The world’s hottest oil field could run out of steam in just a few years if shale drillers can’t overcome the natural constraints of the region’s geology, a new study says. By 2021, oil production could peak in Permian Basin, as rapid drilling and fracking exhaust underground pressure in the most prolific areas of the West Texas play, according to one scenario outlined by energy research firm Wood Mackenzie. In five years, the firm said, oil companies could be drilling wells that pump as much as 30 percent less crude than the ones that kicked off the region’s oil boom. “We’re drilling so many wells and with such tight spacing, should we really expect well No. 5,000 to perform like well No. 5 did?” Robert Clarke, a research director at energy consultancy Wood Mackenzie in Dallas. It’s impossible to predict exactly when drillers will reach the limits of the […]