Random Data Point: US Natural Gas Reserves

CNBC is reporting:

An in-depth study of the second most productive natural gas field in the U.S. shows a vast supply of natural gas that will continue for decades.

The study, funded by Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, showed a cumulative 44 trillion cubic feet of recoverable reserves from Barnett, with production declining through the year 2030. The U.S. in total is expected to have natural gas resources of 2,200 trillion cubic feet.

And, again, the Bakken is mentioned:

But the shale resources are turning out to be even richer than expected, in both gas and oil. "There's a great expression in the oil business: 'Oil's been found where it's been found before," said Tinker. "These big oil and gas rich basins already are producing from the conventional reservoirs that leaked off of the shale. Most of these big basins — the Permian Basin, the Bakken — these have rich source rocks."

"The source rocks are the kitchen where the oil and gas are cooking, and the gas and oil leaked out of the kitchen into the conventional reservoir. We've drilled the conventional reservoir," he said. "There's still some to be drilled, but the kitchen is what we're drilling now, and it contains a lot more oil and gas than what was leaked."

Ceramic For Sale

This came in as a comment.

I don't know how many folks follow comments.

Simply moving comment stand-alone post:

Black Ceramic S580-C305 30/50 Surplus Inventory for sale 600,000 lbs based out of Denver.

rdecker83@gmail.com for contact information, your company supplies trucks we aere able to load trucks to highway legal weight @ 80,0000 lbs.

Wells Coming Off Confidential List Tuesday

21705, 808, OXY USA, Enger 1-15-22H-142-97, Willmen, t9/12; cum 13K 1/13;
22537, 487, Hess, BW-Haugen 149-101-1621H-1, Sather Lake,  t12/12; cum 15K 1/13;
22683, drl, Hess, EN-Jeffrey-155-94-2215H-3, Alkali Creek,
22846, drl, MRO, Diamond A 34-21TFH, Bailey

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 21705, conf, OXY USA, Enger 1-15-22H-142-97, Willmen,

Date	Oil Runs	MCF Sold
12-2012	0	42
11-2012	469	77
10-2012	932	277
9-2012	11354	4016

Thirteen (13) New Permits -- The Williston Basin, North Dakota, USA

Active rigs: 183 (steady)

Thirteen (13) new permits --

• Operators: MRO (5), CLR (3), Whiting (2), Zenergy, XTO, EOG
• Fields: Parshall (Mountrail), Sanish (Mountrail), Murphy Creek (Dunn), Jim Creek (Dunn), Siverston (McKenzie), Foreman Butte (McKenzie), Bailey (Dunn)
• Comments:

Wells coming off the confidential list were posted earlier; see sidebar at the right.

Some Random Comments From The Whiting Earnings Transcript; In The Hidden Bench -- 15 Wells In A Spacing Unit

Posted to help understand the Bakken; not to be used for investment purposes. This is not an investment site; don't make any investment decisions based on what you read or think you read at this site.

Now, some random concepts from the transcript.

... the largest contributor to our production growth has been our North Dakota operations. This has led us to become the top oil producer in the state for the month of December. According to the December 2012 oil and gas production report published by the North Dakota State Industrial Commission, Whiting was the #1 oil producer in North Dakota at 66,156 barrels per day. Those are true oil barrels, not BOEs.

We drilled another prolific well at our Tarpon prospect in McKenzie County, North Dakota. The Tarpon Federal 21-4-13H (sic) [21-4-3H] flowed 6,879 BOEs per day from the Middle Bakken formation. This is the third best well drilled to date in the Williston Basin, the first being our Tarpon Federal 21-4H well with an initial production rate of 7,009 BOEs per day.

... more than 60% [of our total production] is coming from the Bakken, Pronghorn Sand and Three Forks formations in the Williston Basin...

... the lion's share of our CapEx : the Middle Bakken, Three Forks and Pronghorn Sand in the Williston Basin.

... this equates to 18 years of drilling from only our Williston Basin ...

... in the Williston Basin, where we control more than 700,000 net acres ...

We've broken out our acreage into 3 core areas: the Southern Williston Basin, which encompasses our Pronghorn and Lewis & Clark prospects; the Western Williston Basin, which includes Hidden Bench, Tarpon, Missouri Breaks and Cassandra; and our Sanish area, which also includes the Parshall field

... lower Bakken silt, which is primarily present at our Hidden Bench prospect. The lower Bakken silt is situated between the Middle Bakken and upper Three Forks. We plan to bracket this formation with as many as 8 wells above and 7 wells below the lower Bakken silt.

I'll quit there, but I think you get the idea. As the Motley Fool says, "the Bakken is a beast."

Hess In The News: Several Stories

First story from Yahoo! In-Play:

Hess announces culmination of transformation Into a E&P company; HES anticipates achieving a five year compound average annual production growth rate of 5 to 8%: Co announced several initiatives marking the culmination of its multi-year strategic transformation into a pure play exploration and production company.

Second story from Yahoo! In-Play:

Hess issues letter to shareholders; responds to Elliott Management's flawed recommendations : Co letter stated "Indeed, now more than halfway through our transformation, the market has been recognizing our progress. Hess shares significantly outperformed the peer index, rising from $43.93 to $58.90 per share, an increase of 34% in the period between our mid-year strategy update on July 25, 2012 and the January 28, 2013 announcement of our planned terminals sale. On Friday, March 1, our shares closed at $66.54 per share. Operating performance has also been strong. 2012 cash flow from operations was the highest in our 80 year history and 2012 net income was our third highest....In the first phase of our transformation, we invested significantly in our most promising assets, substantially increasing our leadership in the Bakken oil shale, and entering the Utica shale, while acquiring an additional ownership stake in the Valhall Field (Norway).  

The letter goes on.

Third story: Hess will sell retail business; focus on oil. Shares surge.

*****************
A Letter to the Granddaughters

It is so amazing what one finds in the most unexpected places. This from one of Sylvia Plath's journals as recorded in Elizabeth Winder's Pain, Parties, Work: Sylvia Plath in New York, Summer 1953:

I am no longer the crackpot idealist who will eat red beans in a tenement all her life. I like theater, books, paintings, travel, all which costs more than intangible dreams can buy ... To learn that you can't be a revolutionary. To learn that while you dream and believe in utopia you will scratch and scrabble for your daily bread in your hometown and will be damn glad if there's butter on it. To learn that money makes life smooth in some ways, and to feel how tight and threadbare life is if you don't. -- p. 148

[Some punctuation added to the excerpt.]

And then this, same source, p. 182:

 Sylvia turned to Margaret: "Do Mormons believe in life after death?"
"Yes, the soul continues to progress and evolve," explained Margaret.
"Oh, good," Sylvia seemed mildly relieved. "Otherwise it'd be such a waste." Then she slipped out early for a data at Café de la Paix.

Enbridge Announces Completion of Bakken Expansion Program; A Chicago Connection; Meanwhile -- The Winter of 2012 - 2013: Global Warming Will Wallop the East -- Again

From Yahoo! In-Play:

Enbridge Energy and Enbridge Income Fund announce completion of Bakken pipeline expansion project : Co announced that the Bakken Pipeline Expansion Project  part of Enbridge's Bakken Expansion Program, is now complete and in service... reversed and expanded an existing pipeline, running from Berthold, North Dakota, to Steelman, Saskatchewan, and constructed a new 16-inch pipeline from a new terminal near Steelman to the Enbridge Pipelines Inc. mainline terminal near Cromer, Manitoba.

This is interesting. Note the direction of Bakken oil.

A reader sent me this link to an interactive map for the Enbridge pipeline system, along with this statement:

“The new completed pipeline will carry crude oil from Berthold, North Dakota to Cromer, Manitoba where crude volumes can then access the Enbridge mainline pipeline system serving the U.S. Midwest, Midcontinent and eastern Canada."

The reader noted that this "new completed pipeline" means Bakken oil can get to Chicago pretty directly.

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Speaking of Chicago:a winterless 2013 -- but that can't be said for the East Coast.

Link here to the non-partisan website, AccuWeather.com.

Impacts from a storm targeting millions of people in the eastern states will range from travel disruptions and power outages caused by heavy snow to coastal flooding from storm surge.

A major storm will bring heavy snow from parts of North Carolina to portions of West Virginia, Pennsylvania and New Jersey spanning Wednesday into Thursday.

I don't know if this storm has been named, but we're up to R, as in "Rocky." Yup, it looks like this is winter storm "Rocky."

Meanwhile, Florida is setting cold weather records. TampaBayCBS is reporting:

Spring Breakers flocking south to Florida’s typically warm and sunny beaches are bringing along a very unwelcome guest this year – Old Man Winter.

Temperatures averaging 10 to 20 degrees below normal have taken a southward dip into the southeastern portion of the U.S., with temperature highs sitting unseasonably low in the 50 and 60 degree range.

These spring break students will return to university eager to march on Washington, DC, advocating ... well, advocating something...

RBN Energy: Part III of Crude-by-Rail, The Bakken

(Wells coming off the confidential list today have been posted. Click on this blue link.)

For quick snapshot of terminals in North Dakota, click here. This list will not be as accurate, and not as up to date as the RBN list. If I were you, I would go to RBN Energy links first. 

Link here for RBN Energy's third installment of CBR terminals in North Dakota.

Featured:

• Lario's Bakken Oil Express
• Dakota Plains
• Bakkenlink

The lede at the linked RBN Energy site today:

The first episode in this series provided an introduction and overview of the “Year of the Tank Car” (see Crude Loves Rocking Rail). We described the rapid growth in US crude oil production that pressured pipeline logistics and made rail a viable alternative for taking crude to market. The second installment (see Crude Loves Rocking Rail – The Bakken Terminals) began our survey of rail loading terminals with a map and a complete list of facilities in North Dakota.

In the previous episode to this (see Plains, Enbridge and Global) we reviewed three Bakken merchant terminals. Those terminals are mostly third party fee for service facilities that provide crude truck unloading as well as storage, blending, rail loading and pipeline connections. One of the merchant terminals that we cover today – Dakota Plains purchase the crude that they ship at the wellhead and deliver it to refiners rather than just offering transportation services to producers. The other three terminals covered here are traditional fee for service facilities.

All of the episodes in this series can be found at the www.rbnenergy.com website under the Daily Energy Post tab. As you read this series you may find it useful to refer back to the map and table listing of Bakken terminals that we provided previously (click here to download a PDF copy of the map.

 WSJ Links

Section R (Investing in Funds & ETFS):

Section C (Money & Investing):
Heard on the street: cheaper oil would help XOM make a much-needed deal to fuel growth
Google's Chrome and punishment for PCs: Samsung's Chromebook for $249

Section B (Marketplace):
Houston's gushers leave some dry; I would not have posted this except for fact that Warren Buffett's BNSF is mentioned
Google does not have to pay fees for linking URLs -- German courts. One word: wow.
Lots of stories on LeBron James lately -- many sources; no links; easily found;

Section A
Front page headline: US boosts war role in Africa; this one is important; Chester wrote to tell me that President Obama has a domestic legacy (first term: ObamaCare; second term: Keystone) but no foreign policy legacy, unlike his predecessors. It is also well-known that second term presidents often turn overseas;

White House and Congress not even talking about the 2% sequester; been there, done that; negotiations move to debt ceiling and preventing a government shutdown; no links; stories everywhere; easily found

As pirates run rampant, TV studios dial up pursuit: I have not read this one yet, but I might comment on it later. I had discussion with Harvard MBA on a related subject; of course he was wrong, I was right, but he won the debate. Smile.

Baby cured of AIDS for the first time, no links, stories everywhere. In Mississippi. The physician's name: Dr Gay. 

Op-ed: no more Keystone excuses; will Obama side with science and jobs, throw his fringe left under the taxi, or side with faux fringe environmentalists?

Op-ed: the reverse-Joads of California;