Miscellaneous Thursday Night Notes

Many of these stories were sent in by readers. Thank you.

Gulf to shut down: Bloomberg is reporting that faulty bolts manufactured by GE must be replaced in deep-water rigs in the Gulf of Mexico. This is going to be very, very, very costly for the operators.

North Dakota farmers' wish list: If you want to see how North Dakota farmers are spending their money (high prices for commodities, oil royalties, pipeline easements, eminent domain for new roads/bypasses), check out Titan Machinery. Thanks, Don.

OXY USA: At an earlier post I mentioned that OXY USA may just be a "sleeper" among the majors. I've been hard on OXY USA with regard to the Bakken but elsewhere OXY USA is doing some interesting things. Information suggests they are buying up a lot of acreage in the Monterey Shale, California. Recently, I noted the Cline Shale in Texas: interestingly enough OXY USA has a significant presence there also. MyWestTexas.com is reporting that Centurion Pipeline will reactivate, expand Cline Shale pipeline.

Efforts to delineate and develop the Cline Shale play has prompted one pipeline to expand its system to accommodate the increased production.

Centurion Pipeline, a wholly owned subsidiary of Occidental Petroleum, has announced plans to reactivate and expand its existing pipeline system in the play. It will be capable of transporting crude from Coke, Irion, Mitchell, Sterling and Tom Green counties to Centurion's terminal in Colorado City. From there, shippers can either transport crude to Cushing, Okla. or to the Gulf Coast via the BridgeTex Pipeline, which is expected to go online in mid-2014.

As I noted earlier, OXY USA may deserve it's own stand-alone post.

The Niobrara: Don sent me the link to Bonanza Creek's most recent presentation, February, 2013. Two slides to look at:

• slide 9: IRRs for various basins; look how Bakken/TFS compares to other oil fields (near the bottom)
• slide 12: the three benches of the Niobrara and two additional payzones 

 Big oilfield-services companies are poised for a reawakening. -- Rigzone.

DOI: 38 million acres in Gulf of Mexico up for grabs. -- Rigzone.

Statoil 'On Track' To deliver 2.5 million bbls of oil per day by 2020. -- Rigzone.

However, Statoil CFO Torgrim Reitan cautioned in a presentation to analysts in London that the firm expects production this year to be lower than that achieved in 2012 for a variety of reasons including divestments and uncertainty about the resumption of production at the In Amenas facility in southern Algeria, which was the subject of a terrorist attack in January. -- but no mention of the Bakken.