With all the gloom flying around it can be difficult to find anything encouraging to report, but it's there if you look for it.

For example, with much of the valve industry tied to the oil patch, it's a bit discouraging to see that the Baker Hughes U.S. rig count was 1,941 on Nov. 14, down by 51 rigs (2.5%) from the week before and down 2% from the previous month. Yet it's not all bad. We can take some comfort that it is still 8% above year-ago levels. And API numbers back that up, at least partially. The API 2008 Quarterly Well Completion Report: Third Quarter estimated that 16,379 oil wells, natural gas wells and dry holes were completed in the third quarter of 2008, a 16% increase over last year's third quarter.

Yet on Nov. 6 Oil & Gas Journal reported that Saudi Aramco and ConocoPhillips had agreed to halt bidding for construction of a planned 400,000 bpd export refinery at Yanbu, citing uncertainties in financial and contracting markets.

And T. Boone Pickens has put his wind-farm plans on hold, mostly, he says, because of the price of oil. Pickens's plan called for shifting the use of natural gas to powering vehicles, including heavy-duty trucks, and using renewables to generate electricity, but the low prices of oil and gas have made that less attractive for the moment. He predicts, however, that oil will be back to $100/bbl within a year, and that the setback is only temporary.

And while the price of oil doesn't help the oil producers and those tied to them, it does act as a massive tax reduction for the rest of the economy, which could mitigate some of the worst effects of the downturn.

It's also worth noting that the pace of drilling for gas shale is increasing rapidly. By Sept. 12 Pennsylvania's Department of Environmental Resources had issued 445 permits for drilling the Marcellus gas shale and 277 wells had been drilled, and on Sept. 15 DEP issued 73 more. The Marcellus gas shale formation holds natural gas in quantities estimated at anywhere from 1500 to 500 trillion cubic feet.

One unknowable factor is the effect of possible greater emphasis on environmental protection under the incoming administration. Offshore drilling and other oil activities may or may not be curtailed. There are complaints that the Pennsylvania DEP is impeding exploitation of the Marcellus shale because it can't issue permits quickly enough, but this may be due more to staffing limitations than to ideology.

Also unknown is whether there will a new push for control of fugitive emissions. If there is, it could lead to more retrofit activity.

Another factor to consider: Some companies may want to consider upgrading their control valves. Several people I interviewed for my article on ways to save money during tough times, scheduled for the winter 2009 edition of Valve Magazine, pointed out that plants can improve quality and reduce maintenance expenses by installing digital valve controllers. Data from smart controllers can make it possible to concentrate repair efforts on the valves that really need attention and not tear down ones that are working properly, as well as allowing tighter process control.

What about market forecasts? The cover story of the fall 2008 issue of Valve Magazine contains analysis and predictions from a number of experts; there are also reports available from market research firms. As recently as July 2008 the ARC Advisory Group study "Control Valve Worldwide Outlook" predicted that the worldwide control valve market would increase at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 6% over the next five years, from $4.8 billion in 2007 to more than $6.4 billion in 2012.

An earlier study from Frost & Sullivan entitled "World Industrial Valves and Actuators Markets" and published in May 2008 said that the North American market holds the largest share of the total, at nearly 35%, followed by Asia Pacific at nearly 28%, and Europe at 16.1%.

The accuracy of these predictions will be tested over the next year or so; note that they extend to 2012, by which time we should be well into the next up cycle.