If you are an oil producer with wells in California and global oil prices have risen to over $100 a barrel in the last week, are you going to drill new wells? It’s a question that touches the lives of hundreds of thousands of Californians who either live near oil wells or receive royalty checks as mineral rights owners. In the Permian basin of New Mexico and west Texas, for example, producers can more quickly and economically ramp up extraction of light crude oil trapped in shale rock. AdvertisementCalifornia oil production has been on the decline since the 1980s, largely because existing oil fields are becoming depleted and there are more economical places to produce. Gavin Newsom signed a bill to streamline permitting for up to 2,000 new oil wells in Kern County, where new permits had been held up in litigation since 2020.

Source: Los Angeles Times March 14, 2026 17:31 UTC