Where Does North Dakota Stand On Permitting? Also, Comment On Oasis Completions; July 17, 2015

Updates

Later, 12:35 a.m., July 18, 2015: this is entirely coincidental. I posted the note below a few minutes ago. Then I checked the Discussion Group and saw a message pending. The reader provided this link with a look at permitting in North Dakota:

Since the start of 2015, there have been 1116 permits issued in the Bakken shale play, with a monthly high coming in January at 238 permits issued. This past week, there were 29 permits issued, a -53% decrease from the previous week which had 62 permits.

The top permitting county this past week was McKenzie with 14 permits, down -26% from the prior week, which had 19 permits. Other active counties include Mountrail with 6 permits, Williams with 5 permits, and Divide with 4 permits in the last week. Active drilling rigs are also declining but some operators are talking about adding rigs to core acreage.

In addition to their note on permitting, the authors also talk about Oasis completions: Oasis Improves Completions with High-Intensity Slickwater Fracs:

Oasis Petroleum has completed 167 frac jobs in the Williston since the beginning of 2014, pumping 200K tons of raw sand, 31K tons of resin, and 84K tons of ceramic.

They have used Nabors, Schlumberger, and Baker Hughes for the majority of their jobs in the Williston.

In a completion in Williams County, Oasis used a total of 11.7 million pounds of proppant using 7.8 million pounds of ceramic from Carbo Ceramics, and 3.9 million pounds of raw sand in 20/40 and 40/70 mesh sizes.

They also used the friction reducer WFR-6W from Nabors, which totaled 3,901 pounds or 0.007% of the total mass pumped. They have been testing a new completion design in the core of the Williston, going from 100% ceramic to 90% raw and 10% resin, with 50 stages (up from 36 when they were using the slickwater design).

Original Post
 

I track permitting projections at this site. As of today, July 17, 2015, North Dakota has issued 1,276 oil and gas permits in calendar year 2015, which calculates out to 2,426 by the end of the year. That's more than the number of permits issued in 2013 but less than the number issued in 2014. This is how 2015 looks to date:

Total permits. This is from my database. See disclaimer. I assume my numbers are different from those of the NDIC, but I also assume they are very close. These are only oil and gas permits, not salt water disposal permits. If this information is important to you, go to the source:

• 2014: 3,012
• 2013: 2,247
• 2012: 2,187
• 2011: 1,916

Real time (date, # of permits; projection to end of year)

• July 17, 2015: 1,276, 2,426
• February 10, 2015: 327, 2,911
• January 29, 2015: 241, 3,033
• January 28, 2015: 230, 2,998
• January 23, 2015: 195, 3,095
• January 16, 2015: 134, 3,057
• January 15, 2015: 114, 2,896
• January 14, 2015: 104, 2,738
• January 13, 2015: 97, 2,723
• January 12, 2015: 78, 2,373
• January 9, 2015: 75, 3,042
• January 8, 2015: 71, 3,239
• January 7, 2015: 57, 2,972
• January 2, 2015, 14: 2,555