Excellent Article On Pad Drilling In The Bakken

Unconventional Oil & Gas Center is reporting:

Activity will catch up as the Bakken serves up additional efficiencies in drilling and well completion in 2013. This is the year the play transitions to pad drilling, an important inflection point that shortens the cycle time on generating new wells in unconventional drilling.

A Hart Energy survey found two thirds of Bakken shale wells drilled on pads at the mid-point of 2013. Pad drilling share is expected to grow to 73% of all wells in 2014 as the play moves beyond lease capture and delineation into the resource harvest phase of the unconventional cycle.

The article is chock full of interesting data about pad drilling in North Dakota. I hope the linked article is not moved to archives any time soon. It's a must-read.
There are three main story lines in the linked article

• production was impacted by a very wet spring; but operators will catch up this year
• data points about pad drilling; how it differs from pad drilling for natural gas
• the middle Bakken is delineated; operators are now focused on delineating the Three Forks

That last bullet is the most important.