Random Look At Two Slawson Dual Long Lateral Wells In Big Bend -- July 6, 2018

I'll provide the narrative for these wells sometime over the weekend. Too late to do any more tonight.

More And More Political Leaders And Leading Scientists Are Calling "Manmade Global Warming" A Scam -- July 6, 2018

Earlier today I posted this:

Ontario's premier: "cap and trade" nothing more than a cash grab -- wow -- yes, that Ontario; capital city, Toronto --

• the premier says the province will end its cap-and-trade program
• said it was nothing more than a government cash grab that did not help the environment
• "taxes suck, even if they have a bogus feel-good rationale"

If you do't trust that link, then this is the Reuters link, and if you can't trust Reuters, who can you trust?

• the newly elected Ontario government announced on Tuesday it would end the province’s cap-and-trade program, a policy designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, fulfilling one of Premier Doug Ford’s election promises
• it leaves businesses that bought C$2.8 billion ($2.1 billion) worth of allowances in limbo
• Ford’s Progressive Conservative government swept to power last month, ending 15 years of Liberal rule in Ontario, Canada’s most populous province and the country’s economic engine, with a promise to cut corporate and personal taxes
• the government said it would immediately start an orderly wind-down of all programs funded out of cap-and-trade carbon tax revenues but agreed to honour certain contracts that have already been signed

Australia may soon join Ontario. Link here. 

I am re-posting that because now we have a leading scientist in Japan saying the same thing:

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California Heat

California did just fine today, thank you for asking.  Obviously wind and solar kicked in to save the day. Peak demand well below capacity. Link at ISO California:

Three DUCs Reported As Completed; Twelve Permits Renewed; None Canceled; Seven New Permits -- July 6, 2018

Weekly petroleum report, link here:

• US crude oil reserves unexpectedly rose by 1.2 million bbls (not all that much in the big scheme of things)
• gasoline production at 10.3 million bbls (marker: 10 million bbls)
• distillate fuel production at 5.5 million bbls (marker: 5 million bbls, so 5.5 is significant, and good news for the truckers)
• refineries are operating at a very high 97.1% capacity; almost flat out
• considering the data today, WTI did very well for oil bulls, rising slightly

Active rigs:

$73.80↑	7/6/2018	07/06/2017	07/06/2016	07/06/2015	07/06/2014
Active Rigs	65	57	31	76	191

Seven new permits:

• Operators: Kraken (4); CLR (2); Resource Energy Can-Am;
• Fields: Squires (Williams); Oakdale (Dunn); and, Resource has a wildcat in Divide County 
• Comments: CLR has permits for two more Oakdale wells in SWNE 26-147-96; Kraken Operating has permits for a 4-well pad in 1-154-103; and finally, as noted, Resource Energy has a wildcat north of Williston, in Divide County, in SENE 21-163-98;

Twelve permits renewed:

• EOG (4): four Burke permits in Mountrail County
• CLR (4): two Olympia permits in Williams County; and, two Charleston permits in Williams County
• Thunderbird (3): three Watson A permits in McKenzie County
• Oasis: one Kaitlin Federal permit in Mountrail County

And look at this, three completed wells (DUCs) reported as completed (the neighboring wells are still off-line):

• 32749, --, CLR, Dvirnak 8-7H, Jim Creek,
• 33221, --, CLR, Miles 7-6H, Dimmick Lake,
• 33220, --, CLR, Miles 8-6H1, Dimmick Lake

Reader Has Question Regarding Equinor (Statoil) Wells Northeast Of Williston, East Fork, Section 35-156-100 -- July 6, 2018

Disclaimer: in a long, "speculative" note like this there are likely to be typographical and factual errors. The purpose of the post is to help me better understand the Bakken. If this information is important to you, go to the source (the operator or the NDIC).

Over at the discussion group, a reader asks:

With regard to: T156 R100 section 35, example, Jennifer 26-35 #1H (#23033). Nine new wells were drilled from June through September 2017. The reader says he is not sure when the wells will be fracked/completed. He/she is wondering if any one has insight regarding these wells.

The nine wells that have been drilled in the past year or so, aren't required to be completed until late 2019 at the earliest. The reader is curious if anyone has any information suggesting the wells might be completed sooner.

It's a bit difficult to sort out all the wells on the 12-well pad to the east (six wells run north; six wells run south into section 35-156-100 (outlined with four "short" lines).

Likewise the 8-well pad to the west (four wells run north; four wells run south).

The graphics:

The wells:

Section 34-156-100:
28506,
23754,
23752,
28505,

Section 35-156-100 (this is the section the reader is asking about) (the date at the end of each entry is the date the well went on SI/NC; from the date the well goes on the SI/NC (DUC) list, the operator has two years to complete the well; wells may start producing before the deadline; if so, they start paying royalties once runs have begun even if the well is still on the SI/NC or conf list;

33577, SI/NC, Statoil, Jennifer 26-35 XW 1TFH, East Fork, 7/17;
33575, SI/NC, Statoil, Jennifer 26-35 3H, East Fork, 9/17;
23035, SI/NC, Statoil, Jennifer 26-35 2TFH, East Fork, 8/17; 
23033, 2,888, Statoil, Jennifer 26-35 1H, East Fork, t11/12; cum 242K 3/17; off-line since 3/17;

33564, SI/NC, Statoil, Jennifer 26-35 4TFH, East Fork, 10/17;
33566, SI/NC, Statoil, Jennifer 26-35 5H, East Fork, 11/17;
33568, SI/NC, Statoil, Jennifer 26-35 6TFH, East Fork, 11/17;
33570, SI/NC, Statoil, Jennifer 26-35 7H, East Fork, 12/17;
33572, SI/NC, Statoil, Jennifer 26-35 8TFH, East Fork, 1/18;
33574, SI/NC, Statoil, Irene Hovland 26-35 XE 1H, East Fork, 2/18;

Flashback: An American Crude Oil Gusher -- July 6, 2018 -- Quick! Name The Most Productive On-Shore Well In 2012

Doesn't know his history: China's Xi says "Trump has unleashed the largest trade war in economic history." Way wrong. Maybe China's Xi needs to re-read the history of the "opium wars" and how that turned out for the Chinese.

One of my least favorite tropes: lack of investment by the oil companies over the past ten years is going to result in $150-oil in the out years.

Predicting the price of oil is a fool's errand. I'm certainly in the minority on this but I'm not a bit worried about this "lack of investment." It's another trope. If that's the right word.

Bloomberg pressed that trope again -- the lack of investment by the oil sector.  The headline does not provide a time frame; the article does: 2030 -- twelve years from now. My hunch is that Ben Sharples can't even predict accurately what the price of oil will be next week, much less the price of crude oil in 2030.

With regard to lack of investment and lack of exploration, take a look at the sidebar at the right that lists all the shale plays in the US if the price is right. There must be three dozen plays, and right now, only three are actively being pursued: the Permian, the Bakken, and the Eagle Ford.

Quick: in what basin was the largest onshore well in 2012 found? The answer is at this link.

Without the aid of pumps or fracking, the oil just flooded out — more than 600,000 barrels in its first year, making it the nation’s most productive on-shore well in 2012.

The hydrocarbon bounty, however, includes unexpectedly large amounts of methane and other components of natural gas that Fidelity has to burn off because there is no way to get those fuels to market.

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The Literary Page

I just finished Graham Greene's The Quiet American.

It started with Edmund de Wall's books on ceramics, and then moving to the Gavin Menzies' books, and then to W. Travis Hanes The Opium Wars, I finally ended up with The Quiet American. I think the immediate precursor was the "biography" of Edward Lansdale and the lead-up to the US war in Vietnam.

Wow, The Quiet American. What an incredible book. The way Graham Greene can move from the far past to the recent past to the future, and even throw in an epilogue, is quite incredible.

If I recall correctly, "it" was said that Graham Greene, when asked, specifically said Edward Lansdale was not the "model" for the character in The Quiet American who told the story, but that's hard to believe. Too many coincidences between the book and the story of Edward Lansdale.

Trumponomices -- July 6, 2018 -- Quick! Name The First Woman To Be Awarded The Nobel Peace Prize

Updates

Later, 12:28 p.m. CDT: this is not an investment site. Having said that, think about this --

• record number of folks employed
• wages going up (slowly)
• these record number of employed folks are buying things
• US corporations got a tax break this year, from 35% to 21% (is that correct?) -- it seems analysts have completely forgotten
• great buying opportunity

Disclaimer: this is not an investment site.

Original Post

Screenshots worth a thousand words:

WTI turns positive: up about a percent, now trading at $73.60.

What's not to like?

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The Library Page

 A vignette from The Vertigo Years: Europe, 1900 - 1914, Philipp Blom, c. 2008, pp 190 - 192.

Baroness Suttner (1843 - 1914) was a remarkable woman. 

Born Countess Kinsky in Prague, she belonged to one of the Habsburg empire’s most illustrious families. 

Her father having died before her birth, Bertha’s childhood was dominated by her nervous and impulsive mother, whose addiction to gambling soon squandered the remnants of the family fortune. The young countess was forced to earn her living, even though her aristocratic upbringing had prepared her for little more than life in elegant drawing rooms. Enterprising from the start, she attempted to make a career as a singer and then as a music teacher. But despite her accomplishments at the piano it was difficult to make ends meet, and so the young woman chose the only alternative left for one of her class: in 1873, aged thirty, she became a lady companion at the house of Baron von Suttner in Vienna. 

What followed seems to have sprung off the pages of a romantic novel. 

The young, poverty-stricken noblewoman fell in love with Arthur von Suttner, her employer’s son. 

Faced with stiff parental opposition, she fled temptation and moved to Paris where she answered a newspaper advertisement for a position as private secretary to a ‘wealthy elderly gentleman’ whose melancholy, cultured personality enchanted her. 

He was Alfred Nobel, the industrialist and inventor of dynamite. After a few weeks, however, passion got the better of reason and the Baroness travelled back to Vienna and eloped with Arthur. 

Penniless, the couple were in no position to choose their place of exile and went to the Caucasus (today Georgia), where a friend of the family had a country estate. Twelve years of hardship followed, during which Bertha tried to earn money by penning occasional pieces for Viennese newspapers and Arthur contributed his part by giving French conversation and riding lessons.

During the Russo-Turkish War of 1877 - 1878, Bertha was appalled to see the misery of war in wounded soldiers and civilians, and she turned her home in Tiflis into a makeshift hospital. The impression was so deep that she resolved to devote the rest of her life to promoting peace.

By 1885, the couple’s financial situation and relations with the von Suttner family were sufficiently stabilized to envisage a move back to Vienna, where Bertha threw herself into writing an autobiographical novel, Die Waffen nieder! (Put Down Your Arms!), which appeared in 1889 and was an immediate bestseller. Her descriptions of anguished wives and mothers and massacred soldiers, of lives and hopes destroyed in the name of glory and fatherland, touched hundreds of thousands of readers, and suddenly Bertha von Suttner was a household name.

More than thirty novels followed.

Inevitably, Baroness Suttner’s fame was controversial …

…. undeterred by sexual politics, criticism, and caricature, Baroness Suttner continued her campaign. Her platonic affair with Alfred Nobel had not ended with her flight back to her lover, and she had kept up a steady correspondence with the older man, who had become a father figure to her….

…. conceived for use in engineering, in building tunnels, mines and roads, dynamite had also transformed warfare, and Nobel was acutely aware that a part of his fortune rested on destruction. He therefore resolved to devote his profits to the promotion of peace.

In 1892, [he and Baroness Suttner] hatched the plan of awarding a prize in Alfred’s name to peace activists. Nobel died in 1896. In his well he bequeathed his entire fortune to a foundation to award prizes in Physics, Chemistry, Physiology or Medicine, Literature and Peace.

In 1905 the Nobel Prize was award to Bertha von Suttner, who painted an apocalyptic protrait of conflict in the age of industrial warfare.

Baroness Bertha von Suttner was the first woman to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

In the story above, perhaps "Platonic" is the best word. I prefer "limerence." From wiki:

Psychologist Dorothy Tennov coined the term "limerence" for her 1979 book, Love and Limerence: The Experience of Being in Love, to describe a concept that had grown out of her work in the mid-1960s, when she interviewed over 500 people on the topic of love.

Limerence, which is not exclusively sexual, has been defined in terms of its potentially inspirational effects and in relation to attachment theory. It has been described as being "an involuntary potentially inspiring state of adoration and attachment to a limerent object (LO) involving intrusive and obsessive thoughts, feelings and behaviors from euphoria to despair, contingent on perceived emotional reciprocation".

Attachment theory emphasizes that "many of the most intense emotions arise during the formation, the maintenance, the disruption, and the renewal of attachment relationships".

It has been suggested that "the state of limerence is the conscious experience of sexual incentive motivation" during attachment formation, "a kind of subjective experience of sexual incentive motivation" during the "intensive ... pair-forming stage" of human affectionate bonding.

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Give Her A Feather, She's A Cherokee

And President Trump offers her a million dollars if she can prove her Cherokee heritage. LOL.

Half Breed, Cher
Cher. Always audacious. Often bodacious. Frequently flirtatious. Clearly vivacious.

Trumponomics Sweeps Ontario, Canada -- July 6, 2018

Trade war metric to watch: Chinese banks. Watch for bank failures in China. See also this story. [Later: I posted that note earlier this morning; now this afternoon, 5:10 p.m. CDT, Jim Cramer practically said the same thing. He has no concerns about the "trade war" which some have said is a "trade skirmish" and others have gone so far as to call it "renewed trade negotiations."

Trans Mountain Pipeline: presses on.

Ontario's premier: "cap and trade" nothing more than a cash grab -- wow -- yes, that Ontario; capital city, Toronto --

• the premier says the province will end its cap-and-trade program
• said it was nothing more than a government cash grab that did not help the environment
• "taxes suck, even if they have a bogus feel-good rationale"

If you do't trust that link, then this is the Reuters link, and if you can't trust Reuters, who can you trust?

• the newly elected Ontario government announced on Tuesday it would end the province’s cap-and-trade program, a policy designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, fulfilling one of Premier Doug Ford’s election promises
• it leaves businesses that bought C$2.8 billion ($2.1 billion) worth of allowances in limbo
• Ford’s Progressive Conservative government swept to power last month, ending 15 years of Liberal rule in Ontario, Canada’s most populous province and the country’s economic engine, with a promise to cut corporate and personal taxes
• the government said it would immediately start an orderly wind-down of all programs funded out of cap-and-trade carbon tax revenues but agreed to honour certain contracts that have already been signed

Australia may soon join Ontario. Link here. 

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Fact-Checking Reuters

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Coding Isn't Just For Techies Any More

From FastCompany, back in 2016:

Coding has become a core skill that bolsters a candidate’s chances of commanding a high salary. Jobs that require coding skills pay up to $22,000 per year more, on average.

Nearly half (49%) of all jobs that pay more than $58,000 require some coding skills.

What’s most in demand? The highest demand is for programming languages with broad applicability. Other skills in demand include:

• SQL – Databases
• Java -General purpose programming
• Javascript -Web development
• Linux – Computer system operations
• XML – General purpose programming
• C++ -General purpose programming, especially in engineering
• C# -General purpose programming
• Python -General purpose programming
• .NET -General purpose programming

Olivia, our 12-year-old granddaughter said this was one of the toughest courses, she has ever taken. She says she may need to "repeat" the course next summer.

Southern California In The Danger Zone -- AP; How's That Renewable, Non-Dispatchable Energy Working Out? -- July 6, 2018

Southern California heat -- looms dangerously -- AP.

Danger Zone, Kenny Loggins
From ISO California (of course, no cost projections when demand spikes, exceeding capacity):

Hopefully, the sun and the wind will kick in this afternoon when demand will peak.

Californians screaming! Hey, just like a roller coaster when it comes to renewable, non-dispatchable energy, an unpredictable ride.

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Tesla: Less Green Than Your 2018 Mustang 

From Rizone.  Tesla does not report "green data" unlike other companies --

Engaged Tracking asserts that Tesla, Inc. – in contrast to “older, ‘dirtier’ counterparts in the automobile industry” – neither reports its greenhouse gas emissions nor cites climate change as a “current business issue” when reporting business information. Moreover, based on “emissions intensity” (how much carbon a company emits per dollar of revenue earned), Engaged Tracking contends:

• Tesla’s emissions intensity is 13 times greater than that of BMW, its nearest “fuel-burning” rival, even though BMW in 2017 produced 20 times more vehicles than Tesla.
• Compared to Mercedes, Tesla’s emissions intensity is 70 percent higher.

Engaged Tracking is not alone in highlighting problems with Tesla, Inc. and its products.

For instance, as this March 2016 report from Devonshire Research Group, LLC points out, producing Teslas – and other EVs – is not necessarily a net win from an environmental standpoint.

Citing research from Morgan Stanley, a 2017 article on MarketWatch.com articulates a similar sentiment.

We talked about this years ago; nothing has changed. Unless it's gotten worse?

US Adds 213,000 Jobs In June, 2018 -- Unemployment Ticks Up To 4% -- July 6, 2018

Updates

July 6, 2018: of course this wasn't covered by the mainstream media. Hispanic-Latino unemployment rate hits lowest level on record this past June (2018). Reported over at CNS. 

In June, the unemployment rate for Hispanics and Latinos, aged 16 and up, was 4.6%, down from its May level of 4.9%. Before June’s record, the lowest monthly Hispanic-Latino unemployment rate since BLS began tracking the statistic in 1973 was 4.8%. 

During the 17 full months of the Trump administration, beginning in February 2017, Hispanic-Latino unemployment has averaged 5.0%.I

But it's even better:

While the Hispanic-Latino unemployment rate had been as low as 4.8% in five months, four of those months were during the administration of President Donald Trump; the lone exception being October of 2006:

1. June 2016: 4.6%
2. October 2006: 4.8%
3. June 2017: 4.8%
4. October 2017: 8%
5. November 2017: 4.8%
6. April 2018: 4.8%

In contrast, the national Hispanic-Latino unemployment rate averaged 9.4% during President Barack Obama’s eight years (96 months) in office, impacted by the 2008 recession, which officially ended in June of 2009

Original Post

What a great way to start the day! From twitter today, the most "with-it" president in modern history --

Rocket Man, Elton John  

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Now, Back To Earth

Jobs, June, 2018, NYT:

• unemployment rate ticks up to 4% (I thought we were running out of workers)
• jobs added last month: 213,000
• in line with forecasts; 200,000
• wage growth, year-over-year: 2.7%
• [by the way, how did American Crystal Sugar contract negotiations work out, one year ago?
• Union accepted "best and final" offer, May, 2017, which called for a 3% in wage increases for four years; followed by a 2.75% increase in the contract's final year]

Jobs, June, 2018, Econoday:

• prior: 223,000
• prior revised: 244,000
• consensus for June: 190,000
• actual: 213,000
• unemployment rate: 4.0% (up from 3.8%)
• participation rate: 62.9% (up from 62.7%)
• average workweek: 34.5 hours (unchanged)

MRO: I'm posting this article not for investment advice, but to talk about MRO in a general way since it is very active in the Bakken. Some data points:

• the Permian operators are facing significant headwinds over the next twelve months
• however, the Permian accounts for just about 4% of MRO's total production
• 
  
• MRO accelerated its growth in Oklahoma, Eagle Ford, and the Bakken
• MRO production 
• 1Q18: 284K boepd
• 1Q17: 208K boepd
• MRO has raised its production guidance form shale to 25 - 30% from prior projection of 20 - 25%
• strategic sell-offs since 2015:
• August, 2015: sold its Wilburton, OK, assets; $102 million
• Novembe,r 2015: sold it Gulf of Mexico assets; $205 million
• April, 2016: sold its Wyoming upstream/midstream: $950 million
• October, 2016: sold some non-core Permian; $235 million
• March, 2017: sold high-cost Canadian oil-sands for $2.5 billion
• 2018: sold its acreage in Libya for $450 million
• since 2013: has exited seven countries
• over the past two years, divestitures have raised $5 billion 

Disclaimer: this is not an investment site.

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Back to the Bakken

Another DUC: only one well comes off the confidential list today, and lo and behold, it's another DUC --

• 33392, SI/NC, Crescent Point, CPEUSC Paopao 6-35-26-158N-100W TFH, Dublin, no production data, 

Active rigs:

$72.48↓	7/6/2018	07/06/2017	07/06/2016	07/06/2015	07/06/2014
Active Rigs	66	57	31	76	191

RBN Energy: Permian natural gas prices ride constraint-driven volatility.