Great article and graphic in Monday’s Investor’s Business Daily about the country’s shale plays and how Texas is becoming a top oil producing region.

Oil coaxed from the rapidly developing Eagle Ford and Permian Basin production areas recently lifted the state’s output back above 3 million barrels per day (bpd) for the first time in more than three decades. That put the Lone Star state at more than a third of total U.S. oil production, vs. about 12% for No. 2 North Dakota. Texas is on track to outpace Iraq, which, at 3.2 million bpd in April, is the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries’ second-largest producer, behind Saudi Arabia.

(click here if chart is not observable)