A recent report on oil and gas production in the San Juan Basin in northwest New Mexico projects mixed futures for the fossil fuel industry over the coming 30 years. The report, commissioned by the Bureau of Land Management’s field office in Farmington, also says that up to 1,200 new oil and gas wells could be drilled in the region over that time frame. The report’s production numbers are a far cry from recent peaks, and well below the expectations of earlier reports for the region.
The Bureau released the “Reasonably Foreseeable Development Scenario” in mid-July for New Mexico’s second, smaller oil and gas basin. (The Permian Basin, in the opposite, southeast corner of the state, is both New Mexico’s and the nation’s largest.) The base outlook for the two fuels differ, with natural gas production continuing its current, years-long decline, while oil production rises slightly over the next 20 years before tanking.
