From Tehran to the Permian

Scott Sheffield's steadfast determination drove one of the most consequential business careers in modern American energy.

Growing up in Tehran when Westerners walked the streets freely, he would watch later as the country that had shaped his worldview was lost to revolution. The lesson stayed with him: a nation at the mercy of others for its energy is a nation exposed.

Sheffield would go on to build a scrappy West Texas independent—Parker & Parsley, later Pioneer Natural Resources—into one of the largest oil and gas producers in the United States, surviving the brutal busts of the 1980s and 2008 and forging a company culture that kept people, and loyalty, when rivals shed both.

Then came the bet that changed everything. Geologists had written off the Permian Basin as finished, but Sheffield had a hunch they were wrong. His decision to drill the Permian's shale would help turn the United States from the world's largest oil importer into its largest producer, reshaping global politics, lowering costs for American families, and rewriting what energy independence could mean.

But the story doesn't end in triumph. When ExxonMobil moved to acquire Pioneer, Sheffield's own government branded him the villain—accusing him of scheming to collude with OPEC and barring him from Exxon's board. What followed was a two-year fight to reclaim his name against the unchecked power of a federal agency, and a hard-won vindication that came only after the damage was done.

Equal parts memoir, business case study, and warning, this is a firsthand account of the shale revolution from the man who helped lead it—and a clear-eyed reckoning of what it costs to build something lasting—and what it takes to defend it.

With an afterword by Bryan Sheffield.