Another Great Story on the Bakken Impact

Link to the Rapid City Journal.

The 63-year-old hauls cement five or six times a week to Williston, N.D., the epicenter of the Bakken oil shale formation that is fueling record economic growth for that state.

Now the growth is spilling south over the state line, bringing a new and growing market for businesses in the Black Hills that provide raw materials for oil extraction, equipment repair, housing components, and other needed goods and services.

“You don’t have to study very hard to figure out that it’s a multi-billion dollar market, four hours from our back door,” said Duff Kruse, president of Adams-ISC, a Rapid City manufacturing company benefitting from the boom. Adams-ISC makes and repairs the type of pressure pipe and vessel systems used to transport oil and natural gas, as well as hydraulic systems on trucks.

As a reminder, a few months ago, it was being reported that $1.5 billion to $2.0 billion is being poured into the Bakken EACH MONTH. The Bakken comprises more than just western North Dakota -- it extends into Canada and Montana, there are hints that some non-Bakken payzones extend into South Dakota -- but for all intents and purposes, right now, "the Bakken" is centered in four counties in the north (Willams, Mountrail, McKenzie, and Dunn) and one county in the south (Stark). Of course, one can divide McKenzie and Dunn in half and place half of each of those two counties in the "north" and half in the "south."  Regardless how you split it up, upwards of $2 billion is being poured into only a portion of North Dakota. 

Are the numbers inflated? 200 rigs drilling a well/month at $10 million/well. 

Note for newbies: not all rigs are drilling oil wells; some are drilling salt water disposal wells. But the "200 x 10 million" does not include all the pipeline being laid for the oil, the fracking water, or the natural gas pipeline for gathering, nor the new facilities for processing natural gas. The numbers are simply staggering.