A Little Bit For Everyone: Investors and Non-Investors (Those Just Interested in the Bakken) -- CLR -- Oklahoma Says OK to Long Laterals -- Bakken, North Dakota, USA

Link here.

Even if you are not an investor but are still interested in the Bakken, the CLR press release has to get you excited.

The press release came out last week, but I didn't really get a chance to look at it until now. Here are some data points (some numbers rounded):

• The production this company reported in the 3Q11 will very likely mean CLR will be at the top end of its forecast for the entire year: 40% increase in production year-over-year (2010 vs 2011)
• September exit rate: 70,000 boepd; 30% higher than exit rate of 55,110 boepd for June, 2011
• CLR completed 45 gross wells in 3Q vs 34 gross wells in 2Q
• And CLR has another 49 gross wells in completion (fracture-stimulation) phase; folks, think about, CLR completed 45 gross wells in 3Q (three months) and at press time had more than that ready/almost ready to produce -- that's incredible, no matter how you look at it -- 25 of those had been fractured and are probably producing now as we write/read
• CLR's focus: infrastructure; gathering oil and gas; less truck traffic; exploring use of portable gas turbine generators that would consume excess gas and produce electricity -- wouldn't it be a hoot if Harold Hamm put electricity back into the grid at the pad!
• 24 rigs; 5 dedicated frack teams; the most in the Bakken
• CLR's Hawkinson-Whitman Eco-Pad tested 7,214 boepd IP (1,804 average per four wells)
• One of the four, the Whitman 3-34 has not yet been fracture-stimulated due to its high natural production rate: remember, fracturing can double the cost of the well; to boot, this was a short lateral -- WOW!

And finally I get to the reason I went back and read the press release. Oklahoma just passed a new statute allowing long laterals (two or more 640-acre pooled units to be developed with one well bore). We've been doing that in North Dakota during the entire boom. This is huge for players like CLR who have tweaked the long lateral technology in the North Dakota Bakken.

By the way, at $75/bbl at the wellhead, what does 70,000 boepd calculate to? $5.25 million/day, or $157 million/month.