207: New Record -- Active Drilling Rigs in North Dakota

Updates

March 26, 2012: in the daily activity report this date, another Kalil well reported, which I had already noted in the post below (#21125).  No IP yet.

Original Post

Sometime ago, I honestly thought 200 rigs were about the limit. Some companies have mentioned they are pulling some rigs out of North Dakota (e.g., OXY USA); others have suspended operations temporarily (CHK).

But the drilling goes on despite challenges.

Some of the challenges:

“We’re still out of water, we’re still out of sewage capacity, we’re short of electricity and there’s no room on the highways for anyone else,” Kalil said.

But the drilling goes on; Bull Butte oil field is a particularly active field, and a pretty good field, also:

• 8048, DRY, Mosbacher Production, W. D. Kalil, 24-156-103; s10/80;
• 18456, 1,334, BEXP, Kalil 25-36 1561-H, Bull Butte,  25-156-103; s12/09; t2/10; AL; cum 90K 1/12
• 19412, 1.425, BEXP, Kalil Farms 14-23 1H, Bull Butte, 14-156-103; s9/10; t5/11; AL; cum 54K 1/12
• 19661, 999, BEXP, shares pad with 19412, Bull Butte, 14-156-103; s10/10; t5/11; AL; cum 56K 1/12
• 21125, conf, BEXP, Kalil 25-46 2H, Bull Butte, 25-156-103; 10,440 bbls in 1/12 (days of production not given); 10,440 bbls in first month of production (1/12) -- unknown number of days
• 21126, 1,574, BEXP, KLT 24-13 1H, Bull Butte, 25-156-103; s8/11; 13K in 1/12 (days of production not given)
• 21626, conf, BEXP, pad 500 feet or so north of terminus of #21126; Bull Butte, 

Even as the county commissioners were a) asking oil companies to slow down; b) complaining that infrastructure could not support additional drilling or additional rigs; and, c) bringing their concerns to the state legislature, the drilling continued, and the rig count increased. Permits/file #'s 21125 and 21126 are most interesting, being drilled during the voiced concerns.

Good news: No mention of the food shortage in Williston at the most recent meeting (at least not reported/quoted), so at least in one respect things seem to be improving. 

As I've noted before: those with wells are among the first to say "slow down"; those waiting for their wells to come in are saying, "go faster."

Five years into this boom and we're still short electricity, sewer, water?

Oh, by the way, I won't be able to find it now, but sometime ago, I noted that in some cases wells were being given less descriptive names (rarely, but notable), and some wells have had original names changed to delete the family name.