As crude prices plummeted last summer, Steve Pruett, chief executive of a small west Texas oilfield developer, idled a drilling rig, opting to pay $21,000 a day to store it rather than dig more wells and risk bigger losses.
Now as oil prices rise again, the third-generation oil man is offering his only rig crew bonuses to drill wells as fast as they can, but says his company, Elevation Resources, will wait until next year to deploy a second rig.
