当油价暴跌时，上游研发项目首当其冲。很多都被放在架子上。很少有被起飞的。

然后是阿帕奇公司发生的事情。

十多年前，这家总部位于休斯敦的独立石油和天然气生产商在重组后成为 APA Corp. 的子公司，是一小群处于自动化钻井技术前沿的运营商之一。

作为第一个采用者，阿帕奇甚至为其位于德克萨斯州的陆上页岩油田开发了一种新建的自动化钻机设计。

2014 年中期，原油价格在 7 个月内暴跌近 60%。100 美元/桶石油的令人兴奋的日子被“供应时间更长”的时代所取代，这使得阿帕奇建造其开创性原型机的雄心勃勃的计划脱轨。

故事可能就这样结束了。

When oil prices tumble, upstream research and development projects are among the first casualties. Many are put on the shelf. Few are ever taken off.

Then there’s what happened at Apache Corp.

More than a decade ago, the Houston-based independent oil and gas producer, which following a restructuring is now a subsidiary of APA Corp., was among a small cadre of operators working at the fore of automated drilling technology.

As a first adopter, Apache had gone so far as to develop a newbuild automated rig design for its onshore shale fields in Texas.

Then in mid-2014, crude prices plummeted nearly 60% over a 7-month period. The heady days of $100/bbl oil were replaced by the era of “lower for longer,” derailing Apache’s ambitious plan to build its pioneering prototype.

That could have been the end of the story.