The Patterson 298 natural gas fueled drilling rig drills on land in the Permian Basin that is owned by Apache Corp. in Mentone, Texas, in this file photo. The United States expanded its lead as the world’s largest producer of oil and natural gas last year as output from fracking fields surged, the U.S. Department of Energy reported Tuesday. While hydrocarbon production in Russia and Saudi Arabia remained relatively flat, U.S. output, by the British thermal unit (Btu) measure of energy content, gained about 10 percent to nearly 55 quadrillion Btu last year.SD-Agencies