Flurry of Whiting Activity North of Belfield (Bakken, ND, USA) -- Lewis and Clark Prospect -- WLL

I am told that there are now traffic lights about a half-mile north of Belfield, about a half-mile north of I-94 where a county road intersects US Highway 85 (the north-south highway into Belfield). These are the first and only traffic lights in Belfield; if you want to see the next nearest traffic lights you have to drive to Dickinson, Williston, or Baker (Montana).

Unless there is some significantly increased traffic at this intersection, on first look it seems to be an unusual spot for first-ever traffic signals in Belfield.

A bit to the northwest, Whiting has recently opened a new prospect: their Lewis and Clark prospect which, according to a recent Whiting presentation, is centered around the Bicentennial field. The Lewis and Clark prospect is where the Three Folks pinches out -- or extends -- from the Bakken formation.

But the Bicentennial is quite a ways from the traffic lights just north of Belfield. Is something else going on?

Looking at the NDIC GIS map server just a couple miles to the east of this new traffic signal, I notice a rig on site, with permit number 99189, Mann 33-18. That's a very, very unusual permit number. In fact, it is the only 99XXX permit held by Whiting. It turns out it is a stratigraphic well. It is located in the four-section oil field called North Creek. Meanwhile in that same section (18-140-98) Whiting has almost completed another well, permit 19337, Mann 21-18TFH, a wildcat, even though it is sitting in a designated field.

Just to the west of this well, in section 13-140-99, is another Whiting well, on the confidential list, #18837, Kubas 11-13TFH, a wildcat.  It's another Three Forks well and is listed as "plugged or producing" on the NDIC website, as of September 29, 2010.

Less than a mile west of the Kubas well, closer to US Highway 85, is Whiting's permit 19819, another wildcat, Lydia 21-14TFH, and another Three Forks well.

Three miles and four miles to the west, on the other side of US Highway 85, are two more wildcats, #19623 and #19444, Obrigewitch 21-17TFH and Hecker 21-18TFH, both Whiting wells and both wildcats.

One last well to take a look at. This is another Whiting well, #19562, Brueni 28-1H. The Brunei is in the opposite direction, two miles southeast of the stratigraphic well, towards South Heart where there has been a flurry of activity lately. It does not have the TFH designation, so I assume it's a Bakken well, but don't know for sure. It would make more sense for it to be a TFS well. We'll see.

It doesn't take much to get my mind imagining things. In this case, the new traffic lights just a half mile north of Belfield, along with the only stratigraphic well that Whiting currently is drilling, and a number of wildcats in the immediate area targeting the Three Forks area suggest to me that a) Whiting is looking to find the southeastern limits of their Lewis and Clark prospect; and, b) Whiting is looking at putting in an operations center of some sort north of Belfield.

Updates

April 28, 2011: 19444, 3,106, WLL, Hecker 21-18TFH, huge story, click on link

February 26, 2011: WLL corporate presentation. This "flurry of activity" is now called the Lewis and Clark prospect by Whiting. Its objective is the Three Forks formation. It consists of 360K gross/235K net acres; 164 1280-acre units; 12 wells in 2010; 46 in 2011; $280 million CAPEX in 2011

November 2, 2010: This is most interesting. I posted the above on October 31, 2010. Just two days later there's a story in the Dickinson Press that Whiting is requesting Belfield to rezone agricultural land near Belfield to industrial use. The article did not say where the area of interest is, but it doesn't take a lot of imagination to think it might be a half-mile north of Belfield, where the city put in their first set of traffic lights.