Sixteen (16) New Permits -- 7-Well Pad - Heart Butte Field -- The Williston Basin, North Dakota, USA

Daily activity report, March 26, 2012 --

Operators: WPX (7), BEXP (3), Marathon (2), Whiting (2), Zenergy, Oasis

Fields: Cottonwood, Alger, Sanish, Heart Butte, Assiniboine, Bailey

All seven WPX wells appear to be on one pad in Heart Butte.

Thirteen (13) wells released from "tight hole" status, including:

• 20509, 1,151, Slawson, Kahuna 1-7-6H, McKenzie
• 21191, 1,094, CLR, Berlain 1-30H, McKenzie
• 21204, 1,071, CLR, Kate 2-19H, Dunn

Of the thirteen wells, five were not completed/fracked, including this one, interestingly enough,

• 21125, DRL, BEXP, Kalil 25-36 2H (previously reported, however, on this blog)

Two wells on DRL status reported an IP, but not particularly remarkable.

An EOG well in Burke County was temporarily abandoned:

• 20728, TA, EOG, Vanville 17-1213H, Burke County

Comment: to the best of my knowledge, if the seven WPX wells are indeed on the same pad, this is the first time I have seen permits for a 7-well pad in North Dakota.

Based on recent NDIC hearing dockets, we should be seeing many more. Multi-well pads will reduce the number of new roads required for pads, among other cost savings.

I have updated the Heart Butte field; see link above. Note section 31, T150N-R91W with QEP's two five-well pads, with a rig on site.

• 21551, conf, QEP, MHA 3-31-25H-150-92,
• 21552, conf, QEP, MHA 2-31-25H-150-92
• 21553, conf, QEP, MHA 4-31-25H-150-92
• 21554, conf, QEP, MHA 1-31-30H-150-91
• 21556, conf, QEP, MHA 3-31-30H-150-91
• 21557, conf, QEP, MHA 1-31-36H-150-92
• 21558, conf, QEP, MHA 3-31-36H-150-92
• 21559, conf, QEP, MHA 5-31-25H-150-92
• 21560, conf, QEP, MHA 7-31-25H-150-92
• 21561, conf, QEP, MHA 1-31-25H-150-92

Also, note the great wells that XTO is reporting in this field.