Exxon wildcat well in North Louisiana could be first in the state looking for lithium

• BY LIZ SWAINE | Staff writer  July 29, 2025

When the US Geological Survey dropped its eye-opening results about huge lithium deposits in the Smackover geologic formation in 2024, companies like ExxonMobil, Standard and others had already been acquiring both property and mineral rights.

The USGS survey showed the potential of 5-19 million tons. That amount, said Science Alert, is nine times the expected global need for EVs in 2030.

The Smackover formation extends from Texas to Florida and includes parts of Mississippi, Alabama and a bit of Oklahoma, but to date, the ‘sweet spots’ for commercially viable amounts of lithium have been concentrated in Southwest Arkansas and Northeast Texas.

So far, Louisiana has been mostly absent from the lithium conversation.

That could be changing.

A piece of land in Union Parish near Oakland owned by Exxon and operated by Exxon subsidiary XTO Energy could be the first Louisiana lithium test well.

A permit for the wildcat well was applied for on June 9 and approved on July 17 by the Monroe District Office of Conservation.

There are many details that point to lithium testing, says Shreveport-based mineral consultant Skip Peel. He says Exxon’s last Smackover well permit in that area was ten years ago. It was listed as a ‘dry hole,’ plugged and abandoned.

Union Parish is just over the state line from Arkansas’ tested and verified lithium levels.

The depth of the new well permit is a giveaway, says Peel. “There are other XTO wells and Exxon wells that are in the same vicinity, but they're drilled to 2500 feet. They're drilled to 4000 feet. There's nothing anywhere close to 8750 feet.” That depth is where lithium is being found just to the north, he says.

In earlier news releases on their plans for Southwest Arkansas lithium, ExxonMobil stated that reservoirs for the lithium-rich brine were "about 10,000 feet underground." 

The well is on Exxon fee land, for which Exxon owns both the surface and mineral rights. This could work in Exxon’s favor even if the concentrations of lithium in this part of the Smackover are lower.

“If North Louisiana has even 250, 300 parts per million, which would be fairly low compared to southwest Arkansas and East Texas, what does it do to the economics that Exxon also owns the minerals and doesn't have to lease it from any private individuals and also owns the land. Right now, those situations, as far as I'm aware, do not exist in Southwest Arkansas or East Texas,” said Peel.

Even if it were not fee land, drilling a well would reset the clock for another ten years on Exxon’s mineral servitudes.

There has been no response to calls and emails to Exxon and XTO asking questions about the Union Parish well.

James Anderson works at Stantec and pulled the wildcat well permit on behalf of XTO. He said he assumed Exxon “was looking for oil and gas,”  and that he was only helping with the paperwork.

Peel says more clues will come with time. “If they [Exxon/XTO] drill a big enough hole and they go ahead and case it, that would be a pretty good tell that they found what they were looking for.”

Exxon has not been shy about its intentions, or about its 120,000 acre leasehold in Arkansas and Northeast Texas.

In a 2023 news release announcing their first lithium well in Arkansas the company stated that Mobil Lithium plans "to be a leading supplier for electric vehicles by 2030" with first production in 2027.