For Newbies -- Including Me -- Natural Gas Liquids in the Bakken

Part of the reason I started the blog was to educate myself regarding the Bakken. I have concentrated on oil and feel comfortable with oil stories coming out of the Bakken.

It took me a long time to "understand" natural gas but because of the blog and a lot of comments from readers, I'm feeling a bit more comfortable with natural gas.

"Anon 1" alerted me to the Encana presentations accompanying their "Investors' Day" which sheds more light on the ethane story coming out of Tioga, North Dakota, the Bakken.  "Anon 1" alerts us to a new concept/definition, something I was not aware of:

Deep cut:  the processes which recover NGLs from natural gas in excess of amounts required for sales gas to meet pipeline specifications

A technical paper that seems fairly easy to read is here: http://digitalcommons.mcmaster.ca/esr/vol9/iss1/4/ : at the link, click on the title of the article and it will take you to a PDF

The presentations are quick and easy to open at the company's webite. I assume these presentations will be posted for a limited time.

When I review these slides, I am further convinced that as we go forward, natural gas liquids will become a bigger and bigger story as the Bakken matures. It is interesting that as the price of oil has come down recently, royalty owners may have noted an increase in their royalty checks from liquid natural gas. I don't know, but the natural gas liquids story seems to be getting bigger and bigger.

Here's another story about the importance of natural gas liquids (note particularly the price being paid for NGLs -- up to 80 to 90 percent what oil is getting).

Be sure to read this story also, poster earlier today.