Monday, April 11, 2016

A Graphic Of The Area Where CLR Wants To Drill 25 Wells On An Existing 2560-Acre Spacing Unit In The Elm Tree-Bakken Oil Field -- April 11, 2016

Updates

June 8, 2018: this 2560-acre drilling unit is being updated

October 29, 2016: a new screenshot of this area has been placed at this post.

Original Post 
In the April hearing dockets, case #25003 (note: this is a case number, not a permit number):
  • 25003, CLR, Elm Tree-Bakken, 25 wells on an existing 2560-acre unit, sections 14/23/26/35-153-94, McKenzie:
This is the screenshot of the area of the 4-section (2560-acre unit) stand-up drilling unit (depicted in part by the thick purple north/south arrow) -- shown are parts of section 23 and 26. Section 14 is to the far north, and section 35 is to the south.  If the wells shown are all spaced for 1280-acres, then the 25 wells "on the existing 2560-acre unit" would be in addition to the wells already sited here.




Hearing Docket Agenda For April 27 - 28, 2016 -- IN PROGRESS

Earlier it was reported: April 11 - 14, 2016: There is one case. The case will be heard on four successive days in each of four cities in North Dakota: Williston, Dickinson, Minot, and Bismarck. The case, number 24957, is on a motion of the Commission to consider adopting new rules and amendments to the "General Rules and Regulations for the Conservation of Crude Oil and Natural Gas" codified as Article 43-02 North Dakota Administrative Code.

I do not know the outcome of that hearing. I assume there will be an update available if not already available somewhere.

In addition to that agenda item, the NDIC will hear the following new cases (as well as "continued" cases which I do not repeat) later in the month:

Wednesday, April 27, 2016

24958, Lime Rock Resources, Alger and/or Stanley-Bakken, amend, i) 7 wells on a 1280-acre unit; ii) establish a 2560-acre unit; 2 wells, Mountrail County
24959, Oasis, Banks and/or Elidah-Bakken, i) establish two 1280-acre units, 15 wells on each unit; ii) establish an overlapping 2560-acre unit, 3 wells; McKenzie
24960, NP Resources, Roosevelt-Bakken, i) include section 33-142-102 in the field; ii) terminate the existing 1280-acre unit (sections 21/28-143-102); iii) establish four 1280-acre units with 4 wells in each unit; iv) create one 2560-acre unit, 7 wells, Billings
24961, SM Energy, pooling,
24962, SM Energy, pooling,
24963, SM Energy, pooling,
24964, Hess, Alkali Creek-Bakken, 2 wells on an overlapping 2560-acre unit, Mountrail
24965, Hess, commingling,
24966, Hess, commingling,
24967, Hess, commingling,
24968, Oasis, SWD,
24969, Oasis, pooling,
24970, Oasis, pooling,
24971, Oasis, pooling,
24972, Oasis, pooling,
24973, Oasis, pooling,
24974, QEP, pooling,
24975, QEP, pooling,
24976, QEP, pooling,

Thursday, April 28, 2016

24977, Hunt, et al, Alexandria-Bakken, redefine field limits, Divide County
24978, Hunt, et al, Sioux Trail-Bakken, redefine field limits, Divide County
24979, NDIC, North Souris-Spearfish, appropriate spacing for wells in a laydown 320-acre unit, Bottineau County
24980, NDIC, Kittleson Slough-Bakken, appropriate spacing for wells completed in a standup 2560-acre unit, Mountrail
24981, EOG, Stanley and/or Parshall-Bakken, to establish the following: i) an overlapping 1280 acre unit; ii) three overlapping 1920-acre units; iii) four overlapping 2560-acre units; multiples on each unit; Moutrail County
24982, EOG, Squaw Creek-Bakken, i) amend Order # 24853 to terminate an overlapping 1280-acre unit; ii) create a 640-acre unit; iii) multiple wells on the 640-acre unit; McKenzie
24983, Liberty Resources, McGregor-Bakken, i) establish a 640-acre unit, 7 wells; ii) create an overlapping 1280-acre unit, one well; Williams County
24984, Triangle US Petroleum, Williston-Bakken, amend Zone V of Ordern # 26344, extend the time period for drilling and completing three wells in a 2560-acre unit; Williams
24985, CLR, Elm Tree-Bakken and/or Antelope-Sanish, create an overlapping 2560-acre unit, 2 wells; McKenzie,
24986, Slawson, Big Bend-Bakken, reduce setbacks; Mountrail
24987, Basin Shale, recomplete Duncan Federal 30-24 (#6959) into the Scairt Woman-Madison, McKenzie
24988, ETO, location of a boiler,
24989, XTO, pooling,
24990, XTO, pooling,
24991, XTO, pooling,
24992, XTO, pooling,
24993, XTO, risk penalty legalese,
24994, XTO, risk penalty legalese,
24995, XTO, risk penalty legalese,
24996, PetroShale (US), pooling,
24997, PetroShale (US), pooling,
24998, Zavanna, pooling,
24999, Zavanna, pooling,
25000, Zavanna, pooling,
25001, Zavanna, pooling,
25002, CLR, pooling,
25003, CLR, Elm Tree-Bakken, 25 wells on an existing 2560-acre unit, sections 14/23/26/35-153-94, McKenzie; see this post;
25004, CLR, Antelope-Sanish, 12 wells on an existing 1280-acre unit, sections 1/12-152-94, McKenzie
25005, Sinclair, Little Knife-Bakken, 7 wells on each of two existing 1280-acre units, Dunn County
25006, Sinclair, risk penalty legalese,
25007, Liberty Resources, pooling,
25008, White Butte, flaring,
25009, White Butte, flaring,
25010, White Butte, flaring,
25011, Resonance, SWD,
25012, Hanna SWD, SWD,
25013, Tobacco Garden SWD, SWD,

Huge Day In The Bakken Today: WPX Reports Six (6) High-IP Wells; Statoil Reports A Great Well; BR Will Report Two Nice Wells Tuesday; Hess Will Report A Huge Well Wednesday -- April 11, 2016

Note: one swallow does not a spring make. I don't do statistical analyses, but I'm starting to notice an interesting trend. It is subtle and I may be seeing something that does not exist. But today's daily activity report is a good example. Note:
  • five new permits (albeit, from one operator, and on one pad)
  • a lot of DUCs were completed
  • 100% of the wells coming off the confidential list tomorrow were completed; they did not become DUCs
Make of this what you will, but just saying.

Active rigs:


4/11/201604/11/201504/11/201404/11/201304/11/2012
Active Rigs3193190187208

Five (5) new permits:
  • Operators: EOG
  • Field: Clarks Creek (McKenzie)
  • Comments: see graphic below.
Everything in this graphic in red was posted on August 12, 2015. The five new EOG Riverview permits have been added to the graphic and are in purple. I track the EOG Riverview wells in Clarks Creek here (but have not updated them in awhile):

Eleven (11) permits were renewed:
  • CLR (3), three Thorvald permits, all in Dunn County
  • Thunderbird Resource (3), three Watson B permits in McKenzie County
  • Resource Energy Can-Am, a Gary permit and an Arnett permit, both in Divide County
  • Whiting (2), a Kaden TTT permit and a Westin TTT permit, both in Mountrail County
  • HRC, a Fort Berthold permit in McKenzie County
Slawson canceled three permits; two Sniper Federal permits in Mountrail County and one Mauser Federal permit in McKenzie County

Fourteen (14) producing wells completed:
  • 25856, 3,645, Statoil, Skarston 1-12 7H, Banks, t3/16; cum --
  • 29445, 2,441, WPX, Emma Owner 23-14HB, Spotted Horn, t3/16; cum --
  • 29446, 1,871, WPX, Emma Owner 23-14HX, Spotted Horn, t3/16; cum --
  • 29447, 1,690, WPX, Emma Owner 23-14HC, Spotted Horn, t3/16; cum --
  • 29448, 1,986, WPX, Emma Owner 23-14HD, Spotted Horn, t3/16; cum --
  • 29449, 2,049, WPX, Emma Owner 23-14HW, Spotted Horn, t3/6; cum --
  • 30193, 687, XTO, Evelyn 31X-3C, Lindahl, t3/16; cum --
  • 30664, 603, XTO, Smouse 31X-28D, West Capa, t3/16; cum --
  • 30666, 2,553, WPX, Emma Owner 23-14HA, Spotted Horn, 4 sections, t3/16; cum --
  • 31158, 1,097, Whiting, Obrigewitch 11-29PHU, Bell, 4 sections, t2/16; cum 6K 2/16;
  • 31159, n/d, Whiting, Obrigewitch 24-20PH, Bell, no test date,
  • 31160, 584, Whiting, Obrigewitch 44-19PHU, Bell, 4 sections, t3/16; cum --
  • 31220, n/d, XTO, FBIR Reese 43X-33G, Heart Butte, ICO, t3/16; cum --
  • 31221, n/d, XTO, FBIR Reese 43X-33D, Heart Butte, ICO, t3/16; cum --
Wells coming off the confidential list Tuesday:
  • 31179, 2,2124, BR, CCU Atlantic Express 13-19 TFH, Corral Creek, 46 stages, 8 million lbs, t2/16; cum 15K after 27 days;
  • 31180, 3,287, BR, CCU Atlantic Express 23-19 MBH, Corral Creek, 45 stages, 5.1 million lbs, t2/16; cum 13K after 24 days;
  • 32029, 1,258, Hess, EN-Pederson-LW-154-94-0408H-5, Alkali Creek, 4 sections, Three Forks, 50 stages, 3.5 million lbs,  2/16; cum 33K after 25 days;
*************************************

32029, see above, Hess, EN-Pederson-LW-154-94-0408H-5, Alkali Creek:

DateOil RunsMCF Sold
2-20163239348308

31180, see above, BR, CCU Atlantic Express 23-19 MBH, Corral Creek:

DateOil RunsMCF Sold
2-2016126780

31179, see above, BR, CCU Atlantic Express 13-19 TFH, Corral Creek:

DateOil RunsMCF Sold
2-2016148130

And The Problem Is? -- April 11, 2016

Updates

April 12, 2016: along with the article linked below, there was a link to United Van Lines 39th Annual Moves Survey. In addition to the story, there is a great interactive map. When you get there be sure to click on the "video" at the bottom of the map to see the change in moves since 1978, on an annual basis. I think the results for North Dakota will surprise you. [The little grey arrow to click on is at the far right; it bleeds into the sidebar at the right.]
 



Original Post
CNBC is reporting:
Can you move 1,200 miles just to lower your taxes? Well, David Tepper can, and it may save him hundreds of millions of dollars.
Tepper is the founder of hedge fund Appaloosa Management, and he’s worth more than $10 billion, according to Forbes. He ran his firm out of New Jersey for years, but recently moved the operation to Miami Beach. The top income tax rate in New Jersey is nearly 9%. In Florida, the top rate is 0. Tepper will save so much money that New Jersey finance officials worry that the tax revenue lost to his move could blow a hole in the state budget.
Connecticut lost a couple of billionaires as well—businessmen Thomas Peterffy and C. Dean Metropoulos, who also decamped for Florida recently. Their departure lowered Connecticut’s billionaire count from 15 to 13.
The Nutmeg State is also losing longtime corporate citizen General Electric to Boston, a move GE made after Connecticut passed big tax hikes. Florida Gov. Rick Scott even invited Yale University to ditch New Haven and relocate to the Sunshine State, to avoid a new tax some Connecticut lawmakers wanted to impose on the school’s endowment. That bill failed to pass, and Yale says it is staying put (for now).
And the problem is?

The bigger story is that it appears the writer of this story, Robert Frank -- no doubt a business writer -- after all, he titles his column "Inside Wealth" -- seems to have just discovered that a) some states do not have income taxes; and, b) some folks like to take advantage of that.

When I read that only "wealthy" folks can take advantage of that, I cry "foul." There are no restrictions or laws that preclude anyone from moving to a state that has no income tax. Or one can move to a state where income taxes are lower. To the best of my knowledge, one can find work in almost any state if one tries hard enough. At least that's the story line from various state governments and the federal government and Reuters and Bloomberg every week when the jobs data comes out.

Google "unemployment Texas" and note that the unemployment rate in Texas approaches 4% -- full employment -- and that there are many, many stories on the number of jobs being added each month. Florida, at 5.6%, is almost as good. In both states, the unemployment rate has been dropping like a Boeing 747 with all engines shut off.

So, we had Robert Frank to our list of nominees for the 2016 Geico Rock Award.

And, I guess to be fair, we have to add Rick Newman, also, who reported the same story, almost word-for-word. As usual, the comments are more entertaining than the article.

EIA's Monthly Drilling Report -- The Bakken Continues To Shine -- April, 2016

EIA's monthly drilling report has just been posted at this link: http://www.eia.gov/petroleum/drilling/pdf/dpr-full.pdf. At this link, one can find links to sub-reports. The graphs are based on actual data through March, 2016, with projections through May, 2016.

There are several interesting story lines:
  • there really are only five significant on-shore oil and gas plays in the US
  • productivity per rig continues to increase
  • per rig, the Bakken beats the Permian on both natural gas and (by a huge margin) oil
  • per rig, the Eagle Ford for natural gas easily outproduces the Permian or the Bakken; in fact, although the Eagle Ford pales in comparison to the Utica and the Marcellus, at least the Eagle Ford is in the "same ball park" when it come to natural gas (I believe the Eagle Ford has some areas that are primarily oil; other areas primarily natural gas)
  • "legacy oil" from the Eagle Ford has plummeted; the Bakken has shown the most resilience of the three major oil plays (Bakken, Eagle Ford, Permian)
  • in natural gas, the Bakken is the most resilient of all five plays (oil and/or natural gas)


Saudi Arabia Taking Steps To Slow Iran's Oil Exports; Tesla Recalling Its Model X SUVs -- Unsafe At Any Speed -- April 11, 2016

Financial Times is reporting:
Saudi Arabia has taken steps to slow Iran’s efforts at increasing oil exports, banning vessels that transport Iranian crude from entering their waters, according to traders and shipbrokers. 
Iran already faces insurance, financing and legal obstacles despite the lifting of sanctions linked to its oil industry in January.
The Wall Street Journal is reporting:
Tesla Motors Inc. is recalling 2,700 Model X sport-utility vehicles to repair the third-row seats, which could fold forward and become unlatched in an accident.
Tesla found the problem in its internal testing before the start of delivery of vehicles to Europe, and it has had no reports in the public or in accidents.
The recall comes at a crucial time for Tesla as it tries to ramp up production of the vehicle. Tesla has said production of the SUV had reached 750 vehicles a week at the end of March, after struggling with parts supply shortages earlier in the year. 
As a reminder, Tesla's other model, the Model S, was recognized as the best car of 2015, by Consumer Reports.

Meanwhile, Tesla is ramping up production to meet overwhelming demand for Model 3:
The enormous interest in a car that won’t ship for at least 18 months, however, presents a difficult challenge for the Palo Alto, CA, auto maker. Mr. Musk has just 20 months to ramp up production amid continuing quarterly losses and hefty cash outflows. 
Mr. Musk [recently] tweeted that deposits for 180,000 of the vehicles had been amassed in 24 hours since its release. He said the Model 3 generated a $7.5 billion backlog in a day, calculating the average selling price at $42,000.
Yahoo!Finance says Tesla will reports 1Q16 earnings on May 4, 2016; analysts' consensus is a 59 cent/share loss.
********************************
The Politics Page

Reading the tea leaves after this week-end's political news suggests that the establishment has trumped Trump. Events this past weekend suggest that the establishment has pretty much endsed Trump's hope for the GOP nomination. 
According to Yahoo!Finance, Tesla has
  • $1 billion in cash,
  • trailing twelve months, has a negative cash flow of one-half billion dollars; and,
  • a debt of $3 billion 
The temporary link at the top of the sidebar at the right will be removed soon. I first have to clear that with the editorial board.

Thank Goodness This Wasn't Bakken Crude Oil -- April 11, 2016

Breaking news: BNSF says human error is cause of November's Alma, WI, train derailment that sent more than 20,000 gallons of ethanol into the Mississippi River.

***********************
Geico Rock Award Nomination

I'm not sure who this award should go to: Newsweek or Trevor Phillips. Trevor Phillips is the obvious choice, but the fact that Newsweek, a mainstream, albeit liberal, news magazine chose to publish the story, suggests they, too, were under the rock. The rules of nomination for the Geico Rock Award mandates that the nomination go to Newsweek. This is a news article, not an op-ed:
The former head of Britain’s Equalities and Human Rights Commission (EHRC), Trevor Phillips, has admitted he “got almost everything wrong” regarding immigration in a new report, claiming Muslims are creating “nations within nations” in the West.
Phillips says followers of Islam hold very different values from the rest of society and many want to lead separate lives.
The former head of the U.K.’s equalities watchdog also advocates the monitoring of ethnic minority populations on housing estates to stop them becoming “ghetto villages.”
***************************
Notes to the Granddaughters
Tolkien: Beowulf and The Lord Of The Rings

I'm back in my Beowulf and Lord of the Rings phase. I am reading Tolkien's translation of Beowulf along with commentary and analysis of the translation by his son Christoper. I am also reading the translation by Seamus Heaney. I've read Beowulf before but this time I've become more serious about it and much more receptive. That, of course, led me to The Lord of the Rings. Before reading that novel again, or at least parts of it, I'm re-reading JRR Tolkien: Author of the Century by Tom Shippey.

In the latter, Shippey has a chapter on the concepts of evil, which is quite fascinating read in light of 20th century and 21st century global politics. Shippey spends several pages on explaining Ringwraiths which Shippey considers one of Tolkien's "more individual and more original concepts." He discusses how ordinary men and women, on their way to power ("All power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely"), turn into "Ringwraiths. Shippey writes,
However, the best example of 'wraithing" in The Lord of the Rings must be Saruman.
Saruman's goals are knowledge (no one can object to that); organization in the service of knowledge (there are certainly many researchers, and far more administrators, who see this as desirable); but finally control
In the pursuit of control Saruman is prepared to co-operate with forces he knows perfectly well are evil, but which he thinks he can use for his own much more admirable purposes, and later suppress or discard.
The failure of beliefs like this is all too familiar from war after war, and alliance after alliance, during the past century.
One can easily substitute Barack Obama for Saruman, even more so Hillary.

Agree Completely On Man-Camps -- April 11, 2016; Seeing Things That Aren't There -- Or Making Mountains Out Of Molehills

Updates

April 12, 2016: see stories below regarding ObamaCare. The Boston Globe, today, has an op-ed on this very issue, validating what I said below. 
 
Original Post
From The Williston Herald:
Nearly six years ago, as Williston strained to accommodate a flood of workers descending on the area in the hopes of finding work in the oil patch, city officials voted to allow crew camps as a solution to meet immediate needs. But, from the beginning, company-run housing was not meant to be permanent.
“I think that has gotten lost a little bit in the story,” said Ward Koeser, who served as Williston’s mayor for 20 years, and was in office when ordinances allowing man camps, followed by ordinances setting expiration dates for them, were enacted.
“I think we somehow forgot down the line that man camps were always temporary,” he said.
Gasoline demand, from John Kemp: is US gasoline consumption being overstated? Or making a mountain out of a molehill.
The EIA's weekly and monthly surveys both showed domestic gasoline consumption was subdued in January, most likely because of bad weather affecting large parts of the country at the beginning and end of the month.
But consumption reportedly rebounded to record seasonal rates in weekly surveys for February and March leading some analysts to question whether the EIA is under-estimating exports.
This is certainly possible. The EIA's estimating procedure has a backward-looking component so it can miss sudden changes in the rate of exports and only responds with a lag.
The question is how large these errors in estimating exports tend to be and how much of an error they impart to estimates of domestic consumption.
U.S. gasoline exports are very small in relation to domestic consumption so even relatively large errors in estimating exports have only a small impact on consumption estimates. 
In 2015, the country exported an average of 475,000 barrels per day (bpd) of finished gasoline and another 150,000 bpd of blending components compared with domestic consumption of nearly 9.2 million bpd.
******************************
Others Will Follow

The Affordable Care Act suffered another jolt late last week with the news that UnitedHealth Group, the nation’s largest health insurer, was making good on its threat to pull out of Obamacare, beginning with its operations in Georgia and Arkansas.
UnitedHealth roiled the market last November when it revealed that it was considering exiting Obamacare after incurring hundreds of millions of dollars in losses related to ACA business. Then UnitedHealth CEO Stephen Hemsley confessed to investors meeting in New York in December that the company should have stayed out of the program a little longer to better gauge its profitability potential.
The company had cautiously tiptoed into the market in January 2015 after sitting out the first full year of Obamacare operations in 2014. “It was for us a bad decision,” Hemsley admitted to his investors. “In retrospect, we should have stayed out longer.”
So it wasn’t a huge surprise on Friday when UnitedHealth spokesperson Tyler Mason confirmed to The Washington Post that the company, indeed, was pulling out of Georgia and Arkansas, two relatively small states that proved to be highly unprofitable terrain for the company.
***********************************
Just How Bad Is The Trainwreck? Pretty Bad

Investor's Business Daily is reporting:
To little fanfare and virtually no media coverage, the Congressional Budget Office sharply downgraded its forecast for ObamaCare in its latest report, issued in late March. By just about every measure, things are looking worse than they did a year ago.

First, the CBO has cut enrollment goals for the ObamaCare exchanges. Its March 2015 report projected that enrollment would top out at 22 million. Now it puts the ceiling at 18 million. And given ObamaCare’s track record so far, even that’s optimistic.

Lower enrollment numbers should mean lower taxpayer costs, since fewer people will be getting taxpayer-subsidized insurance. But higher-than-expected insurance subsidies are soaking up much of those savings.

Last year, CBO projected that the average subsidy would be $4,040. Turns out, it was $4,240. CBO now thinks subsidies will average $4,550 next year instead of $4,250. That is likely a reflection of the fact that premiums leapt upward this year, and are likely to make another big jump for next year.

As a result, even though the CBO expects that 4 million fewer people will be getting insurance subsidies in 2024, the total cost of those subsidies paid out that year will stay exactly the same: $99 billion.

ObamaCare’s Medicaid expansion is also turning out to be far more expensive than planned, forcing the CBO to hike its 10-year Medicaid cost projection by $146 billion. That’s largely the result of far more people signing up for Medicaid — 2 to 4 million more — than the CBO had previously expected.

In addition, far more workers will find themselves without employer-provided benefits than promised. In its initial report on ObamaCare in 2010, CBO said 3 million workers at most would lose their employer health benefits because of the law. Last year it claimed that 7 million will have lost workplace coverage in a decade. Now it says 9 million will likely be forced off employer plans.

And what about the uninsured? When Democrats shoved ObamaCare onto President Obama’s desk in 2010, the public was told that it would cut the number of uninsured by 32 million. That number has since dropped 25%.
By any measure ObamaCare is a debacle. Anyone still supporting ObamaCare is a) not paying attention; b) is a bit dull-witted; c) is making money off the scam; d) is a political demagogue; and/or e) is gaming the system. 

Long-Time ND Elementary School Teacher Donates Land; Stark County's First Wildlife Management Area -- April 11, 2016

The Dickinson Press reports:
Tucked away a few miles west of the Enchanted Highway south of Gladstone is a large and secluded tract of land where pheasants pop out of thick grassland and deer hide in tree rows that stretch for nearly a half-mile. It’s an area soon to become Stark County’s first North Dakota Game & Fish Department Wildlife Management Area.
The 1,120 acres of land -- which consists of an adjoining section, half-section and quarter-section -- was gifted to the Game and Fish Department by Regina Roth, a longtime teacher and lover of wildlife who died in January at 84 years old.
After graduating from Lefor High School, Roth began teaching at a country school nearby before even obtaining her degree from what was then Dickinson State Teacher’s College. She ended up teaching first and second grades in Mott, where she also became the elementary principal, until her retirement.
I'm just impressed with  how much land the family accumulated over the years starting with a small homesteading tract.
The WMA [will be] named after her parents, Adam and Theresa Raab, who homesteaded the area.
There are 215 Wildlife Management Areas throughout North Dakota either managed or partially managed by Game & Fish. The WMAs are open to hunting, fishing and trapping, and are also used for hiking, primitive camping and nature study, according to the department’s website.
Of those WMAs, only around 30 are larger than the Raab Wildlife Management Area, and many of those in western North Dakota are near Lake Sakakawea and Lake Oahe.

Monday, April 11, 2016 -- Median Days For DUC Status Continues To Increase -- Now Over 160 Days

Saudi banking. Something just happened with regard to Saudi banks.

Oil rally. Bloomberg.

ObamaCare. UnitedHealth makes good on promise. If this link breaks, see this post.

Alternative to ObamaCare taking off. Wall Street Journal.

NGLs: prices headed back up -- RBN Energy.

Crushed: went short and got crushed -- WSJ.

Jordan collapses. Yahoo!

Active rigs:


4/11/201604/11/201504/11/201404/11/201304/11/2012
Active Rigs3193190187208

Iowa formally issues Dakota Access pipeline permit -- Dickinson Press. Pipelines tracked here.

DUCs. Emergent Group has update on DUCs in the Bakken. This is a pretty good update with lots of graphs and a Q & A format. For example:
What was the typical timeframe for a DUC in North Dakota? In 2013 and 2014, the average days as a DUC was between 60 to 75 days. That changed dramatically in 2015.
The rolling median days spent as a DUC continues to increase, now over 160 days. This analysis capped DUCs at 365 days to remove possible outliers and reporting errors.
Likewise, this graphic is pretty cool -- this is the percentage of wells by pad size across the state of North Dakota. Almost 50% of wells in North Dakota are on 5+ well pads. Think of the cost savings and environmental advantages. CLR can claim bragging rights for advocating multi-well pads, although I'm sure others will toot their own horn. It takes a village to do pad drilling.



If interested, here is another Energent Group post on North Dakota DUCs.

As of April 11, 2016, there were 27 DUCs still on the 1Q15 wells