Eight Wells Coming Off Confidential List Today; Active Rigs At 68 In North Dakota -- January 16, 2019

Williston High School band is headed for Washington, DC, for the July 4th parade!

ISO New England: spiking. The first spike was just before midnight last night when the spot price of electricity went slightly over $150/MW. Now this morning, it hit $100/MW. Coal is now providing 2% of needed power. Natural gas is at 52% and renewable energy is less than 10%. Hydroelectricity is just starting its typical move up; that will drive the price. 

The was is won! The war against OPEC price gouging is over. The US won. -- Investor's Business Daily.

The situation began to change in 2008, when advances in directional drilling and hydraulic fracturing, commonly called "fracking," technologies unlocked oil and natural gas resources that had been too difficult and too expensive to recover. After a decade of increasing production, U.S. energy producers in 2018 finally topped our previous record production that occurred in 1970.

API: weekly crude inventories, dropped only 650,000 bbls; forecast: the draw would be at least 2.5 million bbls. My hunch: today's EIA figures will be a lot different than what the API reported yesterday.

The Amad: can be tracked here. It is now just northeast of the Lesser Antilles.

Brexit: a huge, huge lesson for any country that wants to leave. Never gonna happen. Brussels is now firmly in control. The bureaucrats run the lives of all Europeans. Say goodbye to free-market capitalism.

Crisis! What crisis? IRS recalling 46,000 workers to handle tax returns. I wonder if they are getting paid. If so, it speaks volumes.

Silver lining? As more and more TSA workers call in sick, the more efficient airlines/screeners will have to become. When this is all over, it's always possible the whole process will be much improved. I remember the day when the screening process in Portland, OR, was incredibly efficient. Long story for another day.  But the fact that the government is "recalling" IRS agents but at the same time seeming to turn a blind eye to the TSA issue suggests something is going on behind the scenes.

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Back to the Bakken

A bunch of wells coming off the confidential list today -- Wednesday, January 16, 2019

• 34652, SI/NC, WPX, Lawrence Bull 1-12HZ, South Fork, no production data,
• 34492, 1,287, Nine Point Energy, Hovde 150-100-6-7-3H, 60 stages; 10 million lbs, Spring Creek, t8/18; cum 106K 11/18;
• 34491, 1,126, Nine Point Energy, Hovde 150-100-6-7-4H, 60 stages, 12 million lbs, Spring Creek, t7/18; cum 103K 11/18;
• 34490, 1,652, Nine Point Energy, Hovde 150-100-6-7-13H, 60 stages; 10 million lbs, Rawson, t7/18; cum 108K 11/18;
• 33644, 1,744, CLR, Omlid 6-19H, Elidah, t11/18; cum 11,509 bbls after 9 days, extrapolates to 38K for 30 days;
• 32844, 360, BR, Remington-Lovaas 4C UTFH-ULW, Blue Buttes, t11/18; cum --;
• 32431, 4,215, Bruin, Fort Berthold 151-94-26B-35-13H, 55 stages, 14.5 million lbs, Antelope-Sanish, t7/18; cum 175K 11/18;
• 31777, 3,376, Bruin, Fort Berthold 151-94-26B-35-11H, 55 stages; 14.3 million lbs, Antelope-Sanish, t7/18; cum 160K 11/18;

Active rigs:

$51.68	1/16/2019	01/16/2018	01/16/2017	01/16/2016	01/16/2015
Active Rigs	68	57	36	49	157

RBN Energy: Mexico's pipeline theft crackdown inflicts pain on US gasoline suppliers.

With Petróleos Mexicanos’ (Pemex) refineries struggling to operate at more than 30% of total capacity, gasoline pumps across Mexico are more likely to be filling up tanks with fuel imported from the U.S. than with domestic supply. This arrangement works well for U.S. refiners, who are running close to flat-out and depending on export volumes to clear the market. But now, the Mexican government has shut a number of refined products pipelines to prevent illegal tapping, and that’s had two consequences:  widespread fuel shortages among Mexican consumers and a logjam of American supplies waiting to come into Mexico’s ports. Today, we explain the opportunities and risks posed to U.S. refiners that have ramped up their involvement with — and dependence on — the Mexican market. 

Mexico’s refining sector is in dire straits. As of November 2018, only one of its six refineries was operating at more than half of its nameplate capacity, two weren’t running at all and the remaining three were chugging along at between 32% and 44% of their capacities. The problems aren’t new; Mexico’s refinery utilization rates have collapsed in the past couple of years. That’s in large part due to operational inefficiencies that have made refining less than economical there. Additionally, as we have discussed at length, the quantity and quality of Mexico’s crude output have exacerbated those problems. The country’s crude production in November 2018 was 40% lower than a decade prior. And the composition of Mexico’s crude has been getting heavier — that is, lower in API gravity — with nearly 61% of total output categorized as “heavy” by Pemex. Figure 1 shows gasoline output (blue line) has fallen below 300 Mb/d for much of the past two years. Diesel production (red line) hasn’t surpassed 200 Mb/d since March 2017.