Without Question, The Big Story In February, 2019, Director's Cut -- Flaring -- April 13, 2019

The February, 2019, data is posted here.

Ever since the Bakken boom began, the flaring issue has been most problematic on the reservation.

Some months ago, the state threw in the towel and relaxed the rules.

Prior to relaxing the rules, the percent of produced natural gas captured on the reservation was not too far different from that of the rest of the state.

The state goal is to capture 88% of produced natural gas, a compromise between what the faux environmentalists would like and the oil companies would like. Don't take that out of context. The oil companies have their "goals"; the faux environmentalists have their "goals." The former measures success in dollars and cents; the faux environmentalists measure their success differently, but certainly not in dollars and cents. Do not take that out of context. The regulators have to thread the needle using different parameters when setting standards, goals, regulations. Not an easy task.

We've had this discussion before.

Wow, a digression. All I wanted to say is that the state was approaching success in meeting their goal to capture 88% of produced natural gas. But the reservation is the laggard. Last month, the reservation captured 71% of produced natural gas. I thought that was an all-time (recent) low and couldn't get lower. Boy, was I wrong. In February, 69% capture rate.

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For The Record