en.Wedoany.com Reported - Chevron said on Wednesday it will allow rival oil producers to purchase a chemical surfactant technology it developed to boost shale well output, part of a broader effort by the U.S. shale industry to address declining well production and expand oil output.

Chevron will license the technology to chemical manufacturer ZL Chemicals, which will be responsible for selling it to other oil companies. Chevron said the chemical surfactant can increase first-year output from new wells by up to 20% and reduce the decline rate of existing wells by 5% to 8%. Ryder Booth, Chevron's chief technology and engineering officer, said that in a global environment constrained by energy supply, oil and gas companies are being asked to deliver more energy to the market, and opening up the technology is a way to help boost production in response to that call. U.S. President Donald Trump has also recently urged oil companies, including Chevron and ExxonMobil, to increase output to help lower gasoline prices during the war between the U.S. and Israel against Iran.

The chemical surfactant acts like soap, cleaning particles stuck in shale fractures that block oil flow, helping separate oil from rock and thus improving recovery. Industry experts note that current shale oil recovery rates are only 10%, with the remaining 90% of oil left underground due to technical limitations. Bob Fryklund, chief upstream strategist at S&P Global Energy, believes that despite the gradual reduction of optimal drilling areas, technological advances continue to allow the industry to outperform expectations.

In addition to operating its own wells, Chevron also holds interests in some wells in the Permian Basin operated by other companies. By licensing its previously proprietary chemical technology to third parties, the company can benefit from production growth across the most productive oil field in the U.S. Booth also revealed that Chevron will begin testing a new version of the chemical technology in the third quarter.