Three Wells Coming Off Confidential List Today -- May 14, 2019

NDIC monthly report: expect the Director's Cut to be released tomorrow, May 15, 2019, at 2:00 p.m. Link here. 

Mideast: reports of drones attacking Saudi pipelines. WTI up 1.5% today; up about a dollar, now trading just below $62. 

US shale: setting new production records. Link here. For another view, the shale boom is about to go bust (previously linked).

Weatherford: to file for Chapter 11.

Keeping America great: Eqinor to pay almost a billion dollars for a stake in Shell's oilfield in the Gulf of Mexico. Data points:

• will acquire an additional 22.45 percent in Shell Offshore Inc.'s Caesar Tonga oilfield
• 180 miles SSW of New Orleans
• Equinor's current production from this area: 18,600 boepd
• all cash
• a month ago, the deal was expected to be with Delek Group and not Equinor
• Equinor had preferential rights
• the field, now
  Equinor: 46%
• Anadarko, the operator: 33.75%
• Chevron: 20.25% (you can start to see the synergies Chevron saw with Anadarko)
• back of the envelope
• already has 22.45%
• exactly doubles that
• 18,600 boepd x $50 = about $1 million / day
• $1 billion cash / $1 million /day ---> 1,000 days of production

Wells coming off confidential list today -- Tuesday, May 14,  2019:

• 34634, SI/NC, Slawson, Wolverine Federal 13-31-30TF2H, Elm Tree, no production data,
• 34238, 640, Oasis, Aagvik 5298 42-23 8T, Banks, t12/18; cum 80K 3/19; the Aagvik wells are tracked here;
• 34237, 576, Oasis, Aagvik 5298 42-23 7B, Banks, t12/18; cum 111K 3/19;

Active rigs:

$61.96	5/14/2019	05/14/2018	05/14/2017	05/14/2016	05/14/2015
Active Rigs	64	60	51	27	83

RBN Energy: Gulf Coast Express set to reshuffle some Permian gas outflows.

Permian natural gas prices have been on a wild ride lately, trading more than $5/MMBtu below zero in early April before recovering to just above zero over the last few weeks. It’s hardly a secret that the Permian’s gas market woes have been the direct result of production exceeding pipeline capacity. That situation is set to change in a few months, when Kinder Morgan starts up its 1.98-Bcf/d Gulf Coast Express Pipeline, providing much needed new takeaway capacity. And that’s not all GCX will do. Its start-up will shift huge volumes of gas toward the Texas Gulf Coast that currently flow out of the Permian to other markets, likely causing a ripple effect across more than just the West Texas gas market. Today, we look at how Kinder Morgan’s new gas pipeline will redirect significant volumes of Permian gas currently flowing north to the Midcontinent.

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

The Magazine Page

This is very timely. I'm in my dinosaur phase, studying again the history of life on earth using the dinosaurs as the midpoint -- for everything that came before and then everything that came after.

The June issue of Scientific America's lead article: "The Rise of the First Animals." Whoo-hoo!

Of course, the magazine had to include a politically correct article, "Yes, Climate Change Is Making Severe Weather Worse." Okay, it is agreed that the temperature of the year will increase by 2 to 5 degrees over the next 100 years which means that we have not seen more than a half a degree change so far, if that. Many would argue it's been much less, and some would argue that it's actually gotten cooler. If so, perhaps global cooling is due to the solar minima which even NOAA/NASA are discussing as "fact." 

So, it's hard for me to believe that "severe weather is getting worse" due to climate change. At worse, the earth has warmed by a a tenth of a degree since Occasional-Cortex was born; perhaps it's gotten slightly cooler; it's possible, the temperature hasn't changed at all. But regardless, it's hard to believe it's affected the weather.

In the United States, hurricanes and tornadoes have been less ferocious than historical and after that I'm not sure what folks mean by severe weather.

The permanent drought we were going to see in the southwest US, if not the entire US: historic floods in Texas and Iowa this year. Maybe that's what they mean by "climate change" making severe weather worse.

For now, I'm going to read about the "rise of the first animals." 

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

The Apple Page

And so it goes:

• Apple flagship update: the Carnegie Library in DC -- Washington Post, Dallas Morning News, May 12, 2019. 
• The problem with the Carnegie Library Apple store -- Citylab, May 10, 2019.
• Crowds, inconvenience show how Apple Store lost its bite -- Bloomberg, Dallas Morning News, May 12, 2019.