Three Affiliated Tribes (Fort Berthold Reservation) has contracted with a Texas company to conduct a 3-D seismic survey covering 1,000 square miles of the reservation. The survey will image the Bakken, Three Forks, and other producing oil formations. The survey should begin in 3Q12 and 4Q12.
I'm unfamiliar with the reservation and the role it plays in the Bakken. Do you see it becoming a bigger opportunity or is it to early to tell?
ReplyDeleteJust to let you know you've got it labeled as Acres instead of miles in the title.
Thanks for all the information you post.
Thank you for pointing out my error in the subject heading; I've corrected that. I do that (make mistakes) frequently and it really irritates me; thank you for being kind in pointing out my error.
DeleteI "edited" your comment slightly to suggest there is really only one reservation in North Dakota in the middle of all this. You are correct: there are other reservations in North and South Dakota, and others up and down the energy corridor.
I can only comment on one reservation in North Dakota. Fort Berthold Indian Reservation (FBIR) is in the center of the Bakken activity. It was delayed a bit at the beginning of the boom due to Federal/BLM bureaucratic delays. North Dakota Senator Dorgan was instrumental in getting that red tape cut back in 2010.
The Three Affiliated Tribes on the reservation have been very aggressive in developing their resources.
Most concerning for them right now is that the BLM is about ready to announce new fracking rules which I recently blogged about. The new fracking rules -- completely unnecessary and completely redundant -- will cost oil companies billions of dollars.
My hunch is that if an oil company has an opportunity to drill on non-BLM land or BLM land once these new rules go into play, they will go to non-BLM land. Of the companies I follow, KOG, XTO, and WPX have significant exposure to the FBIR. In fact, I believe almost all of WPX's acreage is inside the reservation.
To the best of my knowledge, most leases in the Bakken are now held by production; if not "most," then certainly the best leases are.