Wednesday

Whiting and Petro-Hunt each report a "high-IP"well. 

Disclaimer: this is not an investment site. Do not make any investment decisions based on anything you read at this site or anything you think you might have read at this site.

EPD and Tallgrass Energy report increased dividends/distributions. For EPD, at one penny, inconsequential. 

Natural gas prices continue to climb. The Wall Street Journal is reporting: weather forecasts called for a potential second blast of frigid temperatures in late January that is likely to boost demand for the heating fuel.

Active rigs in North Dakota: 188

RBN Energy: This is a great post preceding the Denver Congress, 29 - 30 January, 2014, when the focus will be on CBR and pipeline takeaway capacity in the Bakken. RBN Energy asks today whether new tank car rules will derail the Bakken. I haven't read it yet, but my answer is "no." Let's see what RBN Energy has to say.

The recent tragic spate of four rail accidents involving crude-by-rail, three of them carrying crude from North Dakota, have increased pressure for regulation of rail tank car standards. The railroad industry- through the American Railroad Association (ARA) - proposed improved safety standards in 2011 for tank cars carrying hazardous materials including crude oil. These standards have been adopted by US tank car builders and were mandated this week by the Canadian Government for new tank car construction. If the new standards applied to all existing tank cars then at least 75,000 cars manufactured before 2011 would require retrofitting. Today we examine the impact hastily implemented new regulatory requirements might have on Bakken crude oil takeaway.

No spoiler alert; you have to go to the linked story to see the answer. Suffice it to say that I have ben "way wrong" suggesting that there is now adequate pipeline to get oil out of the Bakken. The slides at the linked story clearly suggest that there is not enough pipeline takeaway to meet Bakken production.

In addition, The Wall Street Journal has a front-section story on the same subject: CBR and the Bakken.

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The Wall Street Journal

Perhaps most interesting story of the day: a federal appeals court opens the way for broadband providers to charge content companies for faster speeds, striking down federal rules that required equal treatment of internet traffic. My hunch: the legal battles are not yet over.

Cities grapple with oil-train safety.

Every day, a train more than a mile long travels alongside a highway in Albany, N.Y., a half-mile from the state capitol building and even closer to houses.

Its cargo is crude oil from North Dakota, which federal regulators and railroads fear is more explosive than other oils. In the past year, Albany has become an unlikely hub for the U.S. oil business, taking in shipments by rail and sending them out by ship down the Hudson River to refineries.

Now officials there are trying to get up to speed on how to handle a potential oil-train accident, as are their peers from Chicago to Denver to New Orleans.

Railroad officials don't like to talk about it, but oil trains are rumbling through many large cities because of surging output from North Dakota's Bakken shale.

Functioning as pipelines on rails, tanker cars full of oil pass through Detroit, Philadelphia, Toronto, St. Louis, Kansas City and Houston, among others. Bakken crude, which has been involved in three major explosions after rail accidents in the past seven months, is traveling to every corner of the country: west into Washington state and then south to refineries near Los Angeles; south to Gulf Coast refiners; north into Canada; and east to refineries in New Jersey and Philadelphia.

My hunch: cities strapped for cash have just found another set of deep pockets. 

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Mac Pro is a Lamborghini, but who drives that fast? You would be surprised. Big name Hollywood producers and directors for starters. I will post the fun stuff at the very bottom so as not to annoy readers.

The Stockton California diocese will file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy to address growing liabilities stemming from allegations of sexual abuse. Also see the story at this post; if you go to that link, you have to scroll down to find the story.

It's hard to "kill" a plane. This surprised me. I did not know they were still flying. Admirers join forces to save the Warthog.

The Air Force's budget-cutting plan to retire hundreds of jets that have provided invaluable protection for U.S. troops is creating strange bedfellows, as influential lawmakers and longtime critics of Pentagon bloat rally to save the A-10 "Warthog."

For more than two decades, the A-10 Thunderbolt II has provided aerial protection to ground troops, a task it has performed from Iraq's "Highway of Death" in the first Gulf War to the Taliban strongholds of eastern Afghanistan. Few people at the Pentagon challenge the plane's reputation for providing forces with the best support possible.

Eliminating the Warthog—so named because of its ugly, snub-nosed design—is one way the Air Force is looking to deal with its need to trim more than $50 billion from its budget over the next five years as part of a broader congressional mandate that the Pentagon out $500 billion the next decade. Air Force officials say retiring the entire fleet of about 300 A-10s by 2020 would save a total of $3.7 billion.

$3.7 billion over 6 years = $0.6 billion / year. Hardly worth talking about. But great photo-ops. And politicians can speak to their constituencies.

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Jobs deal collapses in the Senate. I thought Senator Schumer was worried about the House. LOL. Just a reminder: the Dems are solidly in control of the Senate. They can pass anything they want. Even unemployment benefit extensions.

Say it ain't so. Beanie Babies creator sentenced to probation for tax evasion.

Supreme Court bars Argentina suit against Daimler. Watershed moment. Repercussions for the Ecuador-Chevron case? Probably no link. I've lost the bubble on which court this case is currently being tried. Canadian? Whatever.

Tesla will start building charging stations in China. Okay. How does one spell Quixote?

The Los Angeles Times

Good for them. LA unified school district ignores advice, moves ahead with iPad program. Sends a message.

The Boston Globe

One western Massachusetts school district is considering a 4-day school week. Bus transportation costs too much.  Meanwhile the governor is pouring money into the Boston transit system.

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That Apple Story

From the article --

My recommendation: Buy an iMac now. It is the Lexus of desktop computers, but trust me, it will handle whatever you throw at it. In two to three years, upgrade to a new one, when the technology has moved along.

The price of two computers over five years will still be less than what you'd spend on one 8-core Mac Pro. People who favor Windows may wonder why I've focused on Apple. The answer is that most consumers who spend more than $1,000 on a computer buy a Mac.

For those people, the question is which one. What caught my eye about the Mac Pro is that Apple priced the entry-level model a tantalizing $1,000 more than a top-of-the-line iMac. Mac Pros don't come with a monitor or keyboard, so the actual price difference for the entry model can be closer to $2,000. The gallon-jug-sized Mac Pro is shaped like a cylinder, with lights on the back that come alive when you move it, an adorable flourish of questionable usefulness. The cover comes off so you can show off the hardware under the hood. While Apple abandoned the tower computer design used by most pro desktops, it didn't skimp on specs. The main processor can have up to 12 cores (standard computers have two or four) and there are two dedicated graphics processors.

Instead of adding new capabilities inside the case, Apple wants you to expand it with peripherals that connect via the fast Thunderbolt cable (as well as the latest versions of USB, HDMI, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth). The Mac Pro's most brag-worthy advantage is it can run up to three Ultra HD (aka 4K) displays—each with four times the resolution of your hi-def TV. But this may be too forward looking. Apple doesn't make an Ultra HD monitor, and the Sharp model it currently recommends costs $3,500. Dell and Lenovo recently announced their own Ultra HD screens priced under $1,000.

Apple has supported most aftermarket monitors, but hasn't yet certified these or said whether it is planning a desktop version of the Retina-display experience it offers on mobile devices and the MacBook Pro. For now, your best Mac Pro monitor option is Apple's $1,000 Thunderbolt Display, which is similar to the 27-inch iMac's.