CLR -- New Permits -- 2026

Locator: 50279CLR.

Movie Night -- The Apartment -- March 20, 2026

Locator: 50278MOVIE.

TCM tonight. 

I've watched this movie a dozen times in the past couple of years. I may now enjoy this movie more than Casablanca. How do I know? If Casablanca and The Apartment were opposite each other tonight, I'm more in the mood to watch The Apartment. Hard to believe. 

AI prompt: On all the best movie lists, how does "The Apartment" tend to rank?

Reply:

Oscars:

• Casablanca: 3
• The Apartment: 5

"Gets the girl": 

• Casablanca: No.
• The Apartment: Yes.

HEB Signs Are Up -- Hurst - Euless - Bedford -- Texas -- March 20, 2026

Locator: 50277HEB.

Currently: a two-minute bike ride to the new HEB. In addition, a one-minute ride to Target; a four-minute bike ride to Walmart. A five-minute bike ride to Albertson's / Tom Thumb (similar to a Kroger's). 

HEB signs are going up.

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Sign Of The Times

Diesel generators to guarantee power if the grid goes down for any reason. 

Three New Permits; WTI Surges At End Of Day -- March 20, 2026

Locator: 50276B.

WTI: $98.23. Up almost $3 at the end of the day. 

Netanyahu wants to dial it back after a lecture from Trump, but Iran appears to be doubling down, continues to wreak havoc on energy sites among neighbors. The GCC won't let Trump leave until this is sorted out. 

Trump could take the gloves off if any US Marines are hit. 

Or if holy sites in Israel are hit. The "Wailing Wall" was within 300 yards of being destroyed today (an accidental / collateral hit). 

Active rigs: 25. 

Three new permits, #42777 - #31780, inclusive:

• Operators: CLR (2); Silver Hill Energy;
• Fields: Beaver Lodge (Williams); Gros Ventre (Burke)
• Comments:
• Silver Hill Energy has a permit for an MT E permit, NWNE 24-159-93, 
• to be sited 465 FNL and 1535 FEL; 1920-acre spacing;
• CLR has permits for two Langved wells, SESW 2-155-95, 
• to be sited 420 FSL and 2555 / 2619 FWL; 1920-acre spacing. 

Alison's Quick Connects -- March 20, 2026

Locator: 50275B.

Quick connect links: 

• EPA change to mercury emissions rules a win for North Dakota lignite -- Bismarck Tribune

• Here's what we learned about the Oliver County data center debate -- Bismarck Tribune

• Higher oil prices don't equate to more activity, especially in the Bakken -- KFYR-TV

• Applied Digital eyes potential third facility in North Dakota north of Bismarck -- WDAY

• Bakken wastewater could mean Fargo company depends less on China for lithium imports -- Prairie Public

• Transparency a concern as ND agency ends oil lease auction notices in newspapers -- North Dakota Monitor

• State, Feds reach settlement following lawsuit involving DAPL protests according to Wrigley -- KFYR-TV

• Lignite Energy Council names Laumb as vice president of research and development -- Minot Daily News

• PSC seeks to gather comments on utility protection plans at March 31 public hearing -- Minot Daily News

• Xcel Energy natural gas customers to see their rates go up more than 10% on April 1 -- North Dakota Monitor

• North Dakota oil experts give first monthly briefing since the start of U.S.-Israeli war with Iran -- InForum

• Basin Electric, PSC set to discuss a cross-country electric project in northwest North Dakota -- KFYR-TV

• North Dakota crude output is expected to rise in March and for the next following months -- Reuters

• There are now hundreds more inactive wells in western North Dakota in latest energy report -- KX News

• Project Tundra $250M loan tap extended again; state CO2 capture effort to be revised -- Bismarck Tribune

• Eastern North Dakota Alternate Water Supply to receive $108 million in federal funding -- InForum

• North Dakota's Military Gallery awareness effort hitting the road with 48-stop tour -- North Dakota Monitor

• Iran war drives up fertilizer and fuel costs for farmers across the region by as much as 36% -- InForum

• Bomb threat reported at the Capitol under investigation by North Dakota State Patrol -- North Dakota Monitor

• North Dakota House Speaker Robin Weisz announces bid for majority leader -- Bismarck Tribune

• North Dakota needs $20 million more for homeowner tax credits; total cost of $430M -- North Dakota Monitor

• State revenues on target amidst unpredictable oil prices; officials urged caution -- North Dakota Monitor

• Control of resource-rich North Dakota riverbed has slipped from tribal hands and gone to state -- E&E News

• America's 250th birthday flag flies in Bismarck, continuing journey to all 50 states -- North Dakota Monitor

• Longtime state Rep. Lois Delmore was 'easily one of state's most respected legislators' -- Dickinson Press

• First federal rural health grants available in ND aim to boost hospital workforce -- North Dakota Monitor

• Western North Dakota set for mixed temperatures in spring, but a warmer summer -- Bismarck Tribune

• Federal Highway Administration awards $2M to Spirit Lake and Standing Rock Sioux Tribes -- Kevin Cramer

• Concerns raised over proposed election ordinance for Three Affiliated Tribes -- McKenzie County Farmer

• District 1 Republicans endorse newcomer Laurie Garbel as candidate for ND House race -- Williston Herald

• New warehouse brings oil field chemicals closer to Bakken service companies -- Williston Herald

• Mercer County zoning board establishes committee on data centers during moratorium -- The Beacon

• Anyone wanting to run for county or city office in North Dakota has three weeks to get on ballot -- The Journal

• Medora glamping proposal advances as officials review permits, infrastructure needs -- Dickinson Press

• Chat with Dustin Dassinger: Dickinson's city administrator shares his life, work, vision -- Dickinson Press

• Committee names 3 finalists to be next president of North Dakota State University -- North Dakota Monitor

• Divide schools plan community survey to gauge public interest in four day school week -- The Journal

• Ray Public School staff says student cellphone ban has been having positive effects -- The Journal

• Divide schools begin pilot implementation of student, teacher coaching and support initiative -- The Journal

• Williston High School's aviation students are getting a first-hand look at how aircraft are made -- KFYR-TV

• Minot Public Schools seek community feedback on logo amid trademark dispute with U of M -- KFYR-TV

• Tioga's superintendent received satisfactory marks in his evaluation from the school board -- Williston Herald

• Feasibility study on four-day week for Williston Basin School District currently underway -- Williston Herald

• I run a fracking company ? New York banned the industry and stuck the poor with the bill -- Fox News

• US stocks climb to their best day since the Iran war began after oil prices ease -- KX News

• Pain of soaring gas prices compounded by electricity rate increases across states -- North Dakota Monitor

• Investor-owned utility profits have soared as consumer utility bills have skyrocketed -- North Dakota Monitor

• Interest in Alaska LNG export project spikes after war in Middle East choked 20% of global supply -- Oil Price

• China remains publicly silent after Trump urges Beijing to help reopen Strait of Hormuz -- Oil Price

• US House approves intensifying sanctions on Iranian oil as Middle East conflict rages on -- E&E News

• Admin secures $56B in investments to support US energy projects during summit in Tokyo -- E&E News

• Coal is rebounding in the US thanks to rising natural gas prices and the explosion of data centers -- Time

• Coal power is in a fight for its life. It needs "boots on the ground" from the industry. -- RealClearEnergy

• Trump promises oil prices will come down; prices rise as Straits of Hormuz remain blocked -- KFYR-TV

• In an unstable world, American energy leadership is economic opportunity and strategic advantage -- The Hill

• US Treasury eases sanctions on some Venezuelan oil companies in bid to help global oil supply -- The Hill

• Advocacy groups seek to block emergency orders extending lifespan of two coal power plants -- E&E News

• China expanded its crude oil stockpiles over the first two months of the year, built massive buffer -- Oil Price

• US crude inventories estimated to rise 6.556M barrels in surprise build of significant magnitude -- Oil Price

• Recent oil and gas drilling rights sale over contentious Alaska area generates record revenue -- The Hill

• Vance, Burgum, Wright are meeting with oil executives as prices soar over the conflict in Iran -- The Hill

• Threat to US fuel supplies from Middle East conflict small thanks to domestic production -- RealClearEnergy

• Oil prices could soar to $150 per barrel or more if Middle East war continues until end of March -- Oil Price

• Indiana tornado destroys billion dollar solar farm, nearby coal-fired plant still standing -- Energy Bad Boys

• House Energy Chairman: Greenhouse gas protocol driving up costs, harming American jobs -- Breitbart

• Trump steamrolls California's anti-fossil fuel crusade to get oil flowing from offshore rigs -- Just The News

• Fear machine: How activist misinformation manufactures climate anxiety in American youth -- Townhall

Five-Mile Spacing Units In The Bakken -- Phoenix Operating Vs Kraken -- March 20, 2026

Locator: 50274B.

From Alison: 

AI prompt: In the Bakken, Phoenix Operating is applying for a five-mile spacing unit; Kraken is opposing the five-mile spacing permit. Using NDIC data and permits requests, which case is this?

Reply:

Case #32392:

Case #32393: 

Strandahl:  

Re-Visiting The Apple Laptops -- March 20, 2026

Locator: 50273AAPL.

My hunch: missiles quit flying in the Mideast by April 15, 2026. 

DFW TSA security checkpoints five days after last TSA paycheck (March 15): 

• 12 / 13 security checkpoints: green;
• 1 / 13 yellow (in least used terminal; other checkpoints in this terminal, 2/3 green.

PDX: I just got back from Portland. I would like to go back this summer. I'm pretty much committed to an October (Halloween trip). A summer trip is contingent upon:

• fares (Iran surcharges); and, 
• TSA concerns.

If things work out, I would like to return to Portland, Oregon,  NLT early July, 2026.

**************************
Apple Laptops

For the high school student, best choice: MacBook Neo. 

For the graduate student: MacBook Pro M5.  

For the college student, a toss-up -- the Neo, the Air, the Pro.

It depends. Probably the Air.

Link here. 

Apparently Apple can't keep the Neo in stock.

How I keep the Air and Pro separated: 

• chip -- both M5;
• cost: a big difference; important for me
• cost for basic model, smallest screen: $1,099 vs $1,699 (Apple increased the price on the Pro);
• cost for basic model, largest screen (my preference): $1,299 vs $1,699.
• screen -- the Air has a slightly bigger screen
• memory -- both the Air and Pro basic model, 512 GB of memory 
• SDXC card slot — definitely don’t need
• Air: no card slot
• Pro: one card slot 
• sound: no difference -- both have six-speak sound system with force-cancelling woofers;
• ports (kind of a big difference):
• Air: two Thunderbolt ports
• Pro: three Thunderbolt ports

Minor considerations:

• cooling (probably doesn't matter, but for those who know, this could be a big deal)
• Air vs Pro: passive vs active 
• battery (makes no difference to me)
• 18 hours vs 24 hours
• color options (makes no difference me)
• Air: four options
• Pro: two options
• weight
• Air, big screen: 3.3 pounds
• Pro: 3.4 pounds
• height: 
• Pro: 0.61 inch
• Air: 0.45 inch (edge to Air)
• depth and height when open (it's really the difference between the small Air and the large Air
• travel (a/c, reclining seat) -- edge goes to small-screen Air
• Air, small screen: 8.5 inches
• Air, large screen: 9.4 inches 

So, my preference:

• at home, no travel: Air, large screen
• travel (air): Air, small screen
• or could I take the Neo on the plan when traveling?
• Neo:
• height (depth): a bit more than 8.12 inches (slightly less then Air, small screen)
• would fit better on the a/c tray 

Putting it all together:

• for my lifestyle and prejudices: for home, the large screen Air, large screen;
• for just the fun of the MacBook when traveling? The MacBook Neo.

What I'm likely to do:

• since my current MacBook Air (M1) more than meets all my needs at home:
• MacBook Neo for my next trip to Portland, just to test it for travel;
• how can one pass up a $499 Apple laptop? 
• MacBook Air big screen when I feel the need to upgrade my M1 (not sooner than next summer).

PSA: Additional Savings At Amazon -- March 20, 2026

Locator: 50272AMAZON.

In addition to all the other savings and perks Amazon offers, there's an additional one that I just noticed: on hundreds of household items that one would buy anyway -- kitchen and bathroom paper products, ordering $50 worth of products (and these days, $50 doesn't buy very much) one gets an "easy" $15 credit. Fifteen dollars on fifty dollars is a 30% discount. 

What's going on? Name-brands are competing fiercely with generic brands for the consumers' dollar and for the consumers' loyalty. I don't now if the 30% discount is a short-term or long-term but for now, it's awesome. 

Amazon prices, to begin with, are incredibly competitive.

Second, the convenience.

Third, 30% off on $50-purchases right off the top. So, use the discount to maximize savings. In other words, buy in bulk to get $15 back on $50, but don't stay as close to $50 as possible. For example, don't take 15% off a $100-order. Be sure to take 30% off a $50-order. Simple divide a single $100-order into two $50-orders.

This more than makes up for the $2 / monthly fee increase for ad-free Prime Video.

YouTube's monthly price for ad-free videos: $13.99.

Amazon Prime's monthly price for ad-free movies: $4.99.

Quick! Do the math!

You have no idea how much fun it is to watch Amazon Prime ad-free.  

News And Updates On Ohio AI -- Staggering -- March 20, 2026

Locator: 50271OHIO.
Locator: 50271AI.

My takeaway from all this, for investors: when non-AI Fortune 500 companies make CAPEX announcements, those announcements are generally in the single-digit billions; in AI announcements, it's in the double-digits billion and not uncommon, in the triple-digit billions -- and it's real hardware and real energy initiatives that are being planned. This is not a bubble.  

From the blog last August, link here:

 Today, from oilprice: link here.

Department of Energy press release here. 

AI prompt: Lordstown Portsmouth Ohio AI data center natural gas power Cleveland Columbus what's going on?

Google Gemini: 

The role JD Vance played:

Same prompt, ChatGPT (some sections not posted):

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

The Next Prompt: How This All Fits Together

 

The AI prompt:  

Interesting. Yes, put the vertically integrated AI-energy stack together for me. Also, PJM, I assume. 

Reply: another long thread which I won't re-post. But PJM is the choke point.

Where the money is made:

• OpenAI
• MSFT
• GOOG
• AWS
• Palantir Technologies

 

Where AI actually runs (building large campuses in the Columbus region):

• AWS
• MSFT Azure
• GOOG Cloud

The compute hardware layer (energy availability = compute availability), this is why location (Ohio, Texas, Virginia) matters again:

• Nvidia
• AMD
• Intel

 

Data center developers / operators:

• Eqinix
• Digital Realty
• hyperscalers building their own
• in Ohio
• Columber - major cluster
• Lordstorn - emerging and contestedthese players used to just lease power; now they are partnering with utilities and generators.

Power generation layer -- this is where the game changed:

• AEP
• SoftBank Group (Japan)
• independent power producers

 

Fuel supply layer:

• Appalachian Basin natural gas: Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia)
• pipelines
• this is why Ohio is uniquely positioned
• it sits on / near one of the largest gas supplies in North America 

The referee = PJM:

• covers Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia 
• PJM: the ring that rules them all
• demand exceeds supply: PJM will decide what gets built; what doesn't get built

 

Ohio: ground zero, checks every box -- 

• access to largest competitive power market in the US;
• natural gas proximity (note that despite the Iran war, the price of natural gas in the US has now increase)
• geography: close to East Coast demand;political alignment: pro-development; willing to subsidize
• New England is going to rue the day they stopped natural gas pipelines from Pennsvylvania 

 

The deeper strategic takeaway:

• we are watching the re-industrialization of computing
• steel mills needed coal and railroads
• auto plants needed supply chains (and railroads)
• now: AI needs electricity at industrial scale 

 

One sentence summary:

• the winners in AI won't just control algorithms -- they'll control electricity.  

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Bragging Rights

 

AI prompt: just for the fun of it, in some kind of order, rank the states on bragging rights with regard to AI ten years from now. In terms of "compute," or "energy requirements," or value to national security, or value to national GDP, how would one rank these five states with regard to AI, and if I missed any: west coast to east coast -- California, Utah, Texas, Ohio, Virginia:

 

Reply: 

 

 

Spaceholder

AI Is Absolutely Amazing -- March 20, 2026

Locator: 50270AI.

It is amazing how quick and easy one can find so much information through AI.

With regard to that KC-135R that crashed in western Iraq with six military members on board: the standard crew on a KC-135R is only three people, two officers -- the pilot and co-pilot -- and one enlisted boom operator. 

That raised the question: why was the crew doubled?

When asking the right questions it is amazing what one finds. The information is deep in the weeds and no reason to post it, but I continue to be impressed. 

Going bike-riding. 

Apple Making A Fortune On AI -- March 20, 2026

Locator: 50269AAPL.

Tag: Apple AI 

Link here. 

 

Tech -- The Book Page -- March 20, 2026

Locator: 50268TECH.

Nvidia / Amazon: Nvidia confirmed that it will supply AWS with one million GPUs through 2027. Link here. 

Dell: one of Dell's biggest competitors, SMCI, may have just handed Dell billions of dollars after SMIC gets caught with fraud. Link here. 

SMCI is down almost 30% after prosecutors charged co-founder in alleged scheme to smuggle $2.5 billion of Nvidia servers to China. Something to do with swapping serial labels with hair dryers.

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The Book Page

Assyria: The Rise and Fall of the World's First Empire by Eckart Frahm, c. 2023, purchased April 6, 2025.

Eve:How the Female Body Drove 200 Million Years of Human Evoluton, Cat Bohanon, c. February 25, 2025.

Why Machines Learn: The Elegant Math Behind Modern AI, Anil Ananthaswamy, c. July 16, 2024, purchased March 18, 2026.

Apple in China: The Capture of the World's Greatest Company, Patrick McGee, May 13, 2025. Have not purchased nor read.

David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants, Malcolm Gladwell, April 7, 2015. Have not purchased nor read.

My Favorite Chart -- MMFs -- Another Record -- March 20, 2026

Locator: 50267MMFS.

Tag: MMF MMFs 

Link here. 

The change each week is in the billions. Last week it was amazing; something I had not seen before -- the change was less than one billion dollars. The change was an increase of 774 million over the previous week, if I recall correctly.

This week? Back in the billions. Specifically, an increase of 38.68 billion week over week.

 This was from last week:

It was a record last week, so I assume it's another record this week: $7.85668 trillion -- but I often make simple arithmetic errors.