WIthin Just A Few Years, UK Gas Production Could Plunge 75% -- Source -- Guess Things Happen That Way -- January 29, 2022

Link to Tsvetana Paraskova. Headline says it all; details unimportant to me. Guess things happen that way.

Guess Things Happen That Way, Jack Clement

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Book Recommendation

Again, if interested in origin of solar system, earth, fossil fuel, origin of life, this is currently the best new book on the market right now for armchair/amateur biologists, geologists, fossil fuel aficionados. 

• How The Mountains Grew
• John Dvorak
• c. 2021
• Pegasus Books, August 2021

From the book, pages 131 - 133:

Eons, eras, and periods. 

That's it. Three geologic "divisions": eons, eras, and periods.

With two exceptions, two "sub-periods":

• the Pennsylvanian (upper)
• the Mississippian (lower)
• The Brits sometimes (often?) refer to these as:
• the lower carboniferous;
• the upper carboniferous.

Let's take a look at coal:

• not evenly distributed around the world
• great abundance / vast majority of coal deposits are found in just five countries:
• India, China, Australia, and Russia: significant deposits; but,
• king of coal: the country with largest coal reserves: the United States

How did this come about:

• geologically there is a noticeable change from the deposition of limestone during the Mississippian subperiod to the deposition to coal;
• thus, a second subperiod has been created, the Pennsylvanian
• these are the only two subperiods in the geologic time scale

Introduction of the term cyclothem.

• layers of alternating strata: 
• sandstone, formed upon a surface that had been cut by sea (saltwater) waves;
• then, a layer of silt, formed by the flow of freshwater;
• then coal;
• then repeating: sandstone, silt, and the coal again
• this pattern given a name: cyclothem

Many cyclothems have been named:

• the Dennis cyclothem: southwest of Dennis, KS
• the Plattsburg cyclothem: along a road cut west of Altoona, KS
• Wabaunsee cyclothem: at the side of I-70, west of Topeka, KS
• stretches for hundreds of miles from West Texas and across Kansas and Illinois and into the hills of Appalachia 

So, if coal "came from" plant material, why is the distribution of coal so limited worldwide?

Mississippian subperiod:

• Eurameria -- the former Laurentia now enlarged by the additional of the continental bits of Baltica and Avalonia during the Devoniian Period -- straddled the equator;
• all other continental material had gathered and formed the large landmass of Gondwana,
• during the Pennsylvania subperiod, sat over the South Pole.

And, thus the reason why US is king of coal when it comes to coal reserves. 

Is The Nor'eastern Over? Aircraft Starting To Fly Back Into East Coast / New England Airports -- 6:38 P.M. CT -- January 29, 2022

Flight radar here: https://www.flightradar24.com/36.22,-75.43/6. At the time I am updating this, aircraft are starting to fly into East Coast and New England airports. Not sure about Boston.

And Now We Wait For The Power Outages; A Bit Of Commentary Regarding ISO NE -- January 29, 2022

Later, 9:45 p.m. CT: telephone call from friend in Boston. The storm is over; it was hardly a storm. A dusting is about all there was for Boston.

Power outage risks, Saturday, January 29, 2022, 7:42 p.m. CT -- right up the eastern seaboard, New England:

Right now, Saturday afternoon, 5:52 p.m. ET:

• demand: 18,144 MW; moderately high; nowhere near a record
  
• oil is now contributing more than nuclear power, and is double what renewables are providing:
• it looks like the region has run out of coal, or the plants are down for other reasons, but not using their least expensive, option, coal;
• hydro only at 6%; very expensive option;
• this helps explain why Senator Elizabeth Warren keeps bringing up other issues to try to keep folks from seeing this -- but they will see it in their utility bills;
• this is a much bigger issue than college tuition debt;

Earlier today:

Additional commentary:

1.) The single remaining coal burner - Merrimack, capacity 415 megawatts - has intermittently shut down/operated at 108 Mw output over the past few weeks. Whether this 60-year-old plant has operational issues or is fuel constrained, I do not know.

2.) Interestingly, the Millstone 2 nuke plant (~1,000 Mw capacity) has been offline for a week due to a leaking pump.  Back online now. [That explains the earlier fuel mix graphic at this post.]

3.) That regular surge in hydro is undoubtedly coming from the Northfield Mountain project which is a pumped storage system. This plant can produce ~ 800/1,000 megawatts every 24 hours, BUT it was originally conceived when obtaining cheap, overnight electricity from the nearby Vermont Yankee nuke plant was available. As Vermont Yankee is now closed, the Northfield Mountain folks are compelled to buy market priced, overnight electricity. This explains why the heretofore cheap overnight electricity prices remain at nose bleed levels. (Supposedly, the net output - economically -  from Northfield is now less than the current electricity production which is fed in at the morning and evening 'rush hour' demand times.)

4.) Regarding the natural gas supply, the FSRU Exemplar is coming up to its fourth week of injecting natgas into the system via the Northeast Gateway Port just offshore Boston. Sourced from Trinidad. This is about the limits of its carrying LNG capacity (based upon the January, 2019 injection history) and I do not know if a replacement FSRU is scheduled to replace it. The company Excelerate owns/operates the Northeast Port and has about a dozen FSRUs worldwide. Replacing that FSRU appears to be absolutely  crucial to maintaining New England's already precarious power situation these next 5/6 weeks.

5.) The site marinetraffic.com is a real time, global trafficking site for worldwide shipping ... an incredible site for the maritime junkies amongst us. The size of the non stop armada of ships delivering expensive fuel oil to New England is simply breath taking. This directly leads to ...

6.) Setting aside all the eye glazing economic components of the ISO/Regular Folks' monthly electricity billings, that constant $160/$200 per Megawatt hour wholesale price we keep seeing will manifest in about 5 month's time in New Englanders' electric bills. 

For rough context, a mere 10 months ago - March, 2021 - the average wholesale electricity price was ~$16/Mwh. With pricing currently, consistently  at 10 times that level,  those poor folks will see absolutely crushing electricity pricing in a few month's time. AND they will still be fortunate IF they have not had blackouts. (See FSRU status for the supply of critically needed natgas).

With all this drama (I picture ISO head van Welie acting like the Lloyd Bridges character in the movie 'Airplane'), New England is facing 2 to 3 more winters - minimum -  of these conditions as lead times for any workable 'solutions'  take just that long. 

Compounding all this self-induced idiocy, there currently  exists NO viable, mid term pathway to alleviate this situation as the huge, power-sustaining LNG terminal at Everett is scheduled to be shut down in 2024.

Simply fascinating- albeit morbidly  so - to observe so many intelligent, concerned people hurtle headlong into a self destructing situation.

And, one more observation:

Brief mention of the availability of natgas and Boston's temperature ... 

When you noted the changing percentage/usage of the natgas component in New England's electricity generation, just Google 'Boston temperature' and you will find a 100% correlation between coldness and natgas availability for power burn. 

This is identical to South Australia's electricity prices and the contemporaneous  temperature and wind speed.

Update On The Three Best Sites For Tracking The Cyclone Bomb -- January 29, 2022

Updates

Later, 6:00 p.m. CT: the "cyclone bomb" remains settles in off shore Boston.Wow, wow, wow -- flights are starting to arrive back in Boston. This storm lasted less than twelve hours, at least as far as the airlines were concerned. They started canceling flights earlier but that was to get aircraft positioned in proper airports. Flights are also arriving New York.

Original Post 

Earlier I said these were the best three sites for tracking the nor'eastern, Winter Storm Kenanf:

The winds: one can pick any point on the globe, to get wind speed, direction and exact GPS coordinates. 

https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/surface/level/orthographic=-71.09,30.29,2600/loc=-70.727,42.505.

ISO NE, of course: https://www.iso-ne.com/isoexpress/web/charts.

• at the linked site, fine “fuel mix”;
• click on “renewables”
• note wind component
• % renewable  times % wind = % wind component

Flight radar here: https://www.flightradar24.com/36.22,-75.43/6. At the time I am updating this, there is one plane "stranded" at Logan Airport (Boston). 

THIS IS SO COOL. Updated at 3:21 p.m. CT, Saturday, January 29, 2022.

I just checked the three sites.

1. The "cyclone' is now just to the east of Boston, having moved from off-shore North Carolina overnight.

2.  There remains one stranded airplane at Logan airport. This has not changed from overnight.

3. There are but a handful of stranded planes at Newark and at JFK but most amazing, while checking Flight Radar for this update, a Bombardier Global 6000 (GLEX) was headed from the northwest (over Pennsylvania) headed into Newark when it literally -- in front of my eyes while watching Flight Radar -- was diverted, making a sharp left turn toward White Plains, NY. It had been on a 120° heading (heading southeast) when it abruptly turned to the northeast on a 45° heading. Pretty amazing to see that live on a random observation. Right now I see plane (call sign N408GJ) having just departed Newark, with a heading due south, 180° and now turning to the southwest, along the coast, over central New Jersey. That plane is a private plane, with flight plans from Teterboro Airport (New Jersey, 12 miles from midtown Manhattan) to Raleigh-Durham.

There is a Lear Jet en route to NYC.

It appears that another plane (XAJCZ) was also headed to Newark and was suddenly diverted and is now headed toward JFK. This is a US Customs and Immigration Enforcement aircraft. Nope, it appears it returned to Teterboro. And that aforementioned GLEX aircraft appears to have landed at Teterboro also.

CLR Mountain Gap Wells Updated -- January 29, 2022

Link here. 

Last update was back in 2019. Look at how much these wells have produced since the last update. 

That dreaded Bakken decline. 

Twenty years from now, they're going to say, "we under-estimated the Bakken." LOL.

Closing The Loop -- PSX -- January 29, 2022

Earlier a reader and I commiserated about the share price of PSX after earnings were announced. 

Closing the loop:

Maybe this is why, link here: 

• Phillips 66 says the cost to maintain / repair its refineries in 2022 will be $800 - $900 million. An anlyst noted this is the highest in the history of the company.

AMGN -- January 29, 2022

How did I miss this?

I just stumbled across this. I don't know how I missed it and I have no idea why I checked. There must be at least one reader who follows AMGN. LOL. 

AMGN: raised its dividend from $.176 to $1.94.

• let's see:
• (194-176)/176 = a ten percent increase in the dividend

Oh, that's right. I check in on dividend announcements every day or so.  

Links for "Investors" here.

Disclaimer: this is not an investment site.  Do not make any investment, financial, job, career, travel, or relationship decisions based on what you read here or think you may have read here.

You Can't Talk About The Bakken And Not Mention MRO; Now Another Mediocre MRO Well Trending Toward 550K Bbls Crude Cumulative -- January 29, 2022

The well:

• 16611, 428, MRO, Carlson 21-29H, Bailey, t10/07; cum 478K 11/21; full production here;
  

Here we go again:

• an MRO well;
• the Bailey oil field;
• the MRO re-frack program
• originally drilled fifteen years ago;

Production when this well was approaching a decade of production:

BAKKEN	9-2015	30	12644	12581	5793	9432	6491	1408
BAKKEN	8-2015	31	10030	10121	5034	8076	6529	302
BAKKEN	7-2015	31	15224	15209	8612	12745	10588	344
BAKKEN	6-2015	30	18132	18447	12833	14088	9918	2050
BAKKEN	5-2015	22	3381	3205	3485	2760	1259	1020
BAKKEN	4-2015	18	2298	2292	3025	1492	154	984
BAKKEN	3-2015	11	1343	1106	1947	957	144	611

And coming from such mediocrity when it was first drilled. This is the initial production. It never got above 8,000 bbls / month until it jumped from 2,000 bbls / month to 15,000 bbls / month many years later. Hubbert said that wouldn't happen. Wiki needs to update the Hubbert entry. But they won't; doesn't fit the narrative.

Initial production:

BAKKEN	1-2008	31	4122	4310	914	227	227	0
BAKKEN	12-2007	31	4924	5089	1207	540	540	0
BAKKEN	11-2007	30	5139	4948	1075	1183	1183	0
BAKKEN	10-2007	29	7644	7989	2493	1202	1202	0
BAKKEN	9-2007	4	1794	967	1240	469	469	0

Here We Go Again -- If We Didn't Have CLR, Would We Even Be Talking About The Bakken? January 29, 2022

Isn't it a hoot that a US federal judge vacated the largest -- repeat, the largest ever -- GoM federal lease? Whoo-hoo! Makes all this on-shore stuff that much more exciting. LOL.

As someone noted, that US federal judge assumes crude oil is "just there," like homogenized milk in your local grocery story. 

And here we go, another CLR well. Full production here.

The well:

• 33027, 2,880, CLR, Hereford Federal 12-17H2, Elm Tree, t9/19; cum 317K 11/21;

So, a well less than three years old and now this, look at this jump in production:

Pool	Date	Days	BBLS Oil	Runs	BBLS Water	MCF Prod	MCF Sold	Vent/Flare
BAKKEN	11-2021	25	14164	14198	12783	19915	18711	880
BAKKEN	10-2021	28	2689	2702	4442	20875	20405	123
BAKKEN	9-2021	30	3434	3472	4845	25083	24399	296
BAKKEN	8-2021	31	4113	4085	6200	27886	27380	101
BAKKEN	7-2021	31	4477	4645	7089	28944	27633	912
BAKKEN	6-2021	30	4870	4770	7295	31201	30798	11
BAKKEN	5-2021	31	5620	5535	7730	27714	26830	480
BAKKEN	4-2021	30	6156	6313	8291	24429	22265	1772

But just a few months earlier:

BAKKEN	3-2021	31	8992	8952	9813	26904	26458	40
BAKKEN	2-2021	28	9394	9452	8182	19288	18900	24
BAKKEN	1-2021	31	7965	8166	7264	15271	14872	90
BAKKEN	12-2020	21	586	350	18	7	0	0
BAKKEN	11-2020	30	6582	6679	8847	49273	48889	0
BAKKEN	10-2020	31	8103	8077	9733	53562	53067	89
BAKKEN	9-2020	30	9370	9255	11400	46337	45925	20
BAKKEN	8-2020	31	13501	13582	14811	46955	46554	0
BAKKEN	7-2020	31	15412	15545	15101	31910	30257	1265

Initial production:

BAKKEN	4-2020	27	9225	9178	9891	37141	37141	0
BAKKEN	3-2020	31	9620	9517	11440	28710	26944	1766
BAKKEN	2-2020	29	11524	11608	15409	33570	31074	2496
BAKKEN	1-2020	31	18695	18588	18114	41831	37948	3883
BAKKEN	12-2019	31	27709	27909	26466	45325	38994	6331
BAKKEN	11-2019	30	35169	35237	27595	56334	38537	17797
BAKKEN	10-2019	30	43208	43102	34035	69295	43162	26133
BAKKEN	9-2019	19	34882	34311	27227	56967	32237	24730

The Bakken. Where Do We Start? So Many Incredible Wells. Let's Start Here -- A Not Atypical Slawson Well -- January 29, 2022

The well:

• 23536, 2,315, Slawson, Gabriel 2-36-25H, North Tobacco Garden, t12/12; cum 347K 11/21;
  

Full production here. 

A mediocre well when it was drilled a decade ago. A decade ago, using old completion strategies, with the dreaded Bakken decline:

BAKKEN	10-2013	31	5329	5184	3562	6439	6284	0
BAKKEN	9-2013	19	4290	3977	2088	6559	6464	0
BAKKEN	8-2013	20	3794	4220	1280	5524	5424	0
BAKKEN	7-2013	29	5559	5387	2043	2428	2138	0
BAKKEN	6-2013	30	7636	8225	2940	10299	9999	0
BAKKEN	5-2013	19	5733	5092	1654	190	0	0
BAKKEN	4-2013	29	7974	8018	2192	290	0	0
BAKKEN	3-2013	31	10428	11044	3490	310	0	0
BAKKEN	2-2013	28	13552	12976	4521	280	0	0
BAKKEN	1-2013	31	21905	22504	6667	310	0	0
BAKKEN	12-2012	9	9076	7598	7433	90	0	0

... and then it plateaued to around the 1500 - 2000 bbls/month production level ---

Then, in early 2019:

BAKKEN	12-2019	31	3338	3392	2131	7992	7487	0
BAKKEN	11-2019	30	3635	3641	2269	8699	8164	0
BAKKEN	10-2019	31	4207	4352	2606	9562	8961	0
BAKKEN	9-2019	30	4166	4083	2557	9500	8905	0
BAKKEN	8-2019	31	4580	4524	2847	10724	10077	0
BAKKEN	7-2019	31	5976	6354	3864	14019	13221	0
BAKKEN	6-2019	30	7543	7543	4724	12051	2600	8492
BAKKEN	5-2019	30	8706	8707	5839	13368	5345	6944
BAKKEN	4-2019	30	10079	10047	6794	18325	15365	1734

So, ten years old, and lots of room to run. It's just beginning.

Someday they're going to say, "we under-estimated the Bakken."

Apple, Walmart, Ulta, And OPEC -- Good Morning -- Nothing About The Bakken -- January 29, 2022

One question: is there any future for a cellphone company who now takes the lead in China? Or is this the beginning of an end for its well-known competitor?

EOG and Eagle Ford: link here. Be sure to read through the thread to the possible / likely explanation (which I suspect is wrong).

Chevron: miss. Folks are missing the story. Hopefully, I will find time to get back to this one; there's an interesting side to this story.

Just how "rich" is America: link here. 

• revenues of the 13 OPEC members
• export all their crude oil production
• at $100 / bbl
• total revenue would almost equal combined revenue of TWO American companies:
• Walmart; and, drum roll ...
• Apple 

Ulta Beauty: best ever article ever in The Wall Street Journal. Link here. On mentors and mentorship for CEOs. 

Stocks to watch next week: link here. Just a few mentioned:

• ABBV (think JNJ); AMD (think XLNX); GOOG; SBUX (think struggling; $10-coffee; and, unionization); XOM (think CVX: best of breed).

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Apple

Apple: this analyst gets it.  "Scary demand."

Apple: perhaps this weekend, if I find the time, I will post the top ten things that blew me away in Apple's 1Q22 earnings / conference call. For now, until I find something else, #1, link here, from The Wall Street Journal:

Apple's iPhone 13:

Signs of Apple’s improved China performance had been emerging since the iPhone 12 with 5G cellular connectivity made its debut in late 2020. They picked up pace when the iPhone 13 lineup was introduced in September. During the iPhone 13’s debut in China, it rose to first place in the market that initial week, according to Counterpoint Research.

Strong sales in the final three months of 2021 continued, allowing the company to capture the top position in the country, with 23% of the market compared with 16% a year earlier.

Meanwhile, Huawei, once Apple’s biggest rival in China for the premium smartphone market, fell to 7% of the market from 23%. U.S. sanctions have curbed Huawei’s ability to buy chips and use American software, such as Alphabet Inc.’s Android operating system, reducing its supply of phones and prompting users to ditch the brand.