The Million Dollar Way (The Bakken Oil Blog): 12/22/12

Saturday, December 22, 2012

Update on That Russian Winter Storm

Close to 200 people have now died from a bitter cold snap across Russia and eastern Europe.

In Ukraine, more than 80 lives were claimed and more than 500 people hospitalised after temperatures dropped and stayed at minus 17 celsius.

Record snowfalls have trapped hundreds of vehicles, and the capital Kiev has experienced its worst snow since records began in 1881.

Forecasters expect another three days of similar weather.

Russian medical sources say 56 people have died there in the last week alone.

Temperatures as low as minus 47 degrees were recorded in Siberia.

Poland has also seen close to 50 deaths, where officials say most victims were homeless people, who had died of exposure.

A state of emergency has been declared in 12 Bulgarian municipalities due to heavy snowfall.

Links to more eurozone/snowfall news here.

On Track for 2,514 Oil And Gas Permits in 2012

Updates

December 31, 2012: "we" finished the year with 2,521 permits (some were canceled).

Original Post

Oil and gas permits (not including salt water disposal wells), as of December 21, 2012: 2,494.

That puts "us" on track for 2,564 new oil and gas permits for 2012 if straight-lined.

With the holidays coming on, the number of new permits for 2012 will probably be closer to 2,514. So, we'll see.

My database showed the following number of permits (may or may not include salt water disposal wells for years prior to 2012):

2012: 2,521

2011: 1,940

2010: 1,684

2009: 629

2008: 956

2007: 497

2006: 422

Rail Trumps Pipelines For Bakken Oil

Link to The Bismarck Tribune.

Oneok’s official statement said, “We did not receive sufficient long-term commitments under the terms we needed to construct the Bakken Crude Express Pipeline.”

Just days before, a 103-car train carrying Bakken crude arrived in Tacoma, Wash.
The postponement of the pipeline and the North Dakota-Tacoma oil-by-rail connection are directly related. They open another chapter in the state’s relationship with the railroad and oil development.

Much of the focus had been on moving North Dakota crude to refineries in Tulsa. But the big increases in domestic oil production have created an over supply in the Tulsa area. That’s where the Bakken Express was headed, and that’s where Keystone XL intends to connect before heading to the Gulf.

Not only that, oil companies in North Dakota are pumping crude and need to move it now. Those pipelines are years from reality.

The stars aligned for BNSF Railway.

North Dakota: Fastest Growing State in the United States -- North Dakota Solidly Over 700,000

This was noted by the Williston Wire yesterday but the story was not linked.

Link to the Minneapolis StarTribune.

North Dakota was the nation's fastest-growing state in the past year.

U.S. Census Bureau data show that North Dakota's population grew 2.2 percent to 699,628 in the year ending July 1, as the oil boom drew workers to the Bakken fields in the western part of the state.

"We had rural population declining in western North Dakota for decades," said Dean Bangsund, an economist at North Dakota State University in Fargo who has studied the effects of the oil boom. "Now we are looking at growth curves that are just short of astonishing."

By contrast, Minnesota's population in the year ending July 1 grew 0.6 percent, according to the Census Bureau.

North Dakota this year became the No. 2 oil-producing state behind Texas as drillers tapped into shale oil deposits and began pumping record amounts of crude. In October, the oil output was 747,239 barrels, nearly six times the output of five years ago.

Rod Backman, chairman of the North Dakota Census Committee, a group of mostly state officials who advise the government, said the census estimates don't include at least 24,000 workers who live in temporary camps set up mainly for migrant oil workers.

Without question, "they" could not have found a worse picture that least represents North Dakota's oil boom. And then I looked at the source for the photograph: The New York Times. I cannot make this stuff up.

If you want to see the oil patch as it really is, visit Vern Whitten photography.

Marvin Windows: Huge Story in New York Times

I have not read the New York Times in ages. I love the Times for its exceptionally good writing, but I can no longer take the editorial slant. I was able to read the Times for years once I realized the op-ed section was the entire first section, but it really has become a blog itself. And no matter how good the writing, I won't read liberal blogs. [And $7 for the Sunday edition; you have got to be kidding. $350 for a year of Sunday Times? One can buy the newest iPad for $329. But I digress, even more.]

But, my reading partner today volunteered to exchange his New York Times for my Wall Street Journal (I agreed, as long as I get the book review section back). I don't know how many folks understand the power of "the" ring in Lord of the Rings, but that's exactly how I felt with the New Yorks Times within reach. Unlike Cate Blanchett who was able to resist the pull of the ring, I was not able to resist the pull of the NYT. But ... I only read the business section.

And on page B4, wow: no-layoff company now writes profit-sharing checks. No government bailout.

Marvin Windows and Doors, a family-owned business based in northern Minnesota, survived the financial crisis without any employee layoffs, a decision that won the company praise from presidential candidates and pundits alike.

On Friday, the company gave employees their first profit-sharing checks in four years, plus a ham. While the checks were relatively modest — $799,379 was split among 2,573 employees, an average of $311 for each employee — company officials said it was a sign that the worst of the crisis may be over.

During the presidential campaign, President Obama referred to Marvin on several occasions as an example of a company that valued its employees over profits. Instead of laying off workers, Marvin officials cut back hours for hourly workers, eliminated some perks and cut pay for salaried employees, including executives and family members, with the goal of breaking even until the economy improved.

And no government bailout. The company only had to move a few manufacturing plants into North Dakota.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the president took credit for saving MWD. He noted how difficult it was "saving MWD" while piloting the second helicopter that went into Pakistan at oh-dark-thirty to take out Osama.

Saturday Morning -- Nothing About the Bakken

The calendar was misread. The Mayan end-of-the-earth might actually be tomorrow. I can't make this stuff.

Hold on to your doomsday fever, folks, the Maya calendar date celebrated Friday as the “end of the world” might actually be off by two days – or a full year.

The end of the 13th baktun cycle of the so-called Long Count of the ancient Maya’s intricate, interlocking calendar system might correspond to Sunday, not Friday, said Carmen Rojas, an archaeologist with Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History.

As “end of the world” hype swept the globe Friday, scholars pointed out that the Maya calendar hasn't been decoded enough to make exact correlations with the Gregorian calendar that we use.

Rojas stressed that the Maya not only calculated baktun cycles of 144,000 days, but also had systems that measured the marches of Venus and the moon. Other scholars note some Maya glyphs mark dates thousands of years further into the future.

Speaking of meaningless deadlines, if "we" go over the ObamaCliff on December 31, 2012/January 1, 2013, the new deadline immediately becomes December 31, 2013. If there is no deal by midnight, December 31, 2012, the new tax rates and spending cuts take effect the next day. But Congress has all year then to rescind them, make them retroactive to January 1, 2013. Kinda fun, huh?

**********************

It could be a very, very slow morning for Bakken news. I will probably spend most of my time going back and updating some previous posts. I did provide an answer to an enquiring mind.

So, starting with the WSJ (I'll will update posts as I go along) and refresh periodically.

WSJ Links

Section D:

Big-Box Barolo: The wine surprises of Costco. I haven't read the article. I will read it later. But yes, Costco wine department was a huge, huge surprise. Even their selections of Scotch. I think I wrote about that some time ago. Nope, can't find that story; must have been at one of my other blogs.
Ford ST: Why should Europe have all the fun? My older daughter introduced me to the Ford Focus some years ago. I bought her a used Ford Focus; it lasted forever. Then we bought a second brand new Ford Focus, which we gave to our younger daughter; that one, too, is lasting forever. If the Honda Civic did not exist, I would buy the Ford Focus. It really does have European handling.

Section C:

Book reviews. I will come back to this later. Maybe.

Section B:

RIM jolts market with fee change. Now that's a real good example of a "dead cat" bounce.
Big bonuses for auto workers. Union employees at GM will get a $7,000 profit-sharing bonus. And that's why they call if "government motors." If I recall correctly, GM does not pay federal corporate taxes for ten years following the bailout. Cue up Connie Stevens.

Section A:

How ObamaCliff talks hit the wall. The MDW follows the story here.

And that's about it. Pretty quiet.

******************

Comments and Observation From All Over

Starbucks, San Antonio, Texas: ~~five~~ six laptops. All MacBook Pros. What more can I say. Even Starbucks Harvard Square cannot top 100% Apple laptops at any given moment. Speaking of which, Apple reclaims the lead in smart phones. In the process, Apple set a new high with 53.3% of the US smartphone market:

Last month, research firm Kantar Worldpanel reported that Apple had retaken the lead in U.S. smartphone sales from Android over the August-October timeframe, topping Android by a 48.1%-46.7% margin on the strength of the iPhone 5 launch.

Bottom line: in the US, it's Apple and Android, ATT and Verizon. Everything else is trivial, quantitatively.

******************

Glacier National Park upset with Blackfeet Indians drilling for oil twenty (20) miles away.

The tension has existed since the drilling began in earnest more than three years ago, and it continues despite no significant oil production to date and a recent lull in exploration. There are dozens of wells drilled across the 1.5-million-acre reservation, with at least 18 within 20 miles of the park.

The park service is calling for a comprehensive, detailed study on the cumulative effects of all existing drilling to date, future drilling and what would happen if the wells start producing oil and gas.

Glacier Superintendent Chas Cartwright said he has no desire to stop reservation development, but wants to make sure it is done right.

I guess big white man know what best for injun.

From earlier this year, same subject:

“While tribes were told they would have a seat at the table with federal agencies, the Bureau of Land Management excluded them from the process of drafting a rule with a potentially devastating impact on their sovereignty, and their economies. Tribes were not afforded an opportunity to provide input on, let alone the time to analyze, the draft rule,” said Subcommittee on Indian and Alaska Native Affairs Chairman Don Young (AK-At large). “New jobs – especially year-round, high wage jobs available in the oil and gas industry – can and will have a dramatic effect on reducing unemployment and poverty on Indian reservations. But if the BLM rule goes into effect, kiss these tribal jobs good-bye. Thanks to the Department of the Interior, while non-Indian landowners will prosper, the tribes will lose. This would be nothing less than another breach of the United States’ trust responsibility to Indians.”

********************

Illegal aliens arrested for minor crimes will not be "targets" of deportation -- Obama. Cue up Connie Stevens.

The Million Dollar Way (The Bakken Oil Blog)

Pages