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Monday, September 26, 2011

New KOG Presentation -- Bakken, North Dakota, USA

Link here.

I haven't had chance to review it yet, but didn't want to delay getting it posted.

Motley Fool on Denbury Onshore -- Bakken, North Dakota, USA

Link here. But not much said.

But Denbury Onshore has some great wells in the Bakken.

Talkin' Frackin' -- What the Tea Leaves Are Telling Me -- Bakken, North Dakota, USA

Starting to connect some dots.

First, the fracking backlog which I've been talking about since July, I suppose. It seems about one out of two, or even two out of three wells coming off the confidential list are not completed, and go on to the DRL list, waiting to be fracked.

Second, the challenge of finding fracking sand. There are some great sources in Wisconsin but folks there are trying to stop the mining. This link, however, is good news. Also this note from a message board:
I live near La Crosse, Wisconsin. There is a sand company (Unimin) buying up land around here like you wouldn't believe. Where is it going? The Bakken. I guess in sand terms, we have the type of sand the fracking calls for. There are two (2) fairly large sand mountains outside of town. Unimin has built railroad tracks to two very large sand cribs (if you will). Each one opens their shoot and fills the rail cars up. These companies are paying up to $9,000/acre. One township had some long meetings to let them build roads to their sand land they bought. I believe Unimin offered the township dollars for a length of time to be paid to the township. A win-win situation. It sure looks like the Bakken is alive and kicking!
Third, the cost of ceramic proppants with a great link here. This explains a $10 million KOG well and a $6 million WLL well.  This Reuters article also talks about the high price of trucking (the word "gouging" was not used, but one can read between the lines).

Fourth: the high cost of living. I am hearing that some oil workers unable to pay the high of living (rent), are going back to Texas and Louisiana. There are other opportunities there. The folks from Idaho and Wisconsin have a worse economy in their home states and are more likely to stay.

Fifth: moratorium on man-camps in Williston and recent no-vote on new 600-bed man-camp in Dickinson't.

Sixth: the number of active drilling rigs continues to drop, which I started noticing about a week ago, despite great weather.

It all suggests to me that drillers are going to slow down a bit, wait for some things to get back in balance.

Good luck to all.

Thirteen (13) New Permits -- Some Nice New Wells -- Slawson Never Seems to Disappoint -- Bakken, North Dakota, USA

Daily activity report, September 26, 2011 --

Operators: Arsental, GMXR (2) , CLR (4), Hess (3), MRO, Newfield (2)

Fields: Stanley, Murphy Creek, Big Butte, Reunion Bay, Keene, and three wildcats. GMXR has two wildcats in McKenzie; and Hess has one wildcat in Williams County.

CLR with permits for an Eco-Pad in Dunn County: Roadrunner/Clover Eco-Pad.
Hess has permits for a two-well pad.


Four nice wells:

19623 - WHITING OIL AND GAS CORPORATION, OBRIGEWITCH 21-17TFH, NENW 17-140N-99W, STARK CO., 1,075 bopd,  BAKKEN

19984 - CONTINENTAL RESOURCES, INC., BROGGER 1-4H, LOT 2 4-153N-99W, WILLIAMS CO., 787 bopd, – BAKKEN

20223 - MUREX PETROLEUM CORPORATION, ESKELAND HERFINDAHL 7-6H, SESE 7-156N-95W, WILLIAMS CO., 672 bopd, 207 bwpd – BAKKEN

20551 - SLAWSON EXPLORATION COMPANY, INC., CRUISER 2-16-9H, NENW 21-151N-92W, MOUNTRAIL CO., 1,660 bopd, 4323 bwpd – BAKKEN

More later.

Active Drilling Rigs in North Dakota Down to 191 From Recent High of 201 -- Bakken, North Dakota, USA

The trend has been declining at a time when the weather should have shown an increase in number of active drilling wells in North Dakota.

This supports my contention: fracking backlog.

It's expensive to complete all these wells and then let them sit. On top of that, the flaring continues to be a big issue. You can only flare for so long, and if you can't flare, and you can't complete the well, at some point, you have to shut the well in. Burlington Resources has been shutting their new wells in regularly, going from "Confidential" list directly to "Shut In," not even bothering with "DRL.

Overheard in Williston today (September 26, 2011): one of the big fracking companies located in Williston is going to bring in another 300 workers this next month (October). They have contracted housing for 300 folks starting November 1, 2011.

It was confirmed by another that Williston expects 11,000 new HAL workers this next year. My hunch is that the figure comes from the HAL press release in which the company said they were hiring 11,000 more works and most of them were headed to the Bakken. I expect that not all 11,000 are coming to Williston. More likely, several thousand will be coming to North Dakota and will be spread across the western half of the state, but regardless, it will be a lot.