is that it's waxy.

That waxy oil is hard to transport. It gums up pumps and parts and valves and pipelines. So the pricing has to be right. So what I think you're seeing now is that we're in this low crew price. I haven't checked it today. It actually has went up a little bit. We're in mid sixties, I think, or low to mid. 63-64 today.

I think the reason you're not seeing revenue checks coming in is I think they didn't cap the well, they just stopped producing it, which is what you get paid on. And I think they'll start producing again once the price gets closer to 70. So just get a little bit of patience. And I think by the end of this year, you'll see those revenue checks. start coming back in. Now, if you're really worried about drilling in that area instead of your revenue checks,

That market's expanding. There's a bunch of renewed interest. There's some good high production rates. So I see growth in that area. So you should see more drilling. So either way, Steve, I think I answered your question. Hopefully. If not, let me know. Well, not only that, if he wants to go look and see what's been permitted, he can go to the Utah Division of Oil, Gas, and Mining. Yep. There you go, Steve. So just a little answer for me. Next up is from Jake Ryan McMullen.

Hi, when is the London mixer planned? Can you keep me posted on the details? I work at Total Energies in the role of surf technical leader. Thanks, Jake. Jake, thanks for writing in. Audience. It's happening. I just can't tell you when. I reached out to our event person just a couple days ago knowing that we were going to have this question, and they're still trying to figure out a date.

And unfortunately, even though I just recently talked about our current presidential administration and the tariffs or negotiation tactic, it's also affecting literally our ability to do a mixer in London. It's not going to stop it, but it is going to delay it a little bit. And it's not going to delay.

it because it's against the law it's a matter of figuring out quite frankly the pricing we have to pay for all of this and we have already chosen a local charity we're going to donate to like we do all our mixers so now do we have to pay for all this we have to make enough of a profit to donate to the charity and the changing tariffs is making

it really hard for my event team to figure out exactly what they should do, what they should spend money on, what they shouldn't. So just a little bit of patience. Now, Jake. I added you to the list, the email list. So whenever the London Mixer comes out, you will get an email about our London Mixer. So you'll know about it at least a month ahead of time. And if you come to our London Mixer, you have to come find Paige and I and introduce yourself and remind us that you wrote in this question.

Don't worry, I'll remember. All right, next up we've got Matt, Chemical Account Manager at Chevron. Mark, what the heck is going on with BP? With the rumors going around about them, a possible takeover target, how did they get here and who which companies would could take on a deal like this? And since you will most likely fanboy. This is the one I was waiting for. Fanboy on Exxon, please include two others. Also, any other big mergers take over potential in the industry in 2025.

Yeah. So I don't think Exxon's could do this. It doesn't make sense to me. I think Shell's could buy BP and they won't be able to buy all of BP. They'll buy the assets that are most important to them. And if you look at what Shell does best, they're an LNG trading company. They do everything. I know they're super.

So I think that's where they're going to concentrate their takeover efforts of BP. I shouldn't say takeover. I think it's going to be a mutually beneficial acquisition. Don't think Exxon's going to do it. To others, there really isn't anybody else that could do this. There may be some investment companies that may look at getting a piece of this business, but not enough to actually pick up all of BP.

Like I said, I don't think ExxonMobil is on their radar. Now, I could be wrong. They don't include me on their strategy session. I kind of feel like they should. Sometimes I think they should. If nothing else, it would be fun for me. As far as any of the big merger potentials in the industry in 2025.

I'm probably going to point you to a place that you wouldn't think of renewables. Here in the U.S., there's a bunch of renewable... infrastructure that has been built and has been operated a lot of it doesn't make fiscal sense and so it's either been idled down turned off or is operating at 10 or 20 of its output but in the process of building all that infrastructure We've learned a lot about solar and wind and brought the prices down dramatically.

I think that's going to be the next big M&A opportunity is I think you're going to see, and I think some of it's going to actually be venture companies, which everybody tells us to think I'm crazy about that because they lost their shirt on the last round of renewable investments. But I think you're going to see some of them come back and I think you're going to see. several companies snatch up these renewable energy electricity generating companies for pennies on the dollar.

put them together with some natural gas generation capacity so that the economics make sense and then be a powerhouse in the electrical generation market here in the U.S. And I think that's probably going to start happening this year. Yeah.

All right. I'm sorry for the next person. I'm probably going to butcher your name. Eric Leisch. Leisch? Leisch, I think. He's an engineer. I work for an offshore oil and gas operator in the DJ Basin Producing. 40 degree API oil with a gore of 1000 to 2000 at a depth of 10. We're using gas lift, but oil output declines with continued injection. Rod pumps have worked well on select wells, but high DLS limits bore use.

The depth is too deep for PCP, so cross that one off too. I'm exploring hydraulic and hydraulic rod pumps as an alternative. Do you know of any companies offering this technology or similar solutions? Damn, Eric. I understood most of that. I understand it all, but this is almost out of my ballpark to be able to answer. I understand the temperature and pressures, viscosity. I get that, but I don't do this for a living. This is where you need to ping one of your other engineers. However.

Because I run Oil & Gas Global Network, I've talked to a lot of companies. I actually can't answer your question because you ask who to buy stuff from. So as long as you're not asking about technical details, I can answer the buying part. You know the deal, Eric. Reach out to either NOV or Champion X. There's two companies that... own the space in the world for artificial lift both of them have hydraulic rod lift systems both nov and champion x i would start there

Go on their website, see what's going on. And then if there's something there you like, if you don't want to work with one of the big companies, take whatever they're doing and drop it into Google. Now that Google has AI suggestions and it will find a smaller company so you have more choices to deal with.

You have to start either ChampionX or Innovate. Both of them own this space. That would be the best place to start if you want to buy that type of solution. Hopefully it helps you, Eric. I'm not going to lie. I loved how specific that was. Actually, me too. It's the nerds in us.

All right. Oh, this is from Carlos and it's about insights on your talk, Mark. I attended your talk today at the VPP symposium and wanted to express my gratitude for your insights. The presentation was both informative and inspiring, especially as I aim to grow. the midstream oil and gas sector. Unfortunately, they did not have the opportunity to ask you a question afterwards, so I will share this here. Has anyone quantified the economic impact of changing population demographics on the energy?

During my college studies in sustainability, I encountered population depletion reports from the 1940s. in 1980s published by the U.S. government. These reports highlighted limitations in current reserves and indicated they would not suffice for human growth volume. Who is currently publishing similar studies and where can I find my macroeconomic topics related to this issue? Thank you for your presentation.

Carlos, do you and Eric buddy up and ask questions that are almost impossible to answer? I'm kind of curious, but Carlos, thank you. I'm glad when I was on stage, you found my ramblings useful, valuable to you. The change in population demographics is not just affecting oil and gas, it's affecting everything. It's going to happen way quicker than everybody thinks. If you don't know what we're talking about at a high level, basically the world's population growth is slowing.

Countries already have negative populations. So basically more people die, they're being born, which means their population is shrinking and that trend will continue in the entire world at somewhere in the future.

There's going to be less people today than there was yesterday. That trend will continue, and it's going to totally change everything we do. God, that totally helps my social anxiety. There's going to be less people we talk to. I actually think for a long period of time, it's going to be a utopia. We're going to have more resources because our use of technology allows us to tap into more natural resources, but with less people. So there should be no more fighting or wars over food, energy.

land to live on housing and our impact to the environment should go down, down, down, down. So we have less people. Plus we know how to deal with impacts environment more because of the technology. Anyway, as far as the oil and gas industry, it's happening right now. We have a shrinking workforce. Young people don't want to come work in this industry.

But there's some other economic things that people don't tie into that. With the shrinking workforce, you have a lower savings and investment, which that then slows economic growth, which means as these people get older,

And I'm one of them. As you get older and as the workforce shrinks and as there's lower savings and investments, that means that here in the U.S. and in other countries like Europe, you have increased spending by the governments on Social Security and health care if you have a bunch of old people that don't have a bunch of savings.

There's going to be a shortage of skills, which leads to increased competition for jobs. And then what's happening right now in oil and gas is technology is taking some of those jobs away permanently because there's no people to fill those jobs. And then all that leads to other stuff like government debt. Text increases and...

Blah, blah, blah. And that eventually leads to things like migration. You're seeing that here in the U.S. where there's a lot of jobs that Americans don't want to do. So people from other countries that are happy to have opportunity come into this country to take those jobs. All that mixed together is a mess and trying to find. something specific to the oil and gas industry.

It's probably really hard. I'll tell you, I'd start a couple of places. Absolutely, I would start with McKinsey & Company. They do a lot of research around all this sort of stuff. Now, whether they drill down to the actual oil and gas industry, I'm not sure, but I promise you they'll have a bunch of good research.

material around the consequences of this new demographic reality. I'd also look at some of the government organizations, although take everything with the US government organizations and also things like United Nations with a grain of salt. Unfortunately, both of them have been corrupt a little bit to be more.

politically motivated than honest market research motivated. But I'd start with McKinsey, look at Bain. And then also I would actually spend a little time in AI tool that is able to surf the internet. We use Claude AI here. We pay a little bit for it.

But it would be interesting, though, Carlos, if you find exact demographic information on the change in population against the oil and gas industry, let me know. As far as I know, I don't think there's anything that's that specific, although you can infer from what other companies have done on the market. research how it also applies to the oil and gas industry. Anyway, hopefully it helped, Carlos. All right. Up next is from Jennifer Morrison, COE manager at ServiceNow.

Long-time listener, first time asking a question. What do you two think about the explosion of AI, both consumer and businesses? Is it oil and gas industry lagging behind or are they adopting as quickly as everybody else? Love the show. Please keep up the great work. No comment on it. Oh. Well, I mean, I think I'm not in any other industries to understand where oil and gas is versus where they are. I mean, I'm using it right now looking at bills. I mean, we're using it.

Actually, in some ways, what's her name, Jennifer? In some ways, Jennifer, probably the first times I've ever heard this come out of my mouth, I think maybe the oil and gas industry is maybe even leading the AI adoption compared to other industries because it has so much benefits to us.

The two biggest benefit it has to us is it takes people out of harm's way, and nobody thinks about that. But, you know, the oil and gas industry is totally focused on health of our people and making sure that everybody goes home at night. And so when you can do something with technology like AI, and it means less people.

in harm's way, we do it because it's our culture. The other thing is we're having to become more efficient and AI is allowing us to do that on so many different levels. So I actually think in some ways, The oil and gas energy is probably leading the true business adaptation of AI. So I don't think we're lagging behind on that. We lag behind on almost everything else, but we're not lagging behind on that. And then the other thing is, I talked about this earlier.

We're also getting involved in AI from the other end, from being able to feed it. So what does AI need to live? Electricity. What's a great industry to provide cheap, abundant electricity at scale all over the world? It's us, the oil and gas industry. So I think we're both using it. We're adopting it quicker than I think a lot of other industries. And we're also feeding it and nurturing it because we see the importance.

of it and it's a business opportunity for us yeah absolutely next up we have elizabeth valley hr specialist too at national grid you two are amazing i've been listening for years although i'm not really in the fossil fuel industry

You have great chemistry together and your podcast allows me to stay up to date on the industry that I don't know a lot about. So I really appreciate how you break everything down and make it simple to understand. Here's my question. What do you think about the future of the use of the natural?

gas in New York State because of the ban that's going to start at the end of the year. So I guess I'm going to kind of start off with what that ban is. Yeah, what is that ban? Earlier this year, the Senate of New York introduced Bill S-4-1. five, eight, And the scope of that is the law prohibits the installation of fossil fuel equipment and building systems, including those used for heating, cooking, and hot water in new construction. Now, this is a ban from the end of this year.

through 2028. But there are exemptions marked. This is kind of crazy. Certain buildings and uses are exempt from the ban, including emergency backup. Power systems, manufactured homes, manufacturing facilities, commercial food establishments, laboratories. Car washes, laundromats, hospitals and other medical facilities, critical infrastructure, e.g. wastewater treatment facilities, agricultural buildings, fuel cell systems, and crematoriums. Damn. So, Elizabeth.

Now that Paige read the exceptions, To me, it's obviously this is just a political sham. Yeah. So New York saying we don't want any more natural gas used in new buildings that we're building, except for the stuff that makes sure that me and my people and my pets are safe. It's utterly ridiculous. So what I think is going to happen.

Probably it's going to get overturned. If it doesn't get overturned and it's actually implemented, it's going to be interesting to see what the enforcement looks like. And if it's enforced, it's just going to add the cost of everything. Can you imagine going to a Chinese restaurant that can't use natural gas?

going to be implementing this at the end of the year oh they are yeah in fact the policy is part of the state's 2024 fiscal year budget that's designed to advance new york's climate goals under the climate leadership and community protection act

Yeah, so Jessica, basically, now that it can't be overturned or it won't be overturned, it's just this guy had cost everything you do in New York City. It's not going to be good for the people. It's not going to be good for the businesses. The only thing it's to be good for is the companies that generate electricity. And this is all new construction.

This is not pertaining to anything that's already existing. Yeah. So basically, New York State is forcing a monopoly and giving all the money to the electrical generation companies, not to the companies that would use natural gas to cook and heat your home and heat water. They're basically forcing a monopoly.

I just can't see how this is good for anybody or anything. Welcome to East California. And as far as impact to the environment, there's no negative impact to the environment for natural gas. There is, if you want to get technical out, there is, but the negative impact of natural gas to the environment is far less. then...

Things as simple as driving your car down the street. And all those impacts can be mitigated. We're really good at that. So this is ridiculous. Yeah. What'd you say? Welcome to East California. Yeah. So Elizabeth, not good stuff. It's just a scam. Yeah. Oh, well. But you know what's not a scam? AI. We just talked about that with one of the questions earlier. And if you need help with your AI or project, just reach out to Cognite. Make your life simple.

out to them, tell them that we sent you, you'll be dealing with the experts. They're not going to try to sell you anything. They've done this longer than anybody else. And they've done it in the real world, in the field. Actually, one of the things we have coming up that

nobody even at Cognite knows about is we're actually about to take them to a trip to the Permian. And we're doing that on purpose to actually raise some money for one of our favorite charities here in Houston. But that just shows you, I mean, how many technology... sales teams wants to join OGGN out in the middle of West Texas when it's 100 degrees. I mean, that just sounds like so much fun.

Yeah, make fun of it. You'll be with us. You'll have to get your FRs and steel tools out too. So yeah, if you're looking at AI, if you're thinking about AI, talk to the company that knows oil and gas. It is Cognite. Links in the show notes.

Now it's time for our audience's favorite part. And really, I know it's not our audience's favorite part. Some people like it. It's my favorite part. I find it interesting. Yeah. So it's time for what? This Week in Petroleum History. Let's see. June 4th, 1896, Henry Ford drives what he called his quad cycle. What's a quad cycle? Well, Henry Ford, before he founded Ford Motor Company,

was working for Edison Illumination Company, and he was an engineer. And in his spare time, he decided to build something on four bicycle tires that had an internal combustion engine and a steering wheel. But the four wheels, since he didn't have a lot of money, came from where? Bicycles. So the first car ever manufactured was by Henry Ford with internal combustion. That was mass produced, later became the Model T. But originally it's called the quad cycle because it sat on four bicycle tires.

June 4th, 1921, first seismograph tested. A team of Earth scientists tested an experimental seismic device on a farm three miles of Oklahoma City and figured out they could see what was under the surface like... reservoirs of oil and gas. But they also figured out they could see things like aquifers. So this is Professor John C. Karsh and W.P. Hanson, the team from University of Oklahoma, founded the seismic industry in 1921. Then 1932, first federal gasoline tax.

First time ever, the federal government added a tax of one cent per gallon to U.S. gasoline. And people complained because it raised the price of gasoline a penny per gallon. They thought that was preposterous. Then, and I know this story. I think I learned about this in the Marine Corps. june 6 1944 english channel pipeline fueled world war ii victory basically when the d-day invasion happened and we had to have

All this Jeeps and tanks and planes and everything else ferried over to England, to the UK, to fight the German invasion and push them out of Europe. All those machines needed fuel. And how could we fuel them? We put a huge... piece of pipe. on this huge reel floated in the ocean and unrolled it like a spool of thread and built a pipeline across Atlantic ocean from the U S to Europe. And we pump fuel for our war machine, which is just crazy. They pulled it off and it worked. Then.

In June 6, 1976, old billionaire J. Paul Getty dies. When he died, he was worth about $6 billion his time, which would be about $32 billion in today's world. He died at 83 years old in London, and he was one of the founders of the oil company.

the Getty Oil Company in Tulsa, Oklahoma. That was This Week in Petroleum History. Everybody's been signing up for stuff, so I'm not going to bore you with all that. Just if you're new listeners, go in the show notes and anything that says sign up, go ahead and do it. Weekly rig count. Where are we? We're at 563 in the United States, 112 in Canada, and 891 internationally. Numbers are about what I expect them to be. Yep.

If you want myself or any experts to come speak, do a keynote, let me know. Happy to share the details. Also, Matt and I from the Only Guys Sales and Marketing Podcast are now doing this little workshop. It's about two hours where we teach sales and marketing teams.

that want to sell to the oil and gas industry, how to use AI in your sales and marketing efforts. And we do way more than that. We're going over the new way to cold call, the new way to build relationships, the way to stay in front of your customers without spending a whole bunch of time, the way...

to market to the industry without spending a whole bunch of money. A lot of stuff that's really useful for sales and marketing teams that are trying to sell to oil and gas. If you're interested in that, reach out to me. Happy to share the details. You ready to get out of here? Yep. Remember, folks, do great work, pay it forward, and we will see you next time.

Thanks for listening to OGGN, the world's largest and most listened to podcast network for the oil and energy industry. If you like this show, leave us a review and then go to OGGN.com to learn about all our other shows. And don't forget to sign up for our weekly. newsletter. This show has been a production of the Oil & Gas Global Network.