Drilling efficiency is beginning to suffer due to dramatically reduced drilling activity, according to RigData’s RADAR Report. On a new wells drilled per rig basis, productivity has dropped by 9% since November 2014. The culprit may be a disproportionate focus on improved-recovery techniques, including longer laterals, that help mitigate volumes lost to slower drilling campaigns and that generate higher returns on existing projects, contends the RigData News & Analysis (RDNA) team. Writing in the RADAR Report, RDNA expects that production volume per each new well drilled is dramatically improving due to those factors and changes to project selection where primarily the best projects and acreage are getting drilled (i.e., high grading): “We can only surmise that cost-cutting measures are now to the point where decisions to further trim the number of horizontal rigs will need to be measured against efficiency losses that will coincide. Simply put, we are entering the ‘Pay me now or pay me later’ scenario, where some planned cost reductions will not be realized due to the impact these plans will have on future efficiency.”