Accessing Spot Crude Oil Prices At Flint Hills Resources

A reader told me that the NDIC uses the pricing at Flint Hills Resources for the oil prices reported at the monthly Director's Cut. At the link, one has a choice of clicking on "EDQ" or "Bulletins." Click on "Bulletins" and then click on "Download." The result should show up as a PDF on your desktop.

See also this post.

A screenshot of part of the current bulletin looks like this:

4Q17 GDP Forecast Back Under 3% -- January 6, 2018

Latest forecast: 2.7 percent — January 5, 2018:

The GDPNow model forecast for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the fourth quarter of 2017 is 2.7 percent on January 5, down from 3.2 percent on January 3.

The forecasts of real consumer spending growth and real private fixed-investment growth decreased from 3.2 percent and 8.9 percent, respectively, to 3.0 percent and 7.6 percent, respectively, after this morning's employment report from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and this morning's Non-Manufacturing ISM Report On Business from the Institute for Supply Management. The model's estimate of the dynamic factor for December—normalized to have mean 0 and standard deviation 1 and used to forecast the yet-to-be released monthly GDP source data—fell from 1.44 to 0.37 after the reports.

EV sales: complete report for December, 2017, has been posted.


Dream a Little Dream of Me, Mama Cass Eliot

Going Bananas Over Radioactive Socks -- Again -- January 6, 2018

For background on this story, see this post.

An update from The Grand Forks Herald:

SIDNEY, Mont. — Montana's capacity for radioactive oilfield waste could be nearing expansion soon as regulators finalize rules for disposal.

State officials are reviewing the license application for the Yellowstone Disposal landfill. It's a project backed by a North Dakota-based company, which plans to build on 2,600 acres of land 4.5 miles southeast of Sidney.

Newton's ranch sits near the Oaks Disposal Landfill, which has been the main destination for this type of waste in the Bakken region since 2013. It took 253,000 tons of waste from 2013 to 2015.

Most of it comes in the form of filter socks, which most often arrive in truckloads from North Dakota.

Waste materials like filter socks are classified as technologically enhanced naturally occurring radioactive material, or TENORM. They collect concentrated amounts of natural radiation during the extraction process.

The Environmental Protection Agency deemed exposure to radioactivity from TENORM waste as low-risk for people who live and work nearby. For comparison to the 50 pCi/g limit set by states, a banana has a natural radioactivity of 3.5 pCi/g, according to the North Dakota Department of Health. Clay-based cat litter is rated at 15 pCi/g.

Week 1: December 31, 2017 -- January 6, 2018

Nationally, the big story this past week has been the road to New England.

Regionally, the biggest story of the week -- taxable sales in the Bakken surge (see below).

Operations
A WPX Hidatsa well may have established a new Bakken production record
A middle Bakken well re-entered, targeting the Three Forks
Despite the Arctic blast, active rigs in North Dakota claw their way back to 54
Whiting's McNamara wells have been fracked
CLR starts to frack the rest of its Rath Federal wells 

Pipeline
ONEOK announces a new NGL pipeline that will connect the Bakken to Kansas 

Bakken economy
Taxable sales surging in the Bakken
New automobile dealership in Watford City 
Predicting the Legacy Fund 
Billings, MT, Exxon refinery remains shut down 

Miscellaneous
The Williston Herald releases its top-10-story-list for 2017
The winner of the 2017 Geico Rock Award announced 
Hettinger, ND, recorded the coldest temperature on earth this past week; but cold is relative

Burning Through Emissions Limits -- Faux Environmentalists -- We Don't Need No Pipelines; We Don't Need No Fracking; We Don't Need No Coal -- The Road To New England -- January 6, 2018

From the EIA: northeastern winter energy alert. 

And then this, a re-posting. This is simply such an incredible story on so many levels, I did not want it "lost" as an update to an earlier post.

As a reader suspected -- dual-fuel units are switching to oil, burning through emissions limits.  A huge "thank you" to another reader for spotting this.

New Yorkers and New Englanders are cranking up their thermostats to stay warm amid an extreme cold snap, but New England's grid overseer and its generators are finding that dual fuel generators are burning through not only needed wintertime oil supplies but also emissions allowances for the rest of the year.

ISO New England spokesperson Marcia Blomberg said the regional power system is operating under normal conditions but the extreme cold weather is increasing demand for natural gas for heating, creating pipeline constraints, driving up natural gas prices and causing dual-fuel generators to switch fuels. As a consequence, oil- and coal-fired power plants are generating much more power than usual and wholesale power prices have soared, said Blomberg.

As of 10:30 a.m. on Jan. 2, 34% of New England's electricity was being supplied by oil-fired generation (which over a given year supplies less than 1% of the region's generation), followed by natural gas at 25%, nuclear at 23%, renewables at 9%, coal at 6% and hydro at 4%. Of the renewable generation, 62% of it was supplied by greenhouse gas-emitting wood-, refuse- and landfill gas-fired generation, with wind supplying 38% and solar less than 1%. According to data from SNL Energy, ISO-NE's internal hub clocked a day-ahead power price of $210/MWh at peak on Jan. 2, up from a Dec. 22 peak of just $66.25/MWh.

In neighboring New York, which also faces wintertime gas capacity constraints, grid overseer New York ISO said the state has sufficient generation capacity and reserves to meet Jan. 2's projected peak demand of 24,500 MW, with some dual fuel units switching to oil as a result of increased demand for natural gas and both higher gas and wholesale electricity prices. According to the NYISO, dual fuel resources supplied nearly 30% of the state's generation at 12:15 p.m. on Jan. 2, followed by nuclear at roughly 28%, hydro at almost 15% and natural gas at approximately 14%.

New York's Hudson Valley saw power prices skyrocket to $205.50/MWh for Jan. 2 day-ahead markets compared with just $35/MWh on Dec. 22, while New York City area day-ahead prices increased to $215.25/MWh compared with $35/MWh on Dec. 22, and Western New York day-ahead prices soared to $195/MWh from $29.75/MWh on Dec. 22.