North Dakota Governor Gives The "All Clear" Sign -- January 15, 2021

All clear! Governor of North Dakota, Doug Burgum will lift the state's mask mandate and business capacity limits effective January 18 2021. Stories everywhere. 

Military parade: This is pretty funny: due to Covid-19 and the excitement Sleepy Joe arouses, the president's inauguration team was concerned no one would show up for President Biden's inauguration. Even President Trump had said he would not attend. So, what to do? This is easy: mandate the US military to show up in force. Remember the military parade Trump always wanted and never got? Biden will get his military parade the day he's sworn into office. National guardspeople from every state will show up for the inauguration. North Dakota is sending 130 national guardspeople. LOL. We did this all the time when I was on active duty. When someone "of importance" was scheduled to visit the base and the commander was concerned no one would show up, the commander mandated (ordered) all personnel to attend. And there were often parades. I can't make this stuff up.

Maybe it won't be so bad. The Bismarck Tribune is now reporting that crude oil production is expected to drop "a little this winter, then stabilize upon spring's arrival and possibly inch upward toward the end of 2021." Weren't we told just a week ago or so, that the state was in deep trouble with crude oil production due to the change in the administration?

Hunting for oil. Holy mackerel! Now "Japan is hunting for oil" to meet "robust" power demand amid faltering LNG stocks. Reported by Platts. This is just like New England in the US. I always thought Japan was better prepared, more pragmatic when it came to energy. Oh, that's right: Kyoto. Or spelled backwards: Tokyo.

Fuel oil. In Japan, low sulfur fuel oil commands strong premium.

Okay, well this was huge. This is pretty funny: an estimated 1,000 fast-food workers across the United States went on strike Friday over low wages, staging protests in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr. President Biden will fix that: the minimum wage will be raised but fast food restaurants will cut staff to pay for the increased wages. I was just checking my old history book: I was unaware that Martin Luther King, Jr., was so focused on the wages of fast food restaurant workers, but there it is.  Maybe the players will kneel before kick-off this weekend in support of the minimum wage, the protest du jour.

The Bismarck Tribune. To see the names of the twenty people in your state who protested yesterday, see page 3.

1,000. By the way, think about that: 1,000. That's what The Bismarck Tribune reported: "An estimated 1,000 fast-foot workers across the United States ...." Do you know what 1,000 people spread across the United States looks like. Fifty seven states -- less than twenty people from each state. Give me a break. "An estimated 1,000 people...." Either that's a huge typo or it was a  really, really slow news day.


The Suez is back! Sea-going tankers now clearly prefer transit from the US to Asia via the Suez Canal, and not, the Cape of Good Hope. Quick! Pop quiz: where's the Cape of Good Hope?

• 
tip of South America
• 
tip of South Africa
• 
tip of Bob Hope's nose
• 
tip of Tip O'Neill's nose

• wherever that US naval hospital is anchored (by the way, has that hospital ship been re-deployed to California where it seems to be desperately needed?
  

Transfer of wealth. The city's first Ferrari dealership soon to open in Caracas, Venezuela. Hopefully these will be EVs.

Week 2: January 10, 2021 -- January 16, 2021

NOTE: most of this is complete. I still have to add Geoff Simon's top ND energy stories and a few other things, but this is pretty close to finished. 

Most under-reported story this week:

• Semiconductor shortage; Toyota shuts down production in China due to "chip" shortage;
• US imports no Saudi crude oil: first time since 1985;

Most interesting energy story this week:

• China's economy is booming; US? Not so much;

Top story of the week:

• First-ever ethane-produced electricity power plant slated to be built west of Williston, ND;
  

Records:

• The Dow; the S&P 500;

Top international non-energy story:

• Freezing temperatures / snowfall in Spain, China, Japan;
• Apple and Hyundai announce partnership;

Top international energy story:

• Volatility of the price of oil; strong surge at beginning of week, only to plummet at end of week

Top national energy story:

Top North Dakota non-energy story:

Top North Dakota energy story:

• Crude oil production flat m/m (October/November 2020);

Geoff Simon's top ND energy stories:

• Mining lignite for rare earth metals;
• Lawmaker proposes an 80-mph speed limit on parts of I-29 and I-94;
• Hess to finish Tioga gas plant expansion in 2021 after Covid delays;
• Oil companies lock in drilling permits, before Biden is sworn in;
• Dickinson public schools to return to full-time, face-to-face;
• This could be one of the mildest winters on record (no one is complaining)
• Senator Kevin Cramer opens western North Dakota office in Williston;
• Shell's ethane-consuming stream cracker in Pennsylvania in the home stretch;
• Enbridge rejects Michigan's demand to shut down oil pipeline;
• India sees $55 billion investment in clean col over the next decade;
• New Mexico bill would halt fracking permits while state conducts study; whoo-hoo! 
  

Most egregious ND energy story:

Operators:

Operations:

• CLR"s Lundberg Federal wells in Rattlesnake Point;

Fracking: 

• Mining frack sand in ND;

Pipelines:

• KMI's Texas Permian gas pipeline on line; huge story;

Wells of note:

• An old Petro-Hunt well with 65X jump in production;
• MRO: four more huge wells in Reunion Bay;
• MRO to report three huge wells;
• MRO's Prior USA well;
• QEP MHA well in Van Hook;
• QEP MHA well in Van Hook;
• Hess EN-Enger well in Big Butte;

Bakken economy:

• New brewery in Williston;

Commentary:

• Fossil fuel production to increase through 2022; will remain flat in 2021 as increased coal production offsets declines in natural gas production; STEO -- EIA;
• Shale: swing producer, 2021?

Notes From All Over -- The Afternoon Before A Three-Day Weekend Edition -- January 15, 2021

All this week on CNBC, all this hand-wringing over the surging 10-year Treasury, jumping from below 1% to 1.13%. 

Some folks on CNBC talked as if the world was coming to an end. 

Today I see the 10-year Treasury dropped four basis points, back to 1.087%. The dollar was stronger despite President-elect Biden's $1.9 trillion stimulus plan, and the price of oil showed the biggest decline in weeks. Guy Adami was practically apoplectic on Fast Money yesterday with regard to the surging 10-year Treasury and the falling dollar and the $1.9 trillion stimulus plan. Tea leaves suggest the US economy is "not yet out of the woods" by any stretch of the imagination. From Rigzone below "... and weak US economic data stoked concerns..."

I didn't watch CNBC all day so I have no idea what their talking points were but when I get back to blogging anything of note regarding the Bakken, we will have a new president. 

It's a three-day weekend, and then a day before the inauguration. I suppose there could be some Bakken news Tuesday but that's about it. Then President Biden takes over. Who would have ever guessed?

EIA's January, 2021, Short-Term Energy Outlook

Link here.

This should be an interesting read, 2021: in the US, total production of fossil fuels to remain flat as increased coal production offsets declines in natural gas production.

Re-Posting: Ethane Power Plant West Of Williston -- January 15, 2021

Updates
January 15, 2021: press release, dated January 12, 2021, from Bismarck, ND, and Westlake Village, CA, data points:

• Bakken Midstream Natural Gas, LLC
• has signed its first ethane supply term sheet to support the power plant previously announced
• will be the largest power plant to utilize advances in combustion turbine technology that enables ethane as its primary fuel source;
• The Energy Center: to be located in the Mountrail-Williams Electric Cooperative near Williston, ND
• October, 2020: announced it had secured nearly $25 million from two separate capital raises
• funding rounds led by the Family Office of Founder and executive chairman, Steven E Lebow
• Lebo was joined by ND business leaders including Gene Nicholas, Ron D. Offutt, and Stephen L. Stenehjem
• Lebow, previously: 
• founded and co-led Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette's (DLJ) Los Angeles office and created and led GRP Partners, a US and European venture capital firm;
• from day one, he was the primary fanancier for companies including Costco Wholesale, PetSmart, Dick's Sporting Goods, Envestnet, Bill Me Later (sold to PayPal) and ULTA Beauty;
• three years of preparation and work to get to this point
• Bakken Midstream: 
• CEO Mike Hopkins
• Lebow, and co-founders Curt Launer and Shane Goettle
• Hopkins:
• has successfully developed 54 power projects around the world, totaling over twelve gigawatts
• was extensively involved in the build out of the value-added industry in Alberta, Canada
• Launer:
• number-one ranked natural gas industry analyst on Wall Street for twelve years
• in the Institutional Investor Magazine Hall of Fame
• Goettle:
• life-long North Dakota businessman and attorney with more than 25 years of state and federal level experience;
• former head of the North Dakota Department of Commerce
• former chair of EmPower North Dakota

Original Post

Link here. 

Bismarck Tribune link here. 

Williston Herald link here.

From The Bismarck Tribune, data points:

• west of Williston
• Bakken Midstream Natural Gas
• $400-million facility
• construction: to begin in 2022
• to take two years
• CEO: Mike Hopkins
• Bakken Midsream
• formed in 2018
• mission: to develop "such" projects
• received a $200,000 investment from ND Department of Commerce
• confidentiality precludes more specific information
  

Are there any other such plants in the US that might provide readers some comparison?

• Pennsylvania Power Plant said to be the first to tap ethane for electricity -- March 27, 2020 -- NGI, link here; proposed as long ago as 2015 by GE, link here;

EIA: costs for new energy plants, 2018, link here. 

• average construction costs, combined cycle: $900 / kW = $900,000 / mW or about a million dollars for a new combined cycle plant;
• average new capacity for a new natural gas plant: 500 MW
• so, 500 megawatts x one million dollars = $500 million 

Hess natural gas processing plant: $150 million, link here. 

Hess Vantage pipeline: link here. 

RBN Energy: Shell's new ethane-consuming steam cracker in the home stretch. See this post also. Archived.

After several years of development, Shell’s $6 billion Pennsylvania Petrochemicals Complex — the first of its kind in the Marcellus/Utica shale play — is really taking shape about 30 miles northwest of Pittsburgh. The facility, which will consist of a 3.3-billion-lb/year ethylene plant and three polyethylene units, is in its final stages of construction, as is a pipeline that will supply regionally sourced ethane to the steam cracker. When the Falcon Pipeline and the PPC comes online, possibly as soon as 2022, they will provide a new and important outlet for the vast amounts of ethane that is now either “rejected” into natural gas for its Btu value or piped to Canada, the Gulf Coast, or the Marcus Hook export terminal near Philadelphia. Today, we discuss progress on the Marcellus/Utica’s first world-class petrochemical complex and what it will mean for the play’s NGL market.