Horizontal Drilling -- Natural Gas Pipeline Expansion From Watford City To Tioga -- September 24, 2022

This post began with a note from a reader. Thank you very much.  

This reminds me of The New Yorker article in 2011:

It also reminds "how much we lost" due to Covid, and how many years (a decade?) we will be paying for that lost year or two.

This story is important for many reasons, has several data points of note.

North Dakota gas plants.

Note, regarding the charg:

• no increase in natural gas processing capacity, 2022 (this year) over 2021 (last year);
• next year, 2023, should see an increase of 200 MMCFD
• from 4,037 to 4,237, a 5% increase

The increase will be at ONEOK's new Demicks Lake III plant.

• Demicks Lake I, in service, 2019: 200
• Demicks Lake II, in service. 2020: 200
• Demicks Lake III, in service, 2023: 200

Will need pipeline for takeaway from Demicks Lake III.

Enter, WBI Energy Transmission, link here:

• Bakken Gas Pipeline Expansion project
• origin: Demicks Lake III, Watford City, ND
• terminus: Northern Border Pipeline interconnect, Tioga, ND --> midcontinent
• 175,000 dt/d expansion of its pipeline system
• in-service: November, 2023
• $32.6 million
• expansion of its existing Line Section 27 system
• two 24-inch-diameter, 500-foot-long pipelines
• two new compressor stations (?) 
• if I'm reading this correctly, $33 million for a 1,000-foot expansion?
  

From The Bismarck Tribune, November 18, 2021:

Work is resuming in McKenzie County on a natural gas processing plant project delayed in 2020 by the coronavirus pandemic. 

Oneok announced this week that it will complete the project known as Demicks Lake III, an expansion of the company's processing facilities near Watford City. 

The company expects work at the site to wrap up during the first quarter of 2023. The new plant will have the capacity to handle 200 million cubic feet of gas per day. It will bring the company's total gas processing capacity across the Williston Basin to 1.9 billion cubic feet per day, which could accommodate about two-thirds of all gas produced in North Dakota. The project is expected to cost $140 million.

I can't say for sure, but it sounds like this partnership / nexus, for three major projects:

• Watford City
• Tioga
• Demicks Lake gas plants (I, II, III -- 2019, 2020, 2023)
• under-the-water pipelines, setting records in the process
• Michels
• Oneok
• MDU
• WBI Energy, a subsidiary of MDU

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Most Recent Major Pipeline Expansion Project

Link here.

From the linked article, November 4, 2021:

Michels completed a 15,426-foot horizontal directional drill (HDD) of a 24-inch pipe crossing of Lake Sakakawea on the Missouri River in North Dakota, extending the limits of trenchless construction.

The crossing is part of a new pipeline being constructed from Tioga, North Dakota, to near Watford City, North Dakota.

The HDD crossing of just less than 3 miles is one of the longest of its kind, surpassing by 3,174 feet a 20-inch HDD crossing Michels completed in the Bakken region in 2019. 

HDD minimized disturbances to the area and provided a delivery outlet for previously untapped energy sources in both instances. Although the crossings were similar in location, length, and technique, each project included its own unique and awe-inspiring accomplishments. 

Prior to pullback, the 15,426-foot pipeline was assembled by Michels Pipeline, Inc., into two sections–one of 426 feet and another of 15,000 feet. 

When laydown space allows, long sections of pipe can be advantageous because they require fewer pull stoppages to weld pipe strings together. While stopping can generally be accomplished, resuming movement of pipe can be challenging, even with a specific and well-planned drilling fluid and lubrication program. Like the 2019 project, the recently completed project used the pilot hole intersect method and two custom-made drill rigs, each with more than 1-million pounds of push/pull capacity.

Abbreviated 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. Full disclaimer at tabbed link.

All my posts are done quickly: there will be content and typographical errors. If anything on any of my posts is important to you, go to the source. If/when I find typographical / content errors, I will correct them.

Bakken Natural Gas Flaring Reaches Historical Low As Production Climbs -- Platts -- November 18, 2021

I mentioned this in passing when the North Dakota September, 2021, data, was released with the Director's Cut earlier in the week, but I did not headline it:

Comments:

• an incredibly good report;
• natural gas capture rate up from 92% to 94%
• look at that crude oil price appreciation from August, 2021
• two consecutive months with increased production m/m
• rig count pretty much steady but up slightly
• DUC count down slightly, but not worth a headline
  

But Platts did headline it: Bakken Shale natural gas flaring reaches historical low as production climbs --

• North Dakota gross gas volumes surpassed 3 billion cubic feet / day
• new midstream infrastructure promises upside

So many stories:

• The impending completion of WBI Energy Transmission's North Bakken Expansion natural gas pipeline project is likely to increase the Bakken's ability push more gas to Northern Border Pipeline for ultimate delivery downstream in the Midwest.
• ONEOK recently announced that it will build Demicks Lake III, announced sometime ago, before the project was "suspended."

Lots of information regarding MDU's subsidiary WBI at the linked Platts article. 

North Dakota Natural Gas Flaring Relief in Sight as More Infrastructure Comes Online -- NGI -- September 22, 2019

Link here. Paywall. I read the article earlier but now when I go back to it, I'm blocked out. I will see if I can find another source.

Natural gas processing plants in North Dakota are tracked here.

Projected, processing capability, increase, year-over-year:

• 2017: 2,137 MMCFD
• 2018: 2,452 MMCFD, 15% increase y/y;
• 2019: 3,162 MMCFD, 30% increase y/y;
• 2020: 3,407 MMCFD, 8% increase y/y;
• 2021: 3682 MMCFD, 8% increase y/y; a 75% increase since 2017;

XTO To Build Gas Plant In Williams County -- July 3, 2019

Link here. Data points:

• Williams County: approves permit, 4 - 1
• XTO
• "gas plant": 150 million cubic feet per day
• neighbors had objected
• Planning and Zoning Commission: a tie vote (generally means a "No" for the county)
• 76 acres in Judson Township
• permit includes an outline for an adjacent future plant if the company plans to expand

Judson Township: first township west of Williston Township, either side of US 2; west of Judson is Round Prairie whose western border is the Montana state line.

Natural gas processing plants in North Dakota are tracked here.

It appears this would be XTO's second gas plant in North Dakota. The XTO plant in Ray, ND, has a nameplate capacity of 25 million cubic feet per day.

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Fantasy Land

From moneyrates, a PDF will load on your desktop.

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More Fun On The Water

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A Musical Interlude

Most of you may just want to skip ahead to 5:58:



I Can't Help Falling In Love With You, Arlo Guthrie

Oasis (OAS) Pops Almost 6% On Earnings -- August 7, 2018

Oasis.

Oasis earnings here.

• EPS: ten cents versus seven cents forecast (that's a pretty good beat); compares to a loss of five cents a year ago; an earnings surprise of over 40%;
• revenues: $501.34 million -- a 27% surprise; compared to revenues of about half that amount last year, $254 million

Press release here. 


Oasis orporate presentation:

https://www.oasispetroleum.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/2018.08_OAS-presentation_v7.pdf

Disclaimer: this is not an investment site.

Oasis Midstream Partners earnings, press release.

NG plants in North Dakota. 

Click on graphic to enlarge.

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Saudis and Tesla

Saudi Arabia takes $2 billion interest in Tesla. TSLA shares pop.

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The Book Page

From Darwin's Fossils, Adrian Lister, c. 2018

The voyage Charles Darwin was on lasted five years, most of it on and around South America.

It is amazing how "economic" his activities were and how incredibly "lucky" he was. Makes one wonder.

Economic: shortly after arriving in South America, his main hunting-ground at Punta Alta, on the Pampas coast of Argentina, just north of Patagonia, was only 500 feet by 500 feet.

500 feet x 500 feet.

He collected a relatively small number of fossils there but no fewer than seven demonstrated distinct types (genera) of mammal, while six more were collected from other sites (seven sites altogether). Of these 13 specimens, only two were known at the time, and six were names on the bsis of Darwin's specimens.

Many of the species discovered by Darwin are now celebrated elements of the South American fossil fauna of the last ice age, some 100,000 to 12,000 years ago.

On only his second day of fossil-hunting in South America, Darwin found the largest and heaviest single fossil of the entire voyage, belonging to the largest and heaviest land mammal ever to live in South America. While a party from the ship went fishing, Darwin went fossil hunting and found this specimen.

He correctly identified that first find, that first huge skull, as belonging to Megatherium, a great beast that had been named by French anatomist Georges Cuvier.

The earliest discovery of Megatherium had been a largely complete skeleton unearthed on the banks of the Lujan River, west of Buenos Aires, in 1788. Discovered by a Dominican friar, Manuel Torres, it was sent to Madrid, where it became the first fossil mammal skeleton ever to be assembled and mounted for public display.

From drawings only Cuvier identified it and named it Megatherium americanum in 1796. Cuvier place it within his 'edentate' order of mammals, along with living sloths, anteaters, armadillos and some others, and presciently suggested that it was a gigantic sloth.

Later:

Darwin's discovery of four genera of large ground sloths was remarkable, and also serendipitous in that the area in which he was collecting happened to be the only region where all four could have been found together. Mylodon is distributed in the southern half of the [South American] continent, Glossotherium in the northern half, and Scelidotherium in the middle. The genus Megatherium is widespread, M. americanum is known mainly from Argentina. Only in the Pampas region and La Plata basin do they overlap. The different forms of their skulls, and teeth and limbs, show how several species could have co-existed in the Late Pleistocene, using different food and habitat resources. [Did the writer interchange species and genera?]

Status Of Natural Gas Processing Plants In North Dakota -- June 16, 2018

Lynn Helms mentioned that flaring in the Bakken has gotten worse. Some of it is due to temporary "glitches," but mostly it is due to "over-production."

The Director, NDIC, mentioned that five new natural gas processing plants were under construction or in development stage, and one plant's expansion project should be completed by the end of the year (2018).

Here's the current line-up:

Unless Something Bigger Happens In The Next 48 Hours, This Is The Biggest Bakken Story Of The Week -- January 25, 2018

Link here to Rigzone.

Hess Midstream Partners LP and Targa Resources Corp. have formed a 50/50 joint venture to build a new 200 million standard cubic feet per day dry gas processing plant near Targa’s existing Little Missouri facility in McKenzie County, North Dakota, Hess Midstream announced Thursday.

“The Little Missouri Four Gas Processing Plant demonstrates our commitment to executing our strategy by providing additional Bakken basin processing capacity, which provides another layer of organic growth to meet our long-term targeted annual distribution per unit growth,” John Gatling, Hess Midstream’s chief operating officer, said in a company statement. “By executing infrastructure projects that provide more optionality to producers, Hess Midstream expects to continue to capture additional Hess and third-party volumes, reinforcing the competitive advantage we enjoy from our strategically located infrastructure in the core of the Bakken.”

According to Hess Midstream, Targa will manage construction of the approximately $150 million Little Missouri Four (LM4) plant and operate the facility. Hess TGP Operations L.P. – owned on a 20/80 basis by Hess Midstream and Hess Infrastructure Partners LP (HIP), respectively – will hold Hess Midstream’s 50-percent stake in the gas plant, the company added. In addition to contributing a total of $75 million to the plant’s construction, Hess Midstream said the two Hess units will invest approximately $100 million toward new pipeline infrastructure to gather volumes to LM4.

Earlier this was posted:

Link here at The Bismarck Tribune. Data points:

• Hess Midstream Partners
• $150 million natural gas processing plant
• partner: Targa Resources Corp
• name: Little Missouri Four plan
• capacity: 200 million cf/d
• location: near Targa's existing facility south of the Missouri River near Watford City
• completion date: by the end of this year
• natural gas production in ND set a record in November, 2017: 2.1 billion cubic feet/day
• flaring: still at 14%
• one of four natural gas processing plants in the planning or construction stages in North Dakota
• the four projects would add an additional 615 million cubic feet per day of additional processing capacity
• ONEOK: to expand it Bear Creek natural gas processing plant north of Killdeer; will expand from a capacity of 80 million to 175 million cubic feet per day
• Crestwood Equity Partners: expand the Arrow Bear Den gas processing plant near Watford City, adding another 120 million cfpd
• Oasis Wild Basin processing plant it expanding to process 345 million cfpd in McKenzie CountyN

Note: if that is not an error in reporting, it seems that the Oasis expansion to 345 million cfpd is a huge addition; prior it was 80 at Plant 1; and 150 at Plant 2.
Note: it looks like a race among Hess, ONEOK and, Oasis to see who will have bragging rights to most natural gas processing capacity in the state.
Note: for newbies, this is a huge, huge story. The Bakken is an "oily" story, an "oily" play; no one expected this much natural gas activity back in 2007.

Holy Mackerel -- It Never Quits -- Keeping North Dakota Great -- New Gas Processing Plant Planned For McKenzie County -- January 25, 2018

Link here at The Bismarck Tribune. Data points:

• Hess Midstream Partners
• $150 million natural gas processing plant
• partner: Targa Resources Corp
• name: Little Missouri Four plan
• capacity: 200 million cf/d
• location: near Targa's existing facility south of the Missouri River near Watford City
• completion date: by the end of this year
• natural gas production in ND set a record in November, 2017: 2.1 billion cubic feet/day
• flaring: still at 14%
• one of four natural gas processing plants in the planning or construction stages in North Dakota
• the four projects would add an additional 615 million cubic feet per day of additional processing capacity
• ONEOK: to expand it Bear Creek natural gas processing plant north of Killdeer; will expand from a capacity of 80 million to 175 million cubic feet per day
• Crestwood Equity Partners: expand the Arrow Bear Den gas processing plant near Watford City, adding another 120 million cfpd
• Oasis Wild Basin processing plant it expanding to process 345 million cfpd in McKenzie CountyN

Note: if that is not an error in reporting, it seems that the Oasis expansion to 345 million cfpd is a huge addition; prior it was 80 at Plant 1; and 150 at Plant 2.
Note: it looks like a race among Hess, ONEOK and, Oasis to see who will have bragging rights to most natural gas processing capacity in the state.
Note: for newbies, this is a huge, huge story. The Bakken is an "oily" story, an "oily" play; no one expected this much natural gas activity back in 2007.

Disclaimer: the table below is not entirely accurate. Much of the data in 2018 is projected for 2018 and later years; some of the numbers in 2018 are based on "plans" by operators, not necessarily what will be accomplished by year end. The NDIC has the official data.

Owner Company	Facility	County	2006	2008	2010	2011	2012	2013	2014	2015	2016	2017	2018
North Dakota
ONEOK/Bear Paw	Lignite	Burke	6	6	6	6	6	6	6	6	6	6	6
ONEOK/Bear Paw	Marmath	Slope	7.5	7.5	7.5	7.5	7.5	7.5	7.5	7.5	7.5	7.5	7.5
ONEOK	Grasslands	McKenzie	63	100	100	100	100	100	100	100	100	100	100
ONEOK	Stateline I	Williams	NA	NA	NA	NA	100	100	100	100	100	100	100
ONEOK	Stateline II	Williams	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	100	100	100	100	100	100
ONEOK	Garden Creek I	McKenzie	NA	NA	NA	100	100	100	100	100	100	100	100
ONEOK	Garden Creek II	McKenzie	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	100	100	100	100	100
ONEOK	Garden Creek III	McKenzie	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	120*	120	120	120
ONEOK	Lonesome Creek	McKenzie	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	200	200	200	200
ONEOK	Demicks Lake	McKenzie	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	200*	Suspended: Feb 24, 2015
ONEOK	Bear Creek	Dunn	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	80*	80	80
Petro Hunt	Little Knife	Billings	32	32	32	32	32	32	32	32	32	32	32
True Oil	Red Wing Creek	McKenzie	4	4	4	4	4	10	10	10	10	10	10
Sterling Energy	Ambrose	Divide	0.5	0.5	0.5	0.5	0.5	0.5	0.5	0.5	0.5	0.5	0.5
EOG Resources	Stanley	Mountrail	NA	20	0*	0*	0*	0*	0*	0*	0*	0
Whiting Oil & Gas	Robinson Lake	Mountrail	NA	30	45	90	90	90	110	110	110	110	110
Whiting Oil & Gas	Ray	Stark	NA	10	NA	NA	NA	NA	10	10	10	10	10
Whiting Oil & Gas	Belfield	Williams	NA	NA	NA	30	30	35	35	35	35	35	35
XTO - Nesson	Ray	Williams	NA	10	10	10	10	10	10	10	10	10	10
Hess	Tioga	Williams	110	110	110	110	110	110	250	250	250	250	250
Hess Targa	Little Missouri 4												200
Hiland Partners	Badlands	Bowman	4	40	40	40	40	40	40	40	40	40	40
Hiland Partners	Norse	Divide	NA	NA	25	25	25	25	25	25	25	25	25
Hiland Partners	Watford City	McKenzie	NA	NA	NA	50	90	90	90	90	90	90	90
Summit Resources	Knutson	Billings	NA**	NA**	NA**	NA**	NA**	NA**	NA**	NA**	NA**
Targa Resources	Badlands	McKenzie	NA	NA	NA	45	45	45	45	45	45	45	45
Targa Resources	Badlands	McKenzie	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	200	200*	200	200
USG Midstream Bakken	DeWitt	Divide	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	3	3	3	3	3	3
Caliber Midstream	Caliber Midstream	McKenzie	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	10	10	10	10	10	10
Plains	Ross	Mountrail	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	75	75	175	175	175
Oasis	Wild Basin	McKenzie									80	80	345
Liberty Resources	Tioga	Williams									20	20	20
Crestwood	Arrow Bear Den	McKenzie	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	NA	30	120
AUX Sable - Chicago, IL
AUX Sable - Chicago, IL	Prairies Ross	Mountrail	NA	NA	110	110	110	110	110	110	110	110	110
			227	370	490	760	900	1024	1369	1769	1889	2199	2754

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Book Recommendation

If one wants to know more about the development of the US movie industry, I strongly recommend The Man Who Made the Movies: The Meteoric Rise and Tragic Fall of William Fox, Vanda Krefft, c. 2017. Fascinating book, extremely well-written, and incredibly detailed without being ponderous.

I have barely started it -- I have completed the first 128 pages of this 755-page book with an 150 pages of notes, bibliography, and index.

I am taking notes as I read the book and putting those notes at this site.