Locator: 50833B.
Deal: holy mackerel! NextEra Energy to buy Dominion!
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Back to the Bakken
WTI: $102.90.
New wells reporting:
- Tuesday, May 19, 2026: 48 for the month, 148 for the quarter, 305 for the year,
- 42030, conf, Kraken, Dwyer East LE 2-36-26 11H,
- 41750, conf, KODA Resources, Stout 1301-1BH,
- 19795, conf, Devon Energy, Johnson 150-99-34-27-1H,
- Monday, May 18, 2026: 45 for the month, 145 for the quarter, 302 for the year,
- 41956, conf, Kraken, Dwyer East 26-35 8H,
- Sunday, May 17, 2026: 44 for the month, 144 for the quarter, 301 for the year,
- 41955, conf, Kraken Dwyer East 26-35 7H,
- 41858, conf, Devon Energy, Finn 13-25F XW 1H,
- 41497, conf, Hess, BW-Wilson-149-99-3625H-6,
- 41496, conf, Hess, BW-Wilson-149-99-6325H-5,
- 41495, conf, Hess, BW-Wilson-149-99-3625H-4,
- 41452, conf, Devon Energy, Wagenman 32-29 6H,
- Saturday, May 16, 2026: 38 for the month, 138 for the quarter, 295 for the year,
- 41957, conf, Kraken, McCabe 24-13 5H,
- 41751, conf, KODA resources, Stout 1301 2BH,
RBN Energy: after a long, steady decline, Alaska oil production is on the rise. Link here. Archived.
Last year, Alaska produced only 421 Mb/d of crude oil, barely one-fifth the more than 2 MMb/d that wells there were churning out back in 1988, when North Slope production peaked. It’s been a long, steady decline, but two new projects — one already producing and the other only weeks away from “first oil” — will add a combined 100 Mb/d once both are fully up and running. And Alaska’s biggest new project in years, ConocoPhillips’s massive Willow effort, will contribute another 180 Mb/d by 2030. In today’s RBN blog, we discuss the ongoing rebound in North Slope production and the prospects for even more growth going forward.
As we said five years ago in The End?, it’s been a challenging few decades for producers in the 49th state. Back in the 1970s and ’80s, Alaska was seen as the next big thing for U.S. crude oil production. With the 1977 completion of the 800-mile Trans-Alaska Pipeline (TAPS) from Prudhoe Bay in the north to Valdez in the south, Alaska North Slope (ANS) production took off (blue line in Figure 1 below), and just 11 years later the state not only accounted for 25% of total U.S. crude oil output, it also briefly knocked Texas off its perch as the #1 oil-producing state. Alaska crude oil production was all downhill from there, however. By 1995, it had fallen to less than 1.5 MMb/d, and by 2000, it was below 1 MMb/d. The slide didn’t end there. Through the mid-2010s, production was hovering around 500 Mb/d, and so far in the 2020s it’s been averaging less than 450 Mb/d — or just over 3% of total U.S. output.
Figure 1. Alaska Crude Oil Production. Source: EIA
