Rig Count Hits 15-Month High, Texas Leads
Plus: Alberta's shale wave, a $50B Louisiana build, and bid windows opening now
🔥 The Big One
US Rig Count Hits 15-Month High as Texas, Oklahoma Add Iron
Drillers added rigs for a fifth straight week, pushing the US count to 588, its highest since April 2025 and up 44 rigs (8%) from a year ago. Oil rigs did the heavy lifting, climbing to 452, with Texas adding two to hit 274 and Oklahoma adding two to reach 50, both multi-month highs. This follows three straight years of rig count declines, so the reversal matters: more rigs now means more completions, workover, and trucking work stacking up behind them through the back half of 2026. If you run crews in the Permian or Anadarko, this is the clearest signal yet that the slowdown is over.
Read the full breakdown →✍️ Editor's Take
Add it up: rig count at a 15-month high, Halliburton locking down a 285-well Aramco program plus Jafurah stimulation work, and Alberta's Basel Belly River licenses at a 14-year peak. That's sustained demand for completions, workover and E&I crews across three continents at once. Layer on Meta's $50B Louisiana data center and Crusoe's 1 GW Texas campus, and the same trades (electrical, mechanical, civil) are getting pulled two directions: oilfield and power buildout. Crews who can flex between the two are going to have their pick of work through Q4.
— FieldNews Staff
This Week in 60 Seconds
- 1 GW AI Data Center Breaks Ground in Childress, TX
Crusoe and Lancium start construction Q3 on a 270-acre campus with thousands of jobs on tap.
- Alberta Shale Play Wakes Up After Years Dormant
Drilling licenses in the Basel Belly River hit a 14-year high as two operators frac for oil near Willesden Green.
- OSHA Hits Texas Contractor With $299K in Fines
A worker died in a school crawl space on a modified mini-excavator; two firms now face big penalties.
- DOL's $162M Apprenticeship Fund Pays for Retention
Sponsors only get paid after apprentices actually stick around, not just when they sign up.
- Energy Services Jobs Dip in June After 3-Month Run
US and Texas energy services employment slipped in June, though the workforce held steady overall.
📍 Where the Work Is
- Texas 🔥 HOT — Rig count hit 274, its highest since April 2025, while Crusoe and Lancium break ground on a 1 GW data center in Childress this Q3.
- Alberta 🔥 HOT — Drilling licenses hit a 14-year high in the Basel Belly River shale while Alberta pushes both an east-west pipeline and a West Coast oil sands line.
- North Dakota / Bakken — BLM's biggest federal lease sale in 15 years put 27,290 acres under lease, but a rollback to a 12.5% royalty rate is stirring a revenue fight.
- Louisiana Gulf Coast 🔥 HOT — Commonwealth LNG's $13B build, Meta's $50B data center, and Delfin's second floating LNG vessel are stacking up major work in the corridor.
- Saudi Arabia — Halliburton locked down two multi-year Aramco contracts, a 285-well onshore program and Jafurah gas stimulation work.
🟢 Open Windows
Bids, packages, and decisions with a clock on them.
Starts September 2026
Irving Oil Saint John Refinery Turnaround — Two-month turnaround in Saint John, NB; mechanical, piping and E&I contractors should watch for bid packages.Early registration ends Jul 31
RAM Blasting & Explosives Safety Training — Sept 15-17 course in Crazy Horse, SD; blasting crews needing certification should register before the discount ends.Deadline Sept 30
IIJA Highway and Bridge Funding — $1.2T infrastructure law expires; highway and bridge subs should lock bids in before authorized funds dry up.Bids open ahead of 2030 in-service
Florida Energy Pathway Pipeline — Chesapeake's $1.2B Palm Beach-to-Miami gas line opens early work for engineering, right-of-way and pipefitting crews.
👷 Crew Market: US energy services jobs dipped to 627,259 in June from 633,115 in May, with Texas falling to 305,653 from 308,519, a pullback after three straight months of gains.
📈 The Number
$50B
Meta's Richland Parish, Louisiana data center build is expected to support 7,500 peak construction jobs, with Turner, Mortenson and DPR running the buildout. That's the kind of number that turns a regional labor market overnight.
Meta, via reporting on the Richland Parish project
On Your Radar
- Jul 27Gordie Howe Bridge opens — Second Detroit-Windsor commercial crossing goes live
- Jul 31RAM Blasting Safety Course discount deadline — Early registration savings end for the Sept course
- Aug 13NRC Commission hearing on TVA's BWRX-300 — Final vote on Clinch River SMR construction permit
- Sept 21Michigan concrete rule enforcement begins — MIOSHA Standard 25 updates take effect
- Sept 30IIJA funding cliff — $1.2T infrastructure law authorization expires
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