The Eagle Ford Shale rig count increased by five this week, with our data showing 89 rigs running across our coverage area by midday Friday. This is the highest since December 2015.

This time last year, the monthly rig count was consistently falling, but during the first quarter if 2017, that downward trend has reversed.

In recent Eagle Ford News, Texas saw a spike in new drilling permits for the first quarter, according to data provided by the Texas Railroad Commission.

Read more: New Drilling Permits Spike in Texas

A total of 847 oil and gas rigs were running across the United States this week, an increase of eight over than last week. 163 rigs targeted natural gas (three less than the previous week) and 683 were targeting oil in the U.S. (11 more than the previous week). The remainder were drilling service wells (e.g. disposal wells, injection wells, etc.) 420 of the rigs active in the U.S. were running in Texas.

Baker Hughes reports its own Eagle Ford Rig Count that covers the 14 core counties. The rig count published on EagleFordShale.com includes a 30 county area impacted by Eagle Ford development. A full list of the counties included can be found in the table below.

Eagle Ford Oil & Gas Rigs

Nine rigs in the Eagle Ford region targeted natural gas this week with the commodity trading at $3.23/mmbtu.

80 Eagle Ford rigs were targeting oil with WTI oil prices increasing to $53.18

A total of 85 rigs are drilling horizontal wells, one are drilling directional wells and three are vertical.

Karnes County leads this week with 20 rigs in production. See the full list below in the Eagle Ford Shale Drilling by County below.

Eagle Ford Shale Drilling by County

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What is the Rig Count?

The Eagle Ford Shale Rig Count is an index of the total number of oil & gas drilling rigs running across a 30 county area in South Texas. The South Texas rigs referred to in this article are for ALL drilling reported by Baker Hughes and not solely wells targeting the Eagle Ford formation. All land rigs and onshore rig data shown here are based upon industry estimates provided by the Baker Hughes Rig Count.