The Permian is expected to be the main driver of U.S. production growth in 2022. Supply chain snarls are starting to weigh on Permian production growth. Oilfield service companies are struggling after two years of mothballing equipment fleets. Rising rig counts, record forecast production from the Delaware Basin, and another forecast for record production for the whole Permian from the EIA are just some of the latest news from the star U.S. shale play. And yet this production growth is much slower than it should have been and is likely to remain too slow. What happened? One reason is shareholders. As Bloomberg noted in a recent report on the state of the Permian, public shale drillers have switched their focus after years of putting everything into production growth and are now prioritizing the return of cash to shareholders. And the switch back appears to be unlikely at this point. […]