Low oil prices renders $1.5T worth of oil and gas production projects uneconomic

Research firm Wood Mackenzie predicts that the $1.5 trillion worth of new oil and gas production projects may not push through as it will be rendered uneconomic with the oil prices still currently under $50 a barrel.

The Financial Times writes that a report published Monday shows that the $.5 trillion global investment, which includes North America's shale companies, is out of money with the persisting low oil prices.

Wood Mackenzie claims that industry operators' capital spending on these new projects to slump to 20 and 30 percent on average due to the oil price decline.

So far, the report calculated a total of $220 billion worth of investment being cut. An additional $20 billion more was cut off a couple of months ago. These investments went down the drain due to the projects being deferred.

According to CNN Money, Wood Mackenzie's James Webb said, "In addition to reduced activities onshore North America, a total of 46 projects has been deferred as a result of the oil prices fall."

Before the oil price crash, there was an average of 40 to 50 new projects being approved globally. Now, there are only six projects expected for 2015, and 10 more in 2016. Producers are suffering from a massive supply glut due to the surge in production by the American shale oil companies.

However, according to Market Watch, there are still plenty of producers that are benefiting from the low costs of oil. Shale-oil production companies in the US are more resilient than others in the industry when it comes to facing low oil prices due to the significant technological developments and other efficiency enhancements among these companies.

Wood Mackenzie predicts that squeezing the supply chain sector's supply chain savings will lead to an average cost drop of 10% to 15%. To efficiently cut cost, the sector must come up with new approaches, suggests Mackenzie. Most of the way these companies approach their projects are already very expensive even when the oil prices were at a hundred dollars per barrel.