Significance of Two CLR Wells in the Banks Oil Field, The Bakken, Williston Basin, North Dakota -- Looking For 20+ Well Pads This Year

Updates

April 22, 2018: production data updated; note the jump in production, scroll down; see also this post.

Original Post 

It's funny how things work out. I wrote a fairly long post (everything under the asterisks below) but I put it in draft and wasn't sure I was going to post it; I felt it wasn't adding anything to the blog. Then Robb Siverson sent me a nice note. He alerted me to some aerial photos of CLR's Chicago/Syracuse system in the Banks oil field.

In his note he mentioned, with regard to CLR's Chicago/Syracuse wells, and the Atlanta pad in the Williston oil field:

The landscaping CLR did is applauded amongst the locals I've heard too which is great to hear. Looks like 14+ pads are going to be a thing of the past... 20+ pads are in the works for 2013.

To say the least, this is huge, and very, very interesting. Anyone who lives in oil country knows how much farmland is lost due to scoria/gravel roads to well sites. A single road to a 20-well pad is an incredible savings compared to twenty individual roads going to twenty different sites.

Robb has his own site. When you get to the site, robbsiverson.com, click on the photograph at the right, and then click again on the aerial photograph (or go directly here: Robb Siverson aerial photography).  Specifically, at his home page, robbsiverson.com, the image to the right is of the Chicago/Syracuse cluster in the Banks. By the way, his web page is permanently linked at my "data links" page.

 ********************************

Note: I don't particularly care for the note that follows, but in light of what Robb sent (above), I thought I needed to post the note below as background. The note below was written earlier today, but I put it in draft, not sure if I would post it. 

Tomorrow there will be two very nice CLR wells coming off the confidential list, the two CLR Syracuse wells in the Banks oil field. The Banks oil field is in northeastern McKenzie County which Mike Filloon recently addressed in his article about CLR.

I believe the Charlotte wells in this field are targeting/testing the four benches of the Three Forks.

So, needless to say, the results of these two wells will be interesting. Checking out the location of these wells, it was incredible to see the amount of activity in this immediate area. The list below are the wells in a line less than 3.4 miles long, stretching west to east.

• 23388, 3,375, Statoil/BEXP, Beaux 18-19 3TFH, Banks, t6/13; cum 278K 2/18;
• 23387, 5,387, Statoil/BEXP, Beaux 18-19 4H, Banks,  t6/13; cum 257K 2/18;
• 23386, 3,823, BEXP, Beaux 18-19 5TFH, Banks, t6/13; cum 203K 2/18;
• 23385, 5,070, Statoil/BEXP, Beaux 18-19 6H, Banks, t6/13; cum 283K 2/18;
• 24335, PNC, CLR, Lansing 3-25H, Banks,
• 24334, PNC, CLR, Lansing 4-25H, Banks,
• 24333, PNC, CLR, Steele Federal 3-24H, Banks, 
• 24332, PNC, CLR, Steele Federal 4-24H, Banks,
• 23051, 505, CLR, Syracuse 4-23H, Banks, t10/12; cum 269K 2/18;
• 23050, 954, CLR, Syracuse 3-23H, Banks, t10/12; cum 268K 2/18;
• 23049, 334  CLR, Chicago 4-26H, Banks, t5/13; cum 211K 2/18;
• 23048, 606,  CLR, Chicago 3-26H, Banks, t1/13; cum 249K 2/18;
• 23610, 731, CLR, Akron 2-27AH, Banks, t5/13; cum 276K 2/18;
• 23609, 360, CLR, Akron 3-27AH, Banks, t5/13; cum 186K 2/18;
• 23608, 1,303, CLR, Charlotte 5-22H, Banks, t6/13; cum 220K 2/18;
• 23664, 657, CLR, Charlotte 3-22H, Banks, t11/12; cum 163K 2/18;
• 23612, 673, CLR, Charlotte 4-22H, Banks, t7/13; cum 144K 2/18;
• 23611, 988, CLR, Akron 4-34H, Banks, t6/13; cum 280K 2/18;
• 22244, PNC, CLR, Wahpeton 3-21H, Banks, Bakken,
• 22245, PNC, CLR, Wahpeton 2-21H, Banks, Bakken,
• 21128, 692, CLR, Charlotte 2-22H, Banks, Bakken; t10/11; cum 219K 2/18;
• 19918, 496, CLR, Charlotte 1-22H, Banks, Bakken; t6/11;cum 325K 2/18;
• 19637, 443, CLR, Akron 1-27H, Banks, Bakken, t5/11; cum 316K 2/18;
• 22423, conf-->loc, CLR, Akron 2-27H, Banks, Bakken,
• 22424, PNC, CLR, Akron 3-27H, Banks, Bakken,
• *****22235, 539, CLR, Syracuse 2-23H, Banks, Bakken, t6/12; cum 226K 2/18;
• *****22375, 814, CLR, Chicago 2-26H, Banks, Bakken, t6/12; cum 236K 2/18;
• *****19740, 646, CLR, Syracuse 1-23H, Banks, Bakken, t7/11; cum 400K 2/18;
• *****19590, 540, CLR, Chicago 1-26H, Banks, Bakken, t5/11; cum 303K 2/18;
• 22273, 609, CLR, Steele 2-24H, Banks, Bakken, t5/12; cum 229K 2/18;
• 22155, IA/553, CLR, Lansing 2-25H, Banks, Bakken, t5/12; cum 178K 2/18;
• 19915, 743, CLR, Steele 1-24H, Banks, Bakken, t8/11; cum 354K 2/18;
• 19126, IA/76, CLR, Lansing 1-25H, Banks, Bakken, t11/10; F; cum 381K 2/18; 30 stages; 2.8 million lbs sand and ceramics

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

Jump In Production

*****22235, 33-053-03940; FracFocus: no re-frack data;

*****22375, 33-053-03972; FracFocus: no re-frack data;

*****19740, 33-053-03310; FracFocus: no re-frack data;

*****19590, 33-053-03272; FracFocus: no re-frack data; 

#22235:

Pool	Date	Days	BBLS Oil	Runs	BBLS Water	MCF Prod	MCF Sold	Vent/Flare
BAKKEN	2-2018	22	2690	2693	6405	3970	3700	270
BAKKEN	1-2018	31	10825	11053	18813	20129	12359	7770
BAKKEN	12-2017	13	7946	7507	9575	11756	11750	6
BAKKEN	11-2017	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	10-2017	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	9-2017	16	581	699	562	2416	2416	0
BAKKEN	8-2017	31	1430	1614	1245	5956	5956	0

#22375:

Pool	Date	Days	BBLS Oil	Runs	BBLS Water	MCF Prod	MCF Sold	Vent/Flare
BAKKEN	2-2018	21	4028	4126	6784	6471	6336	135
BAKKEN	1-2018	31	12758	12832	17196	25544	24312	1232
BAKKEN	12-2017	14	8453	8052	10373	12847	12770	77
BAKKEN	11-2017	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	10-2017	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	9-2017	16	534	755	307	1031	1031	0
BAKKEN	8-2017	31	1520	1640	810	3055	3055	0
BAKKEN	7-2017	31	1435	1320	832	2828	2768	60

 
#19740:

Pool	Date	Days	BBLS Oil	Runs	BBLS Water	MCF Prod	MCF Sold	Vent/Flare
BAKKEN	2-2018	28	11245	11321	17174	18919	18066	853
BAKKEN	1-2018	27	16833	16227	23452	31462	23696	7766
BAKKEN	12-2017	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	11-2017	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	10-2017	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	9-2017	15	690	976	405	1572	1572	0
BAKKEN	8-2017	31	1768	1710	962	4067	4067	0

#19590:

Pool	Date	Days	BBLS Oil	Runs	BBLS Water	MCF Prod	MCF Sold	Vent/Flare
BAKKEN	2-2018	28	10086	10123	13057	17610	16210	1400
BAKKEN	1-2018	30	16821	16248	23381	27791	20891	6900
BAKKEN	12-2017	4	1333	1259	310	2264	0	2264
BAKKEN	11-2017	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	10-2017	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	9-2017	13	500	673	289	1428	1428	0
BAKKEN	8-2017	31	1583	1999	910	4059	4059	0
BAKKEN	7-2017	16	630	0	547	1329	1326	3

The graphic:

Burke County May Be The Edge of The Bakken to the Northeast -- January 6, 2013

A reader alerted me to the story.

Burke County is a fairly huge county. Bowbells, the city prominently featured in the linked story, is in the northeast quadrant of Burke County.

The Director, NDIC, hinted that one operator had acquired a fair amount of acreage in Burke County and might be preparing to "give it back." Three operators come to mind: CLR, Oasis, and OXY. The Director mentions Hess and MRO doing some work in Burke County suggesting that Burke County might be at the edge of the Bakken, but when one does a "well search" one does not see a huge presence of Hess or MRO wells in Burke County.

Of the other other three operators (CLR, Oasis, and OXY), OXY has a huge presence in Dimond oil field. This has always been an unimpressive field but I thought it was due more to OXY's fracking results than the geology. It looks like it was the geology, according to Lynn Helms.

Oasis has a large presence in Cottonwood oil field in Burke County; it's not a great field, but it's not terribly bad. Cottonwood field is closer to the better Bakken, whereas Dimond oil field is significantly farther away.

Again, "well search" doesn't result in many CLR wells in Burke County. And when you look at Filloon's CLR map one doesn't see much CLR acreage in Burke County though the size of the map makes it somewhat difficult to tell for sure.

Putting all this together, if I were a betting man, and I'm not, except for an occasional hamburger, I would bet the OXY USA is ready to give back some of its Burke County acreage.

So, we'll see.

Just one problem. This was the quote from the story:

“One larger operator took a fairly big position in northeast Burke County,” said Lynn Helms, director of the state Department of Mineral Resources.
“It’s been disappointing.
“Now they’re thinking they may let some leases go.”

Dimond field is east of the Cottonwood, and Dimond field is more east-central Burke County, and not northeast Burke County, as Lynn Helms said. But the problem is that northeast of Dimond field there is not enough public information known (or at least known by me) to figure out what other operator might have leases in northeastern Burke County. Despite this, I will stick with OXY.

Oasis Has a Huge Well, Record IP for the Company? -- Wells Coming Off The Confidential List Over The Weekend; CLR With Two Nice Wells; Oasis With A Huge Well; Natural Gas Being Sold, Not Flared

The two CLR Syracuse wells below are located among a string of 30 wells stretching less than 3.4 miles west to east in the Banks oil field. For photos of CLR's Syracuse/Chicago wells, click here.

Monday, January 7, 2013
22077, 977, OXY USA, Tony Kralicek 1-5-8H-142-95, Manning, after five months, natural gas still being flared; production to date not promising, t7/12; cum 20K 11/12;
23037, 415, Hess, LK-Edward 147-97-28H-1, Little Knife, all natural gas being sold; t10/12; cum 21K 11/12;
23050, 954, CLR, Syracuse 3-23H, Banks, looks like a nice well; see below; all NG being sold; t10/12; cum 33K 11/12;
23156, 433, Samson Resources, Baja 1522-5H, Ambrose, NG being flared; t10/12; cum 21K 11/12;

Sunday, January 6, 2013
22211, conf, WPX Energy Williston, George Evans 14-23HC, Van Hook,
22214, 436, WPX Energy Williston, George Evans 11-2HC, Van Hook, NG flared; t10/12; cum 26K 11/12;
22973, 436, Hess, GO-Jarland-156-98-1102H-2, Wheelock ("Ray-Epping Corridor"), t11/12; cum 11K 11/12;
23053, 395, CLR, Wilhelm 2-21H, Lone Tree Lake, first month -- natural gas being sold; t11/12; cum 10K 11/12;
23074, drl, CLR, Berthold 1-10AH, Corinth,

Saturday, January 5, 2013
21595, 1,351, Slawson Exploration, Jericho 3-5H, Big Bend, all natural gas being sold; t9/12; cum 32K 11/12;
22380, 2,209, BEXP, Vachal 3-34 3H, Alger, some natural gas being sold; t10/12; cum 29K 11/12;
22428, 4,341, Oasis, Casey 5200 13-30B, Camp, looks like a great well; t7/12; cum 91K 11/12;
22607, 1,216, Oasis, Tanner T 5601 42-24B, Tyrone, and looks like a mediocre well; all NG being sold; t9/12; cum 22K 11/12;
22778, 1,433, Newfield, Clear Creek Federal 152-97-36-25-2H, Westburg, looks like a nice well; most NG being sold; t9/12; cum 30K 11/12;
22873, drl, BEXP, Pyramid 15-22 3H, Todd,
23051, 505, CLR, Syracuse 4-23H, Banks, another nice well in the heart of the Bakken, see below; all NG being sold;
23122, drl, SM Energy, Holm 13-12H, Siverston,


23050, conf, CLR, Syracuse 3-23H, Banks; note: NG is being sold, not flared:

Date	Oil Runs	MCF Sold
11-2012	16188	25852
10-2012	16447	24498

 22428, conf, Oasis, Casey 5200 13-30B, Camp, right in the heart of a sweet spot in the Bakken; looks like a great well; note: NG is being sold, not flared; almost 100K boe in first 4 -5 months:

Date	Oil Runs	MCF Sold
11-2012	13480	11605
10-2012	15203	7424
9-2012	21797	12205
8-2012	26582	18801
7-2012	13930	648

 23051, conf, CLR, Syracuse 4-23H, Banks:

Date	Oil Runs	MCF Sold
11-2012	15764	23203
10-2012	15975	24041

Eastern North Dakota: Jamestown Expansion; Update on John Deere in North Dakota: Valley City and Fargo

Let me preface this by saying: I love to see North Dakota economic development stories outside the Bakken. There are some huge stories coming out of the eastern side of the state: Grand Forks, Fargo, Jamestown, and Valley City.

For newbies: Fargo is on the eastern border of North Dakota, on the Red River. A BNSF rail line, paralleling I-94, runs to Valley City (about 60 miles) and then to Jamestown (another 40 miles). A straight shot. Lots of industrial development potential along this line. Jamestown to Bismarck, another 100 miles. Again, a straight shot.

Jamestown, North Dakota

Spiritwood Energy Park

[Update, July 25, 2015: up and running.]

Spiritwood Energy Park is a huge project; housing for construction workers will be at a premium; community leaders are even talking about man-camps -- and this has nothing to do with the Bakken in the far west of North Dakota.

A power plant, an ethanol plant, and a rail spur on about a section of land.

Some data points:

• Spiritwood Energy Park: a 500-acre industrial park, 10 miles east of Jamestown
• Dakota Spirit AgEnergy: a 65-million-gallon/year ethanol plant; should break ground in 2013; hopefully completed by 2014/2105; being developed by Great River Energy
• Spiritwood Station, a combined heat and power plant; steam to operate the ethanol plant; also operated by Great River Energy
• CHS, Inc: to built a "massive" $1 billion nitrogen fertilizer plant; construction tentatively planned for 2013; could by operational by 2016 [I think this is the same fertilizer plant reported back in August, 2012; that link will take you to additional information on Great River Energy]
• 100 acres of land still available
• local community has pledged $3.75 million for a rail loop to provide access to the Warrn Buffett's BNSF rail line

The only thing surprising me: the Jamestown City Council had reservations about these opportunities, narrowly voting to pass some incentives by a 3-2 vote.

John Deere: Fargo, Valley City

Back on November 26, 2012, I posted a story on continued John Deere investment in Valley City, North Dakota: a $20 million expansion of its facility there. Now, from PrairieBizMag.com:

On Nov. 27, John Deere Seeding Group Valley City broke ground on a $20 million expansion project that will provide an additional 100,000 square feet to the company’s manufacturing operations. John Deere initially opened its Valley City facility in 1996 to build tillage and air seeding equipment for customers worldwide. Now, with more than 300 employees, it is the largest employer in the town of about 6,500 people.

In a separate story at the linked article, which I had missed earlier, John Deere opened another facility about the same time in Fargo:

John Deere Electronic Solutions held an inauguration event Oct. 9 to celebrate the company’s new $22 million, 90,000-square-foot building in north Fargo. The facility has some manufacturing capabilities but will primarily be used for engineering and product development and testing, according to Tom Budan, general manager of JDES. 

For the most part, this building will consolidate Deere's 1,000 employees currently in six locations in Fargo at one location. 

The amount of economic activity in North Dakota -- outside of the oil patch -- never ceases to amaze me. It really is quite remarkable. It speaks well of the business environment in North Dakota.

Another Carbon Capture Process -- New Technology -- Absolutely Nothing To Do With The Bakken -- At Least Not Yet

Updates

January 6, 2013: Pilot plant to capture atmospheric CO2 going up in Calgary, Alberta.

A Canadian company has developed a cleansing technology that may one day capture and remove some of this heat-trapping gas directly from the sky. And it is even possible that the gas could then be sold for industrial use.

Carbon Engineering, formed in 2009 with $3.5 million from Bill Gates and others, created prototypes for parts of its cleanup system in 2011 and 2012 at its plant in Calgary, Alberta. The company, which recently closed a $3 million second round of financing, plans to build a complete pilot plant by the end of 2014 for capturing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, said David Keith, its president and a Harvard professor who has long been interested in climate issues. 

This will drive faux environmentalists mad: using CO2 to extract even more oil from the earth:

Should the cost of capturing carbon dioxide fall low enough, the gas would have many customers, he predicted. Chief among them, he said, would be the oil industry, which buys the gas to inject into oil fields to force out extra oil. The injection has minimal risk, said Howard J. Herzog, a senior research engineer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “The enhanced oil recovery industry has put tens of millions of tons of carbon dioxide into the ground every year for decades with no problems,” he said.

Much of the carbon dioxide for enhanced oil recovery comes from naturally occurring underground reserves that are piped to oil fields, said Sasha Mackler, vice president of Summit Carbon Capture, a unit of Summit Power Group in Seattle. Summit Carbon Capture harvests carbon dioxide gas from coal and natural gas-burning plants before it can be spewed into the air.

Original Post 

This is a new technology that I have not seen before; lots of moving parts to the story, new names, new companies. It's best you to the linked story to sort it out yourself but I will put down some data points that caught my eye. (Some numbers rounded.) Again, a big "thank you" to Don for sending it my way.

This is a new company built around a new technology that captures CO2 to

a) convert it to acid and baking soda that can be sold; and/or,
b) converted to a solid that can safely be stored in landfills

The new technology was developed partly with the aid of a Department of Energy grant. 

Capitol Aggregates, a cement company, in San Antonio, TX, where I now call home, will build a plant with a new patented process that will "offset" 225,000 tons of CO2/year. Cement production is a significant source of CO2. If I read the article correctly, that plant will cost about $125 million.

I have no idea if 225,000 tons is huge amount of CO2 or not. What does one compare it to?

It turns out that Air Products & Chemicals Inc is building a $430 million project at a Valero refinry in Texas where it will capture 1 million tons of CO2 and pipe it to Denbury Resources for enhanced oil recovery (EOR) -- CO2 flooding of old oil fields.

Anyway, a lot of data points, new technology, San Antonio, all very interesting. See the story at the link.

Bad Ideas Gone Worse -- BioFuels -- Nothing About The Bakken, Though Fracking Is Mentioned in Passing

Updates

February 4, 2013: the administration will press on expanding biofuels -- more ethanol even though "everyone" agrees it's a bad idea. Especially the starving Ethiopians.

Original Post

Over on the sidebar at the right, the MDW has something called the "top ten lists." Kind of eclectic, to say the least.

I can't remember when I started the "top ten lists" but it was back in August of last year when I added the top ten "bad ideas gone worse" list. The worse idea, that keeps getting worse, is the issue of biofuels. At the link you will see where this issue rests.

Now, today, a case in post. A story in the New York Times sent to me by Don. The biofuels industry is converting Guatemala corn from food to fuel, where folks can least afford it.

In a country where most families must spend about two thirds of their income on food, “the average Guatemalan is now hungrier because of biofuel development,” said Katja Winkler, a researcher at Idear, a Guatemalan nonprofit organization that studies rural issues. Roughly 50 percent of the nation’s children are chronically malnourished, the fourth-highest rate in the world, according to the United Nations.

The American renewable fuel standard mandates that an increasing volume of biofuel be blended into the nation’s vehicle fuel supply each year to reduce carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels and to bolster the nation’s energy security. Similarly, by 2020, transportation fuels in Europe will have to contain 10 percent biofuel.

Large companies like Pantaleon Sugar Holdings, Guatemala’s leading sugar producer, are profiting from that new demand, with recent annual growth of more than 30 percent. The Inter-American Development Bank says the new industry could bring an infusion of cash and jobs to Guatemala’s rural economy if developed properly. For now, the sugar industry directly provides 60,000 jobs and the palm industry 17,000, although the plantations are not labor-intensive. 

Meanwhile, faux environmentalists in the US have killed the coal industry; would like to kill the fracking industry (and the domestic oil and gas industry in the process); have moved oil from pipelines to the more dangerous and more CO2-emitting method of rail; and, now they can add starvation among the developing countries to their well-thought out programs.

Thank goodness we have the New York Times to print the "bad ideas gone worse" and to shed light on what the faux environmentalists are bringing to our brave new world. Where temperatures are expected to increase by a degree or two over the next century under the worse scenario; data already suggests that this may be changing. But I digress.

You know, if Guatamala has the fourth-highest rate of malnourished children in the world -- wow, it's hard to come up with three countries that could possibly be worse: Ethiopia, the Sudan,....

But The Guardian is correct: global warming will mean more malnourished children. But not for the reasons suggested. Increased temperatures and increased CO2 at the levels predicted will actually increase global vegetation (no links; multiple posts in the past two months). The crazy solutions to a non-problem, like converting food to fuel, will be the real reason "global warming" will result in more malnourished children. But I digress, again ....

Back to the three countries that might be worse than Guatamala for malnourished children: Ethiopia, the Sudan, Rwanda, ...

By the way, someone's data is out of date, or there's a bit of exaggeration, or I'm misreading something, but according to the most recent data available (through 2011), Guatemala isn't even close to number four on the list: it's number 46, and not even close to 50% -- it's 12%. Still atrocious but not quite what the New York Times stated. They are obviously using different sources. By the way, no country hits 50% for childhood malnourishment, though several countries come awful close. This source is the World Health Organization. The Times source was the UN.

Sorry for all the digressions. It's the only way to keep the faux environmentalists off balance.

Enbridge To Add Another $600 Million To Pipeline Activity in The Bakken

If you think you read this on the MDW in another post, you are not wrong. This is a "cut and paste" from an earlier post, but for housekeeping reasons, am re-posting it here.

The Dickinson Press has an update which says about the same thing, but provides a bit more detail and background. In addition, the article references two large Enbridge pipeline projects which were announced earlier (back in 2012). Apparently, Enbridge has added another $600 million to the huge $6 billion project previously announced. That is "new" news.

Enbridge Inc, already the largest transporter of Canadian oil, moving more than 2 million barrels a day, added C$600 million ($609 million) worth of new plans on Friday to a massive C$6.2 billion expansion of its system through Western Canada, North Dakota, the U.S. Midwest and Eastern Canada, announced in early December.

The company said it would spend C$400 million on its Western Canadian system to add 230,000 barrels a day of capacity, mostly by increasing the horsepower of its pumping stations between Hardisty, Alberta, and the Canada-U.S. border.

Its U.S. affiliate, Enbridge Energy Partners, will spend $200 million to further that expansion between North Dakota and Superior, Wisconsin. The capacity is scheduled to be on line in 2015, the company said.

Enbridge remains one of a handful of Bakken-centric companies I most enjoy following. EOG is another. And, of course, BRK, now that Warren owns BNSF.

More information about the "massive C$6.2 billion expansion program can be found at this link. Again, please correct me if I am double counting, or posting any errors regarding the Bakken. There are so many announcements of expansions and new projects, it is easy for me to get confused. The best example was the recent announcement for new peaking plants planned by Basin Electric.

More Cuts for the World's Largest Wind Turbine Manufacturer

Updates

Later, 5:52 pm est: in the original post I noted that anyone reading the tea leaves, would have bet that the wind energy tax credit would have been extended. I assumed the tax credit would have been extended for another year. From prairiebizmag.com:

[A wind proponent spokesperson was] optimistic that the proposed policy [wind energy tax credit] had a chance of success. Rebenitsch said that while a longer timeframe would be preferable, six years “is better than nothing” and would still provide some certainty to project developers on the brink of a collapsing industry [whine, whine whine].

It seems a bit confusing, perhaps due to the date of the article and when the quotes were taken. My understanding is that the wind energy credit was extended for one year, through the end of 2013.

But even with that, what's the future of wind in 2013?

Rebenitsch says just 2,000 megawatts of wind power are expected to come online nationwide in 2013, compared to a high of 13,000 megawatts in 2012 as project developers rushed to beat the PTC’s expiration. “We went from boom to bust,” he says. “Hopefully this longer term extension will enable [the industry] to recover from that bust,” he said. “It won’t happen in 2013 because these things take time but it will help us begin recovering and make longer-term plans and move forward.”

Locally [the Dakotas], the impacts of an expiring PTC have been visible in layoffs at turbine component manufacturing facilities and in the halt of wind farm project development. 

At the end of 2012 there were no wind projects under construction in South Dakota, according to Rebenitsch. “There are a number of projects in various stages of development, but most of those developments have been basically stopped,” he said. North Dakota’s industry was in a similar state, according to Mark Nisbet, North Dakota principal manager for Xcel Energy and wind representative for North Dakota’s Empower Commission. He said North Dakota was set to have 1,670 megawatts of wind energy by the end of 2012, ranking it among the Top 10 wind energy producing states, but there were no known new projects on the books for 2013.

A single nuclear plant, for round numbers: 1,000 megawatts of electricity. And unlike nuclear reactors, wind and solar farms require back-up conventional power plants when the wind if not blowing, and the sun not shining.

Original Post

Vestas cuts workweek to 24 hours. This gets them under the 30-hour mandated ObamaCare workweek.

Link here to The Denver Post.

The article suggests that wind farm developers expedited projects in 2012 to get them completed by the end of the year before the wind energy tax credit expired. Anyone who can read tea leaves would have bet (and bet correctly) that Congress would extend the tax credits. There was no need to hurry.

But be that as it may, The Denver Post suggests that wind farm development will be slow in 2013 because much of the work was already done last year. 

Vestas cut its Colorado workforce from 1,800 workers to 1,100 in 2012 according to the linked article.

One can find several posts at the MDW on Vestas, by using the "search" application.

This is a triple whammy for these workers. First, they see an immediate cut in the number of hours they work. Second, the company, under ObamaCare, is no longer required to provide health care insurance. And third, because they were not laid off, they cannot simply "quit" and collect unemployment insurance. Some of them might have been better off had they been laid off (I don't know; I don't have that data) and would have been able to collect unemployment insurance for up to 99 weeks, or whatever it now is.  I assume they will now qualify for other Federal programs, such as food stamps, however. The number of folks on food stamps hit a record high in 2012, according to a most excellent source, the Huffington Post. Which by the way is not reflected on the scariest graph of 2013.

Random Post: A Beehive Of Activity Just West/Northwest of Dickinson

There is a cluster of rigs just to the west/northwest of Dickinson, what Whiting has labeled their Pronghorn Prospect.

There is one rig in Green River oil field; three rigs in Dutch Henry Butte oil field (and a fourth just on the north edge, and a fifth on the southeast border, sited in the Dickinson oil field), and another rig in St Anthony field.  So, about seven rigs in a three-mile radius or however one might measure them.

The NDIC GIS maps show the following sites with rigs on site:

• 24496, drl, Whiting, Koppinger 31-13PH, Green River,
• 24071, drl, Whiting, Oukrop 24-24PH, St Anthony,
• 23653, drl, Whiting, Marsh 14-9PH, Dutch Henry Butte,
• 23579, drl, Whiting, Havelka 14-10PH, Dutch Henry Butte,
• 23641, drl, Buresh 41-15PH, Dickinson,
• 23700, drl, Fidelity, Albert 14-23H, Dickinson,
• 23396, drl, Fidelity, Schmidt 11-2H, Dutch Henry Butte

In addition, these are shown to be in "DRL" status also, but rigs not on site:

• 23652, drl, Whiting, Wagner Farms 11-16PH, Dutch Henry Butte,
• 23577, drl, Whiting, Havelka 21-15PH, Dickinson,
• 23576, drl, Whiting, Havelka 11-15PH, Dickinson,

Results of wells in the immediate area that have been completed:

• 22176, 1,261, Whiting, Marsh 34-9PH, Dutch Henry Butte, t5/12; cum 71K 11/12;
• 21527, 667, Whiting, Buresh 34-10TFH, Dutch Henry Butte, t2/12; cum 92K 11/12;
• 19275, 193, Fidelity, Dutch Henry Butte, t5/11; cum 73K 11/12;
• 19698, 622, Fidelity, Dutch Henry Butte, t7/12; cum 37K 11/12;

Looking for Something, Anything -- If I Ramble Long Enough, I Finally Get Back to the Bakken

I feel I let folks down when I can't find something to blog about the Bakken. Perhaps it's just a sign that the Bakken is maturing.

But it's feast or famine. Later this month the earnings reports will come out for the Bakken-centric companies for 4Q12 and I won't be able to keep up. A reminder: let me know if you see anything with regard to warnings, earnings, etc., that I might miss. I'm most interesting in hearing what Newfield has to say about the Bakken, if anything. Newfield has completely dropped off the Bakken radar scope. Even OXY USA has gotten more active with new permits over the past few days.

Odds and ends: someone noted that my concern about the Great Recession of 2013 based on lousy jobs reports is off-base, noting that unemployment is a lagging indicator. Wow, that is right on target. Employment has been lagging now for four years. If one was assured that the country would continue adding 155,000 jobs/month, we would be back to the baseline in another four years (based on that "scary" graph). Just use the same slope of the curve as it is now (and has been for quite some time) and extrapolate out: yes, it would be about another 48 months before we get back to the baseline. The concern is that there is nothing in the tea leaves suggesting that we will continue adding 155,000 jobs/month, and there are plenty of signs to suggest the number could go down. For the record: I remain very, very optimistic that 2013 will be a great year. Maybe "hopeful" would be a better word.

So, what's going on in the Bakken? Same old, same old, I guess. I see "they" have run out of steel-toed boots in Helena -- due to the Bakken.  For newbies, Helena, MT, is about 550 miles southwest of Williston. Just saying. A reminder: Montana Headlines (at the link) posts three times weekly; it does a good job wrapping up news, and it's very, very good writing.

I have never updated the Todd oil field which is a fairly large field covering the west half of the city of Williston and extending west of the city.

For a quick "cut and paste," here are the results of permits issued for Todd oil field in 2011.  (This may not be ready for prime time; there could be errors in this; if your numbers are different than mine, your numbers are probably correct, mine wrong. Note: data is current as of end of November, 2012, most recent reporting period for the NDIC; it appears natural gas production reports come in a bit later than oil production reports; which means that some wells reported as still flaring in November, 2012, might not be flaring any more in January, 2013.)

Permit #	Operator		IP
20282*	BEXP		2,671
20980*	BEXP		2,708
20997*	BEXP		2,823
20998*	BEXP		3,024
20999*	BEXP		2,603
21005*	BEXP		2,436
21006*	BEXP		3,001
21007*	BEXP		2,788
21150***	OAS		3,021
21499*	BEXP		2,327
21562*	BEXP		2,037
21709**	BEXP		2,066
21710**	BEXP		3,229
21711**	BEXP		2,272
21712**	BEXP		DRL
21933***	CLR		636
22056**	BEXP		2,437
22057**	BEXP		2,561
22081**	BEXP		3,383

* Wells that have been in production close to a year; hooked up to natural gas pipelines, but still flaring up to half of its natural gas production.
** Wells that have come on-line in the last two or three months, and all natural gas is still being flared.
*** Wells that have been on-line for almost a year and all natural gas is still being flared.

The CLR and Oasis wells in Todd field (in the table above) are "loners" on the far southwest side of the field, which explains why they are not yet hooked up to natural gas pipelines. The BEXP wells are fairly close together on the northwest quadrant of the field. I assume pipelines are not being laid when the ground is frozen.

[By the way, lack of natural gas pipelines might explain the lack of drilling activity in East Fork, but the  presence of natural gas pipelines in the Brooklyn oil field might explain why there are three rigs in the latter field. Both fields are in the same general location.]

NOTE: comments about flaring may be way off but I think this is fairly accurate.

There could be typographical errors in the table above, but I think it's pretty close to being completely accurate. I'm sure readers will let me know where I've made mistakes. Smile.