More Global Warming Hits Alaska -- Temperature of -79 Almost Breaks Record -- Themometer Breaks Instead -- Absolutely Nothing To Do With the Bakken

Link here.

Jim River, AK closed in on the all time record coldest temperature of -80°F set in 1971, which is not only the Alaska all-time record, but the record for the entire United States. Unfortunately, it seems the battery died in the weather station just at the critical moment.

Something tells me the caribou are huddled along the Trans-Alaska-Pipeline -- in fact, it may be the oil industry that saves these beautiful animals. The irony of it all.

Food Shortage in Williston, Obama Administration Has Created 22 Million Jobs, And Other Urban Legends

I may have to incorporate an "urban legend" page into my blog.

Along with the 57 states in the US.

Link here.Video of the president saying he had created 22 million jobs.  I believe that's how many folks are out of work.

Thank goodness for the Drudge Report.

Hardy Bakken Field -- Just for the Archives

Link here and here.

The Hardy Bakken Field in Southeastern Saskatchewan was discovered in 2008 by individuals involved in the original Bakken discoveries in Montana and North Dakota. The Hardy area falls along a well documented oil migration pathway that extends from the heart of the Williston Basin in North Dakota out to the old Bakken producing Roncott field (just Northeast of Hardy). Passport has participated in the second Bakken horizontal well in the Hardy field which is considered a successful well (initial rates of ~164 barrels of oil per day) and proves the area's potential.

A successful well with initial rates of 160 bbls/day. Hmmm. Think what the wells in North Dakota with initial rates of 1,000 bopd mean.

By the way, at the link, there is a nice schematic of the Williston Basin Bakken.

Awesome: Headline Alone Tells Me The Whole Story -- Off-Shore Oil Rigs To Benefit from Wind Energy

Link here to Rigzone. 

Somehow there is some irony here, but I cannot articulate it.

Since the late 1960s, the North Sea has been a major source of energy in the form of hydrocarbons for several countries, chiefly the United Kingdom and Norway.

But while some concern has been raised in recent years about how long North Sea oil can continue to support the Northern European oil and gas industry it has created, a whole new energy sector is taking off in the region where much of the experience and know-how that has been developed in the offshore oil sector is proving useful.

After the UK government announced plans in 2008 to open up the seas around Britain to enable the development of up to 33 gigawatts of offshore wind power by 2020, energy utilities have shown a great deal of interest in the sector. And they have invested heavily: firstly, in order to secure offshore wind development licenses awarded by the UK's Crown Estate; and, secondly, in the equipment and components required to construct offshore wind farms.

Meanwhile, other countries connected to the North Sea are getting in on the act. Denmark – actually a pioneer of the sector, having been involved in developing offshore wind farms since the 1990s – recently, in 2009, built a wind farm at Horns Rev (in the eastern North Sea) that was briefly the biggest offshore wind farm in the world. Not far away, further south, Germany is developing offshore wind schemes off its North Sea coast.

On top of everything else, the oil companies can offset their profits, taxes, whatever, with those "cap-and-trade" costs. The rich get richer. Playing by Al Gore's rules. 

At the link, the photos are worth a thousand words, or more.

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A very random thought. The faux-environmentalists (TFE) are concerned about the rising ocean due to global warming and the disappearance of islands (hasn't happened; in fact, more islands than ever rose this past decade). TFE are worried that coastal cities like New York City will be inundated. Well, duh. The Low Countries (Netherlands, for example) dealt with this problem centuries ago; trying to keep the ocean water back from their land below sea level. And they did it with windmills and dikes. It doesn't take an Orson Welles to imagine windmills pumping water back out out to ocean as well as creating electricity. Just a random thought. Comments probably won't get posted.

CCS Gets Permission To Build Waste Treatment Complex Near White Earth -- The Williston Basin, North Dakota, USA

The top of the scenic White Earth valley near Tioga will become an industrial zone for treating oil field waste - some of it slightly radioactive.  CCS development manager Scott Herbst said he expects the White Earth facility will generate from three to 10 truckloads of radioactive waste weekly, the same as a similar treatment facility it owns near Alexander. The waste comes from naturally occurring radioactive materials in the earth that are concentrated in the oil production and treatment process. It's a small amount of the total volume and is hauled to an approved disposal site in Colorado, he said.  The state Industrial Commission approved the facility in an order issued this week, requiring a $200,000 reclamation bond.

Naturally occurring radiation. Hmmm. Concentrated. I'm impressed with the state. If this were Minnesota or California or BLM, the decision would be tabled, slow-rolled, decided, appealed, killed, re-visited, and finally passed -- maybe, ten years from now.

The county commissioners complain that there's too much waste, not enough infrastructure. This is a start.

The link is to the Dickinson Press.

And, of course, the article ends with the usual:

Some White Earth residents are concerned about truck traffic, road damage and declining property values. The Industrial Commission says that many of those concerns are outside of its jurisdiction.

My hunch: no one passing through the White Earth area will be even slightly aware of it. The population of White Earth is 80.

Incidentally, Arnold Morse Samuelson was born and raised in White Earth, North Dakota, which I blogged about a few days ago.