Oil prospecting has a failure rate greater than 55 percent.

Judge as of 2014-01-14. The claim is that oil prospecting (exploratory drilling) fails more than 55% of the time. True: industry or government data from around 2014 (for example EIA dry-hole statistics or industry exploration success rates) show exploration failure rates above 55%. Mostly true: failure rates are roughly at that level (about 50–55%), or above 55% only for wildcat or exploratory wells, which is consistent with 'prospecting'. Mostly false: failure rates are well below 55% (about 35–50%), or the figure applies only to an unrepresentative subset. False: failure rates are clearly below about 35%.

Set before the research began.

1. E1 Independent Statistics and Analysis U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) · 27 September 2012

   “| 2010 | R 16,254 | R 16,973 | R 4,277 | R 37,504 | R 88.6 |”

2. E2 Independent Statistics and Analysis U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) · 27 September 2012

   “Data are for exploratory and development wells combined; see Table 4.6 for exploratory wells only, and Table 4.7 for development wells only.”

3. E3 Independent Statistics and Analysis U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) · 27 September 2012

   “| 1949 | 21,352 | 3,363 | 12,597 | 37,312 | 66.2 |”

4. E4 Table 4.6 Crude Oil and Natural Gas Exploratory Wells, 1949-2010 U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

   “| 2010 | R 668 | R 1,044 | R 1,093 | R 2,805 | R 61.0 | R 6,099 | R 9,226 | R 6,192 | R 21,517 | R 9,130 | R 8,837 | R 5,665 | R 7,671 |”

5. E5 Table 4.6 Crude Oil and Natural Gas Exploratory Wells, 1949-2010 U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

   “| 2000 | 288 | 657 | 1,341 | 2,286 | 41.3 | 2,103 | R 4,798 | R 9,147 | R 16,048 | 7,302 | R 7,303 | R 6,821 | R 7,020 |”

6. E6 Table 4.6 Crude Oil and Natural Gas Exploratory Wells, 1949-2010 U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

   “Data are for exploratory wells only; see Table 4.5 for exploratory and development wells combined, and Table 4.7 for development wells only.”

7. E7 Time to Invest or to Panic? - GeoExpro GeoExpro · 6 December 2015

   “The commercial success rate of exploration wells dropped from 40% in 2009 to only 30% in 2014 with discovered volumes at a 7-year low.”

E7, an independent industry source, reports that the commercial success rate of exploration wells fell from 40% in 2009 to 30% in 2014. That means 60–70% of exploration wells did not succeed commercially around the time of the claim, which is above 55%. The EIA exploratory-well rows (E4, E5) are unlabelled in the quotes, so they can't settle the claim under the rules. Because those rows are unlabelled, it is not clear whether they show success or failure rates, so they neither confirm nor contradict the claim. Because the labelled evidence supports a failure rate above 55% only for commercial success, the verdict is mostly true rather than fully true.