Absolutely Nothing About The Bakken -- August 19, 2022

NFL: for absolutely no extra cost -- I am watching NFL Network Live this evening and it's incredible. This is simply amazing. It's obvious why "streaming" is now "bigger" than cable. Simply amazing. Watching NFL Network Live on Hulu on an Apple big-screen monitor / computer. At no additional cost.

Mammalian classification: years ago the two older granddaughters were interested in the hawks we saw in Boston. As part of my at-home education, we studied the Linnaeus classification of the raptors. Absolutely fascinating. We learned a lot; forgot a lot.

On the road trip from north Texas to Montana, Sophia was really intrigued by the pronghorn we saw along the way. 

So, I put together a short tutorial that Sophia and I can study. 

The 30-second elevator speech:

• on the farm, there are horses, and then everything else (cattle, goats, sheep). 
• of course, humans, dogs, and cats fall into their own groups
  
• on the range, there are pronghorn, deer, and antelope. 
• pronghorn are New World; antelope are Old World.
  
• if they have horns, they are not horses; if they don't have horns, they are horses.
• horses walk on one-toe; all the rest walk on two toes, or occasionally four toes.
• and that's it.  

• The three families: horses, rhinoceroses, and tapirs are one group (order).

• The other order also has three families: giraffes (to include pronghorn); deer; and all the other farm animals with horns (goats, sheep, cattle). 
  

• Whales? They fall into the the group (order) of even-toes hoofed animals (deer, cattle, pronghorn, antelope)
  

• Why couldn't our science teachers make things this easy?
  

• Sure, this is simplistic, not quite correct, and so much more, but it's called scaffolding, from which we build. 
  

The book page: tomorrow the book I ordered today will arrive, the newly released biography of CCR. So, I'm sipping sake and listening to CCR. One new book each week; this book was released August 9, 2022. [Later: the book arrived before 8:00 a.m. Saturday morning, at the door. Amazon never disappoints.]

Age-appropriate: speaking of books, the state of Texas under governor Abbot has gone nuts with regard to books and the issue of age-appropriateness in school. Carried to the extreme, under state law, I'm not sure I am allowed to watch Moon River with Sophia.

Apartment rental: I love apartment living but if things change and we need to buy a house, it is truly amazing. I would qualify for a VA loan for a $500,000 home with a monthly mortgage that would be about what I'm paying for our apartment. Minimal to no down payment. What a great country. 

Streaming: favorite show right now? "Only Murders in the Building." But it looks like the next one will be "The Bear." 

Lego: our younger daughter and I, and now Sophia and I love Lego. The other night we noticed that the magnifying glass in one of the Lego sets actually worked. For collectors, we've priced this little magnifier at $1,000. And even at that, I might not let it go.

Night light: best gift for the under-80-year-old who doesn't yet have a night light? "The astronaut" at Amazon for $35. Link here. Or here to see it in action.

MRO With Three New Permits In Bailey Oil Field; Nineteen Permits Renewed; Two CLR DUCs Reported As Completed

Ukraine: to receive, in round numbers, one billion dollars worth of armaments, ammunition --

The package, worth $775 million, includes ammunition for HIMARS systems, 16 105mm howitzers and 36,000 shells for them, 15 ScanEagle drones, de-mining equipment, HARM anti-radiation missiles, 1,000 Javelin missiles, and 1,000 TOW anti-tank missiles.

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Back to the Bakken

WTI: $90.77. Would be much higher but traders are more certain of a recession; and a Fed that will raise rates another 75 basis points.

Natural gas: $9.336. Headline: Gazprom will halt Nord Stream gas flows on August 31, 2022, have not yet sunk in.

Active rigs: 45.

Three new permits, #39179 - #39181, inclusive:

• Operator: MRO
• Field: Bailey (Dunn)
• Comments:
• MRO has permits for a Cinninger well, a Thorstein well, and a Jack well, all in SWSW 32-146-94; 
• to be sited 638 FSL and between 703 FWL and 783 FWL.

Nineteen permits renewed:

• MRO (9): six permits in Dunn County -- Elva USA, Shell USA, Anita USA, Treasure USA, Carolyn USA, and Judith USA; three permits in Mountrail County: Cecelia USA, Riley USA, and Bracklin USA:
• Enerplus (7): all in McKenzie County -- Possum, Quoll, Joey, Bandicoot, Potoroo, Boomer, and Koala;
• XTO (2): two Ernest Federal permits  in Dunn County;
• BR: an Omlid permit in McKenzie County

Two producing wells (DUCs) reported as completed:

• 38532, 1,091, CLR, Whitman FIU 12-34H2, Oakdale, no production data; Whitman is tracked here; needs to be updated;
• 38533, 716, CLR, Whitman FIU 13-34HSL1, Oakdale, no production data; Whitman is tracked here; needs to be updated;
• the neighboring Whitman wells (#20212, #20210) remain off line.
• #20210: cum 1.789 million bbls;
• 20212: cum 1.06 million bbls;
  

Week 33: August 14, 2022 -- August 20, 2022

 

 Top Stories

Top energy story:

Javier Blas:

Focus on fracking: link here.

Top story of the week:

• Liz Cheney loses her US House seat; amasses fortune; considers run for White House.
  

Top international non-energy story:

• Putin's war; tide is turning?
• US sends another billion dollars (in round numbers) to Ukraine this week; the check is in the mail; Ukraine will acquire more HIMARS
  
• Ukraine: ready to target nuclear plant as soon as it's safe to do so; Turkey's Erdogan to meet with Putin; doesn't want another Chernobyl;
  
• Ukraine: opening new front in Crimea; may gain back lost territory from previous war
• Putin: ready to negotiate?
  

Top international energy story:

• Rhine River is surging due to high rains in the Swiss Alps
• Russia is now starting to feel the effects of the sanctions, most of which won't start until December, 2022
  

Top national non-energy story:

• US equity markets surge but give back on Friday
  

Top national energy story:

• Regulator (FERC) gives "okay" for Warren Buffett / Berkshire Hathaway to acquire up to 50% of OXY
  
• WTI maintains at $88 - $91.
  
• US gasoline at $4.00 / gallon range and GasBuddy is cheering Joe Biden's policies.
  

Top North Dakota non-energy story:

• huge crypto loss this week raises questions re: North Dakota's own crypto mining hopes

Top North Dakota energy story:

• Denbury says it's ready to be acquired;
• NOG acquires bolt-on minerals in the Permian (Midland, Howard County)
  

Geoff Simon's top North Dakota energy stories:

• Quick connects.

Bakken economy:

• Legacy Fund August, 2022, deposits set highest amount since the boom, going back to December, 20214
  

Commentary:

• energy investing: stay the course;
• Warren Buffett continues to build his position in OXY,
• meanwhile it appears someone is (some ones are) building positions in DVN.
  
• the Dems will hold the US House and the US Senate in the fall elections.

Entertainment:

• best show on "television: "Only Murders In The Building"

OXY, Buffett, Energy, And The ND Legacy Fund -- August 19, 2022

NFL: lots of pre-season NFL tonight and tomorrow. 

There is way too much energy news today. It will be difficult to wait until September to add to my positions. I am fully invested right now and my next investing tranch is scheduled for the first week of September.

I'm taking a break.

In the meantime, one may find it valuable to google buffett OXY news.

I may come back later but I doubt it. I will post the end-of-day report and the top stories of the week, but that's it.

Quickies: what I learned today --

• energy investing: stay the course;
• along with Warren Buffett continuing to build his position in OXY,
• someone is (some ones are) building positions in DVN.
  
• the Dems will hold the US House and the US Senate in the fall elections.

US crude oil in storage, excluding SPR: 26.2 days. Trending toward historical norm but anything above 21 days is too much. Link here.

Meanwhile, North Dakota Legacy Fund deposits for August, 2022, have posted.

Link here.

This would be the highest amount deposited, going all the way back to December, 2014.

I would assume this number correlates directly with what small mom-and-pop Bakken mineral holders will receive this month. 

Oh, by the way, on December 31, 2014, there were 170 active rigs in North Dakota. Today, there are 39, according to Baker Hughes, or 46, according to the ND state regulator. Let's go with 39. 

39 / 170 = about 20% in round numbers.

EV Challenges In China -- August 19, 2022

China: Yesterday mainstream business media was starting to report power shortages in south China due to drought --> hydroelectricity shortages. Those sources stated that China would start replacing -- temporarily -- hydro losses by burning coal. 

Now this:

I was always told that "overnight charging" of EVs would be the solution. 

And "significant penetration" of EVs has not even begun.

Even in California, on at least two occasions over the past few years, EV owners have been asked to minimize charging due to electricity shortages.

Canada: I don't find this "pathetic." I just found it incredibly interesting. It goes well beyond Trudeau. One needs to ask why? Link here.

*************************
Mid-Terms 

Confirms my thoughts, previously posted. 

I don't foresee a "red wave" this fall. 

In fact, there are signs that the Dems could secure clear majority in the US Senate.

Link here.

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71st Birthday Celebration -- Last Week

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The Book Page

I remain committed to reading one new book a week this summer, a habit I may continue well into autumn and winter.  

Released August 9, 2022, I just ordered the new biography of Credence Clearwater Revival from Amazon and it will arrive tomorrow. 

Looking for background to the book, lo and behold, a featured essay in The New Yorker, behind a paywall, but for which I have a subscription.

The lede: 

When Creedence Clearwater Revival broke up fifty years ago this fall, they were critically respected, hugely influential, and popular almost beyond belief. 

Billboard credits the band with nine Top Ten singles in just two and a half years, from early 1969 to the summer of ’71—an amazing stat, but one that still undercounts the band’s success. 

The fanciful twang of “Down on the Corner” and the blue-collar rage of “Fortunate Son” were each tremendously popular, but, because they were pressed on flip sides of the same 45, Billboard counted them as only one hit record. C.C.R. also has the most No. 2 hits—five—of any band that never scored a No. 1. 

In 1969, as John Lingan notes in his new book, “A Song for Everyone,” Creedence Clearwater Revival even reportedly achieved “something that no other group had done in America since 1964: They outsold the Beatles.”

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Road Trip To Flathead Lake

Tracked here.

In some ways, this was my most satisfying road trip ever to Flathead Lake. It was just Sophia and me. 

We had a great time. It really was an incredible trip.

Sophia, eight years old just a few weeks earlier, was an incredible traveler. We seldom went longer than ninety minutes or maybe two hours without stopping for a break, regardless of whether we needed gas or not. 

Staying overnight in motels along the way made a huge difference, something I would not have done had I been traveling alone.

In Wyoming she loved looking for deer and pronghorn antelope. From wiki:

The pronghorn (Antilocapra americana) is a species of artiodactyl (even-toed, hoofed) mammal indigenous to interior western and central North America.

Though not an antelope, it is known colloquially in North America as the American antelope, prong buck, speed goat, pronghorn antelope, prairie antelope, or simply antelope because it closely resembles the antelopes of the Old World and fills a similar ecological niche due to parallel evolution.

It is the only surviving member of the family Antilocapridae.

During the Pleistocene epoch, about 11 other antilocaprid species existed in North America. Three other genera (Capromeryx, Stockoceros and Tetrameryx) existed when humans entered North America but are now extinct.

As a member of the superfamily Giraffoidea, the pronghorn's closest living relatives are the giraffe and okapi. 

The Giraffoidea are in turn members of the infraorder Pecora, making pronghorns more distant relatives of the Cervidae (deer) and Bovidae (cattle, goats, sheep, antelopes, and gazelles), among others.

The pronghorn is the fastest land mammal in the Western Hemisphere, with running speeds of up to 90 km/h (55 mph). It is the symbol of the American Society of Mammalogists.

More here.

A Reader's Perspective On Denbury And CO2 Injection -- August 19, 2022

The reader has long experience with the oil sector in North Dakota and Denbury specifically through family history in southwest North Dakota. The reader follows the oil sector closely in North Dakota and is a member of at least one oil-related organization in North Dakota. It appears he/she has no direct financial involvement with Denbury. 

EOR: enhanced oil recovery
CO2I: carbon dioxide injection

With regard to Denbury, a reader provides this insight (editing may have resulted in typographical and/or content errors): 

Denbury has converted 43 water EOR injection wells to CO2I mostly in Bowman county, since March, 2022. 

CO2 started injecting in April. 

The CO2 comes from the Wyoming Powder River Basin CO2 pipeline that’s now in Bowman county. They started the preparations and permitting with NDIC in 2019-2021.

The biggest change in the 24 wells filed that were reviewed [by the reader] occurred in 2022. The changes can be found in the well files of the CO2I wells.

Here’s an easy way to find these CO2I wells:

Find well page:

• https://www.dmr.nd.gov/oilgas/feeservices/findwellsss.asp

Select Denbury as operator: 

• by section, township or range or field; or just operator.

Search the table view page with your browser: 

• find on page function for CO2I well type - O = alpha O (not numeral 0).

Onee should see 43 CO2I or CO2 injection wells for Denbury. 

with "basic subscription" file reports are available. With premium you can click the well file for more information.

Neither Lynn Helms nor Justin Kringstad used Denbury in the operators highlighted doing EOR in the  June NARO conference. 

However, last December Lynn Helms said one operator was going to be using horizontal CO2 floods in Bowman; without naming the operator, it had to be Denbury. 

In June, 2022, state officials singled out CLR, Liberty, Kraken and a few others with projects [to include EOR]. 

From presentations at this year's NARO conference the reader sees EOR as a near- long-term bolt-in technology and we’ll see much more of it in ND. 

Stark County was the first major vertical EOR county -- a generation ago -- involving Conoco, Whiting and others and they got "amazing" results for years in the Lodgepole & Heath (Tyler) formations.

The reader saw no CO2I injection-related changes in production up until June, 2022. 

Typically it takes 1-3 years before thee build up / injection shows results, but things may be different with horizontal drilling and prior fracking. So far, it appears CO2I has been limited to vertical wells in North Dakota [needs to be confirmed; there could exceptions, and there could be test projects of a limited scale]. 

The reader suggests significant CAPEX was required by Denbury to convert 43 well bores from water to CO2 gas due to different approaches in the well bore.

The reader was surprised by the announcement of a potential Denbury sale, saying that Denbury has produced a lot of petroleum in the Red River Cedar Creek area, in southwest North Dakota.

Deere -- A Hit And A Miss -- August 16, 2022

English language: I was taught that double-negatives were a "no-no." Is that an example of "irony" or an oxymoron? 

Rhine River: depth will surge -- navigation to get back to normal next week.

• from 30 cm to 148 cm "almost ovrnight"
• link here;

Deere. Link here.

• net income: $6.16 / share vs $5.32 / share a year ago
• forecast: $6.65 -- which appears to mean, a huge miss.
• but need to see if "adjustments" affect the numbers
  
• revenue: $14.1 billion vs $11.53 billion from a year ago
• forecast: $12.9 billion -- another big miss, but at least in the "right" direction
• guidance: slightly lower
• ticker:
• pre-market: down 3.5% (the entire market is down this morning)
• share price yesterday: 367.99 with a P/E of 19.20
• share price one year ago: $357.16 with a P/E of 22.39 (link here)

The usual disclaimer applies.

$$$: Big 10 lands $7 billion television deal. CBS, FOX, NBC. 

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Back to the Bakken

The Far Side: link here.

WTI: $88.45 - pre-market, but turned positive at the opening, up 31 cents and trading above $90. Trending toward $91.

Natural gas: $8.987 - pre-market, but losses moderated; down only 1 cent at the open, and natural gas is back above $9 at the open.

Active rigs: 46.

Sunday, August 21, 2022: 13 for the month, 44 for the quarter, 383 for the year

• None.

Saturday, August 20, 2022: 13 for the month, 44 for the quarter, 383 for the year

• 38370, conf, CLR, Fuller 7-2H, 

Friday, August 19, 2022: 12 for the month, 43 for the quarter, 382 for the year

• 38738, conf, Hunt, Clearwater 157-90-26-23H 2,

RBN Energy: carbon capture gets a big boost in Biden's climate bill. Part 11.

The 45Q tax credit has been the federal government’s main tool to incentivize the development of a carbon-capture industry. If the original legislation that created the credit in 2008 was intended to get things started, and the credit’s 2018 expansion designed to give the industry a further boost, the newly enacted Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) — which focuses on clean energy, despite its name — aims to propel carbon capture into the big time. In today’s RBN blog we look at changes made to the 45Q tax credit under the IRA, from the scope of the enhanced incentives to how they could boost carbon-capture opportunities for all types of projects.