Billy Helms
Chief Operating Officer at EOG Resources
Thanks, Ezra. Our operating teams continue to deliver strong results. Once again, we exceeded our oil production target, producing slightly more than the high end of our guidance, driven by strong well results. In addition, capital came in below the low end of our guidance as a result of sustainable well cost reductions. We have already exceeded our targeted 5% well cost reduction in the first half of 2021. We now expect that our average well cost will be more than 7% lower than last year. As a reminder, this is in addition to the 15% well cost savings achieved in 2020. We continue to see operational improvements outpace the inflationary pressure in the service sector. Average drilling days are down 11%, and the feet of lateral completed in a single day increased more than 15%. We are utilizing our recently discussed Super-Zipper completions on about 1/3 of our well packages this year and expect that percentage to increase next year. In addition, our sand costs are flat to slightly down year-to-date. We have line of sight to reduce the cost of sand sourcing and processing and expect to start realizing savings in the second half of 2021 and into 2022. Water reuse is another source of significant savings, and we continue to expand reuse infrastructure throughout our development areas.
Finally, we have renegotiated several of the expiring higher-priced contracts for drilling rigs and expect to see additional savings the remainder of this year and next. We also use the strength of our balance sheet to take advantage of opportunities to reduce future costs in several areas. As an example, last summer, we pre-purchased the tubulars needed for our 2021 drilling program when prices were at their lowest point. EOG is not immune to the inflationary pressures we're seeing across our industry. But this forward-looking approach helps EOG mitigate anticipated cost increases. As a reminder, 65% of our well costs are locked in for the year, and the remaining costs we are actively working down through operational efficiencies.
As usual, we have begun to secure services and products ahead of next year's activity, with the goal of keeping well cost at least flat in 2022. But as you can rest assured that with our talented and focused operational teams, our ultimate goal is to always push well cost down each year. The same amount of air freight is being placed on reducing our per unit operating cost, with the results showing up in reduced LOE, driven mainly by lower workover expense, reduced water handling expense and lower maintenance expenses. Savings are also being realized from our new technology being developed internally to optimize our artificial lift. We have several new tools that help us reduce the amount of gas lift volumes required to produce wells without reducing the overall production rate. These optimizing tools not only reduce costs, but also help reduce the amount of compression horsepower needed, which ultimately reduces our greenhouse gas footprint as well. These and other continual improvements are a great testament to our pleased but not satisfied culture.
This quarter, we can also update you on our final ESG performance results from last year. We reduced our greenhouse gas intensity rate 8% in 2020, driven by sustainable reductions to our flaring intensity. Operational performance in the first half of this year indicates promise for future -- further improvements to our emissions performance in 2021, putting us comfortably ahead of pace to meet our 2025 intensity targets for GHG and methane and our goal to eliminate routine flaring. Achieving these targets is the first step on the path towards our ambition of net-zero emissions by 2040. Water infrastructure investments also continue to pay off. Nearly all water used in our Powder River Basin operations last year was sourced from reuse. For company-wide operations in the U.S., water supplied by reuse sources last year increased to 46%, reducing freshwater to less than 1/5 of the total water used. These achievements and other, along with the insight into ongoing efforts to improve future performance will be detailed in our sustainability report to be published in October. We are starting to fill in the pieces on the road map to get to net-zero by 2040.
Here's Ken with the details.