Only One Well Comes Off Confidential List Today; Russian Oil Imports Surging; Jobs -- March 8, 2019

Jobs: good, bad, indifferent --actual -- 20,000 3.8%

• forecast
• 210,000, 3.8
• 200,000, 3.9
• 195,000, 3.5
• 200,000, 3.9 
• 189,000, private jobs only, Steve Liesman, doesn't do govt numbers,
• 239,000, won't give rate, Rick Santelli

Dow, futures:

• before February jobs number is released: down 130 points
• after Februaryjobs number is released: down 200 points

Russia's oil exports to US surge amid sanction on Venezuela. Link here. Data points:

• data from February
• Russian imports highest since 2011
• taking advantage of the Venezuelan collapse
• So, let's see how much oil we're talking about --
• 3.19 million bbls in the week February 23 t0 March 1
• about 500,000 bopd
• but most of it naphtha and fuel oil 
• Venezuela (preliminary EIA data)
• most recent week: 83,000 bopd
• previous week: 208,000 bopd
• Venezuela uses naphtha as a diluent

ISO New England: link here. Actually doing quite well; remains in $50 - $75/MWh range; 2% coal; renewables, 8%.

***********************************

Back to the Bakken

Only one well coming off confidential list today -- Friday, March 8, 2019: 27 wells for the month; 27 wells for the quarter

• 33088, 1,939, CLR, Sakakawea Federal 2-19H, Elm Tree, 64 stages, 15.8 million lbs, t1/19; cum 20K 1/19;

Active rigs:

$55.35	3/8/2019	03/08/2018	03/08/2017	03/08/2016	03/08/2015
Active Rigs	65	59	44	33	114

RBN Energy: part 2 -- more Mexican gas pipelines on the way, but challenges loom.

The Mexican market is critically important to Permian producers. Rising gas demand south of the border — along with expected gains in LNG exports from new liquefaction/export facilities along the Gulf Coast — are key to their plans to significantly increase production of crude oil, which brings with it large volumes of associated gas.

All that gas needs a market, and nearby Mexico is a natural. For a number of years now, Mexico’s Comisión Federal de Electricidad has been working to implement a plan to add dozens of new gas-fired power plants and to support the development of new gas pipelines to transport gas to them from the U.S. The new pipelines have been coming online at a slower-than-planned pace. But what pipeline capacity has been added across the border from West Texas is already changing Mexico’s gas market. The El Encino Hub in Northwest Mexico is one such area where there are signs of a shifting supply-demand balance. Today, we continue a blog series on key gas pipeline developments down Mexico way and the implications for gas flows, this time delving into the dynamics at the El Encino Hub.

The aim of this series is to provide an update on pipeline development in Mexico. In Part 1, we focused on pipelines entering Mexico from far West Texas.

We noted that natural gas enters Northwest Mexico on three pipelines from the U.S.: Kinder Morgan’s El Paso Natural Gas (EPNG; aqua-green lines), the ONEOK-operated Roadrunner (orange line), and the Energy Transfer-operated Comanche Trail (brown line). Note that Roadrunner is owned in a 50/50 joint venture between Fermaca and ONEOK, while Comanche Trail is owned by a consortium comprising Carso Group (51%), Mastec (33%) and Energy Transfer (16%).

Volumes on these three pipelines have been running around 400 MMcf/d combined, about half of which is delivered to power plants and local distribution companies (LDCs) near the town of Samalayuca, which is just south of the major Northwest Mexico industrial center of Ciudad Juarez. The rest of the gas then flows south toward El Encino, mostly on Fermaca’s Tarahumara Pipeline or on SISTRANGAS. In the future, gas from West Texas will also be able to access the Samalayuca-Sasabe Pipeline.