How Fast Will They Lay Down Rigs In The Bakken? -- Baseline: 55 -- March 18, 2020

Active rigs:

	3/18/2020	03/18/2019	03/18/2018	03/18/2017	03/18/2016
Active Rigs	55	65	58	47	32

Four new permits, #37452 - #37455, inclusive --

• Operator: Hess
• Field: Little Knife (Dunn)
• Comments: 
• Hess has permits for a four-well LK-Hamilton pad in lot 4, section 2-145-97, Little Knife oil field

One permit approved for re-entry:

• 17256, 430, MRO, Reiss Ranch 24-10H, Killdeer, t7/08; cum 2279K 3/20; off line 3/19; remains off line 4/20; see below;

Two permits renewed:

• XTO: two Frisinger permits in Williams County.

Three producing wells (DUCs) reported as completed:

• 35656, A/SI, CLR, Boise 4-24HSL, 33-053-085032, Brooklyn, t--; cum 11K over 16 days; fracked 1/10/20 - 1/26/20; 8.7 million gallons of water; 87.8% water by mass; friction reducer, 1.0005; the "norm" runs about 0.05 - 0.06; cum 85K 4/20;
• 34851, A/SI, CLR, Pittsburgh 8-18H, 33-053-08510, Banks, t--; cum 51K over 31 days; fracked 6/3/19 - 6/21/19; 11.1 million gallons of water; 88.7% water by mass; friction reducer, 0.05966; cum 144K 4/20;
• 34850, A/SI, CLR, Pittsburgh 7-18H1, 33-053-08509, Banks, t--; cum 28K over 31 days;  fracked 6/3/19 - 6/21/19; 9.7 million gallons of water; 89.4% water by mass; friction reducer, 0.05923; cum 101K 4/20;

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Approved For Re-Entry

The well:

• 17256, 430, MRO, Reiss Ranch 24-10H, Killdeer, t7/08; cum 228K 3/20; off line 3/20; remains off line 4/20;
  

Recent production profile:

Pool	Date	Days	BBLS Oil	Runs	BBLS Water	MCF Prod	MCF Sold	Vent/Flare
BAKKEN	1-2020	31	944	948	152	883	0	639
BAKKEN	12-2019	31	1014	960	160	935	0	686
BAKKEN	11-2019	28	864	863	220	801	0	586
BAKKEN	10-2019	31	974	952	146	913	0	668
BAKKEN	9-2019	30	960	919	147	871	0	632
BAKKEN	8-2019	31	986	1068	204	902	296	359
BAKKEN	7-2019	31	1083	1085	226	972	132	587
BAKKEN	6-2019	30	1129	1067	301	992	132	610
BAKKEN	5-2019	16	628	599	591	551	308	116
BAKKEN	4-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	3-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	2-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	1-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	12-2018	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	11-2018	1	1	0	0	1	0	1
BAKKEN	10-2018	4	65	86	11	103	84	0
BAKKEN	9-2018	30	853	860	138	794	534	27

From the file report:

• Bailey field stated in the operator's paperwork; turned out to be in Killdeer oil field just one mile to the west of Bailey;
• part of MRO's Hector Prospect in the Williston Basin 
• target: middle Bakken
• dirt-work date on the permit request: March 1, 2020;
• two laterals already drilled
• lateral 2, TD TVD: 10,780 feet
• lateral 1: 20,225 feet MD; open hole;
• lateral 2: 20,530 feet MD; perforation;
• proposed work: 
• MRO is planning to refrack this well. 
• Originally an open hole completion in 2008 and drilled when toe setbacks were 500' from the respective line. 
• This well had an original TD depth of 20,225' MD (at approx 607' FNL of section 3). MRO plans to put a drilling rig on this well, clean out the existing lateral to TD, and extend/sidetrack the lateral at the last good survey on original lateral at a depth (approx 175' FNL of section 3). 
• MRO will then run a cemented liner for a 45-stage plug and perf style completion, completing the well when other future drilled offset new wells to the west are schedule to be fracked in August, 2020

I assume these are the "new" wells being referred to:

• 37159, drl, MRO, Gustav 44-9TFH, Killdeer,
• 37158, ROS, MRO, Gunvaldson 44-9H, Killdeer,
• 37157, drl, MRO, Helset 41-16H, Killdeer,
• 37156, drl, MRO, Lowry 44-9TFH, Killdeer,
• 37315, drl, MRO, Gunter 11-15TFH, Killdeer,

Notes From All Over, Part 1 -- Nothing About The Bakken -- March 15, 2020

I first posted this on March 15, 2020, but it was accidentally posted on a different blog. I was wondering what happened to it. Well, I found it. So, it will be out of sequence, but that's fine.

I happened to find it when I was posting this note regarding one of the books I'm reading.

Making social media rounds now:


Link.

Is it not amazing how great writing can put so much into less than a minute of filming? Ya gotta love it.

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Two Weeks of Bliss, Maybe Four Weeks

Almost no Uber-driving.

Stores will be empty.

Streets will be empty.

And four great books, all of which I've never had time to finish.

And once the weather clears, a lot of grilling.

A Wartime President -- March 18, 2020

March 31, 2020: thinking like a wartime president. 

March 20, 2020: I don't find this surprising at all. The president's poll numbers might be rising. 

March 18, 2020: has any wartime president ever been defeated for a second-term bid? Could a wartime president impose sanctions against Saudi Arabia? In the past, it was feared that this action would drive Saudi Arabia and Russia closer together. Not going to happen now. Sanctions against Saudi Arabia? Their threat to increase their crude oil exports would come to an end overnight.

Rasmussen: the most important poll to follow right now -- the daily presidential tracking poll. Question: why does the Rasmussen poll only go to 60% (at its max) when the minimum goes to 0%? The actual y axis data is entirely between 30% and 60%.

FDA: President Trump considered issuing an executive order greatly expanding the use of investigational drugs against the new coronavirus, but was met with objections from Food and Drug Administration scientists who warned it could pose unneeded risks to patients. This tells me the pandemic is not as serious as the CDC is making it. But even if it is not as serious as the CDC says it is, if I'm going to die from a disease, tell me again, what the risks are by taking an investigational drug? It's not like going to Mexico for almonds to fight cancer. 

Have we reached the inflection point? A reader sent me a note using that phrase. Interesting. I thought about that phrase when President Trump began to think of himself as a "wartime president." If America beats this (and it will), might one think the turning point began today?

If so, the president's staff needs to consider this song as one of many in the build-up to the RNC convention later this summer:

Everybody's building

Ships and boats;

Some are building monuments,

Others dummy pound notes.

Everybody's in despair,

Every girl and boy.

But when Quinn the Eskimo gets here

Everybody's gonna jump for joy.

The Mighty Quinn, Manfred Mann, song by Bob Dylan

Saudi Arabia: In A Fight For Its Very Survival -- March 18, 2020

We all have our worldviews (myths). This writer articulates much better than I ever could my worldview on this subject: Saudi Arabia: a fight for survival, contributor over at oilprice, March 15, 2020.

Iraq in a panic.

Saudi Aramco CEO: comfortable with $30-oil (previously posted). I wonder if he is comfortable with $20-oil?

I don't know if folks remember Enron -- "precursor" to EOG, as it were.

Meanwhile, even as I'm updating this, President Trump invokes the Defense Production Act, declares himself a "wartime president," and the media says there are 114 deaths in the US due to coronavirus. 

What will change this immediately? When the CDC says "we" now have a toolkit of pharmaceuticals that can be successfully treat this illness. That will be the bridge giving researchers time to release a vaccine.

Idle Chatter -- March 18, 2020

One of the real cool things in life: while we go about our usual business, thousands of others are doing the same, for example the US logistics chain all the way from farm/manufacturer to store shelves.

Today, stopping by Tom Thumb on the way home to pick up a cinnamon roll for breakfast, I noticed all the folks stocking the shelves. I've never seen so many. I made that comment to one of the stockers: she said, yes, we are working as fast as we can.

I didn't anything except my cinnamon roll, but I went up several aisles checking out the shelves. A fair number of folks were in the store but only one individual had picked up toilet paper, and there were actually enough packages of toilet paper on the shelves to meet demand today. I did not pick up any toilet paper. And no paper towels.

I got my cinnamon roll -- enough for four breakfasts for $1.59. I did not need any coffee. The Keurig supply at home is well ... supplied. Thank you, May (my spousal unit).

Break, break.

While taking Sophia to Tutor Time this morning, I kept up my usual banter with Sophia. We were commenting on the weather -- we have had five days of rain and more is predicted. Sophia said we needed the rain to keep the trees green; she said some of the trees were already "behind," and we needed the rain.

I agreed. We talked a bit, and then I said, "Have you ever heard that April showers bring May ...."

She abruptly interrupted me: "Yeah, yeah, you already told me that before."

I asked, "Do I talk too much?"

Sophia, trying to be tactful: "No, you don't talk too much. But you say the same things you've said before. I heard this when I was four, and when I was three, and when I was one and [... a pause] when I was two."

Then, Sophia added, "You're like a 'robot-talking-machine."

So, there you have it.

Now back to the subject: folks keep on truckin' despite coronavirus.

There's a lot of research going on. And with the internet, information is spread more quickly than the coronavirus.

I was intrigued by this. This will need to be confirmed by other sources, but if accurate, very, very interesting.

A single traveler from China infected 39 people in Washington state with China’s coronavirus, according to virus expert Trevor Bedford.

“Thanks to sequencing by @UWVirology @CDCgov and @seattleflustudy we have genomes for 39 viruses sampled from WA,” he tweeted Tuesday. “Importantly 35 of these 39 viruses (90%) fall into a single genetic cluster indicating a single ~ January introduction from China and subsequent local spread.”

Bedford runs a research laboratory Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle.

From the article (https://www.breitbart.com/health/2020/03/17/wuhan-report-one-traveller-from-china-infected-39-people-in-washington-state/):

Global Warming -- Corona Virus Hysteria Will Get Us First -- March 18, 2020

Whatever.

Clearing off the desktop.

Two recent reports regarding global warming which St Greta apparently overlooked.

Note: that St Greta is the Swedish phenom, not the Greta Vogel who wrote this story:

The global coronavirus outbreak is now curtailing research at the top of the world. Travel restrictions imposed by Norway have forced the cancellation of research flights in support of the Polarstern, the icebound German research ship that is the centerpiece of a $150 million mission to study the effects of climate change on the Arctic.

A series of 10 to 15 research flights due to take off from Svalbard, Norway, in March and April have been canceled, says Markus Rex, an atmospheric scientist at the Alfred Wegener Institute Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research. “It’s very sad, but we had to cancel,” says Rex, leader of the Multidisciplinary drifting Observatory for the Study of Arctic Climate (MOSAiC). A second set of flights, planned for August, might still happen, he says. “We just have to play it by ear.”

The mission is also facing a potentially more serious disruption: The next rotation of researchers, scheduled to join the Polarstern in early April, are also supposed to travel through Svalbard, a semiautonomous archipelago that has closed its borders to outsiders because of coronavirus concerns. Expedition leaders are working with Norwegian authorities to find a way to get 100 coronavirus-free researchers to the ship, which has not reported any cases of COVID-19.

Second: there appears no hurry to get the study done. USA Today grants the Arctic a 20-year reprieve. In 2009, scientists say that polar bears may disappear by 2014. Now? those same scientists say it will be at least 2034 before polar bears go extinct.

EIA's Weekly Petroleum Report; Jet Fuel Down 13% -- March 18, 2020

Link here.

• US crude oil inventories increased by 2.0 million bbls week-over-week
• US crude oil in storage stands at 453.7 million bbls; about 3% below the five-year average for this time of the year
• refineries are operating at a very, very low 86.4% of total capacity;
• imports averaged about 6.5 million bopd, up by 127,000 bopd  from the previous week;
• imports over the past four weeks averaged about 6.4 million bopd, which is 4.5% less than the same four-week period lat year;
• interestingly enough, total products supplied over the last four-week period averaged 21.1 million bbls a day -- my threshold for reporting is anything above 21 million bbls/day (20 million bbls/day has been the norm for most of the time I've been blogging);
• this is what's driving the refineries: jet fuel supplied as down a whopping 13% (reported: 12.6%) compared with the same four-week period last year;

Re-balancing:

Week	Week Ending	Change	Million Bbls Storage
Week 0	November 21, 2018	4.9	446.9
Week 1	November 28, 2018	3.6	450.5
Week 2	December 6, 2018	-7.3	443.2
Week 3	December 12, 2018	-1.2	442.0
Week 4	December 19, 2018	-0.5	441.5
Week 5	December 28, 2018	0.0	441.4
Week 6	January 4, 2019	0.0	441.4
Week 7	January 9, 2019	-1.7	439.7
Week 8	January 16, 2019	-2.7	437.1
Week 9	January 24, 2019	8.0	445.0
Week 58	January 3, 2020	-11.5	429.9
Week 59	January 8, 2020	1.2	431.1
Week 60	January 15, 2020	-2.5	428.5
Week 61	January 23, 2020	-0.4	428.1
Week 62	January 29, 2020	3.5	431.7
Week 63	February 5, 2020	3.4	435.0
Week 64	February 12, 2020	7.5	442.5
Week 65	February 20, 2020	0.4	442.9
Week 66	February 26, 2020	0.5	443.3
Week 67	March 4, 2020	0.8	444.1
Week 68	March 11, 2020	7.7	451.8
Week 68	March 18, 2020	2.0	453.7

Compare:

• week 0, November 21, 2018: 446.9 million bbls
• most recently: 453.7 million bbls

Jet fuel delivered:

Jet Fuel Delivered, Change, Four-Week/Four-Week
Week	Week Ending	Change
Week 0	March 11, 2020	-12.80%
Week 1	March 18, 2020	-12.60%

Imported oil to the US:

North America:

• Canada: +178K bopd; now at 3,802K bopd -- pipeline
• Mexico: +213K bopd; now at 816K bopd -- pipeline

South America:

• Venezuela: unchanged at 0
• Colombia: -236K bopd to 294K bopd (cut in half); one VLCC;
• Ecuador: +136K bopd to 216K bopd (more than doubled); one tanker;
• Brazil: +174K to 174K bopd (from 0 last week to 174K bopd this week); one tanker;

Mideast:

• Saudi Arabia: -18K bopd; now at 425K bopd (sitting at record lows); a rounding error in total imports
• Iraq: -183K bopd to 169K bopd (cut more than half); one tanker;

One week changes are very volatile; it doesn't take my supertankers to change the numbers. A VLCC can be loaded with two million bbls in days; two million / seven days = almost 300K bopd.

Northern Border Closed -- March 18, 2020

US and Canada agree to temporarily close the northern border.

Canadians are obviously concerned about Washington State.

And Washington State, of course, is concerned about fossil fuels.

So yesterday.

Is Mexico next?

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

Photograph Of The Day

The first thing Sophia told me when I picked her up from Tutor Time yesterday: "No coronavirus at school." And she pronounced it as clearly as I wrote it. LOL.

Today, she told me why parents were not allowed to take students to their rooms. She said that the teachers wanted to make sure parents did not bring coronavirus into the school.

Legacy Fund: February, 2020, Deposit

Link here.

Five Wells To Come Off Confidential List Today, Including Three Incredible CLR Uhlman/Pittsburgh Wells -- March 18, 2020

Three articles of interest:

• oil supertankers fetch astronomical rates, Bloomberg, March 17, 2020;
• Saudis to push oil exports to 10 million bopd, Rigzone, March 17, 2020;
• Saudi Arabia: a fight for survival, contributor over at oilprice, March 15, 2020; will be re-posted as a stand-alone post;

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

Back to the Bakken

Active rigs:

$25.08	3/18/2020	03/18/2019	03/18/2018	03/18/2017	03/18/2016
Active Rigs	56	65	58	47	32

Wells coming off the confidential page -- Wednesday, March 18, 2020: 41 for the month; 212 for the quarter, 212 for the year:

• 36857, drl, Resonance Exploration, Resonance Greene 15-23H, Wildcat, a Madison well; t--; cum --;
• 36301, SI/NC, BR, Renegade 34-15TFH-R, Sand Creek, t--; cum --;
• 36143, A, CLR, Uhlman Federal 10X-7H, Banks, t--; cum 72K 1/20; 70K in 1/20;  see production data below;
• 35161, A, CLR, Uhlman Federal 9-7H1, Banks, t--; cum 28K 1/20;
• 34850, SI/NC, CLR, Pittsburgh 7-18H1, Banks, t--; cum 28K 1/20;

RBN Energy: School of Energy will go virtual. Now, easier than ever to attend.

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Early Production Data For CLR Wells Reporting Today

36143, 33-053-08964: middle Bakken, 11.4 million gallons of water; 89.1% water by mass; friction reducer, 0.06068; fracked 7/25/19 - 8/7/19:

Pool	Date	Days	BBLS Oil	Runs	BBLS Water	MCF Prod	MCF Sold	Vent/Flare
BAKKEN	1-2020	31	69939	69768	48960	95650	93645	1855
BAKKEN	12-2019	1	1930	1882	1345	2522	2475	10
BAKKEN	11-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	10-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	9-2019	4	439	439	1974	694	0	6

35161, 33-053-08641, first bench, Three Forks, 9 million gallons of water; 89.1% water by mass; 0.06778, friction reducer;fracked 8/17/19 - 8-27-19:

Pool	Date	Days	BBLS Oil	Runs	BBLS Water	MCF Prod	MCF Sold	Vent/Flare
BAKKEN	1-2020	28	27884	27818	67753	47758	46755	928
BAKKEN	12-2019	1	839	818	2256	1478	1450	6
BAKKEN	11-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	10-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	9-2019	4	239	239	3639	599	0	599

34850, 33-053-08509, first bench, Three Forks, 9.7 million gallons of water; 89.4% water by mass, 0.05923, friction reducer; fracked, 6/3/19- 6/21/19:

Pool	Date	Days	BBLS Oil	Runs	BBLS Water	MCF Prod	MCF Sold	Vent/Flare
BAKKEN	1-2020	31	26770	26707	50043	40135	39293	779
BAKKEN	12-2019	2	834	813	1591	1054	1035	4
BAKKEN	11-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	10-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	9-2019	4	435	435	2301	493	0	493