4Q13 New Wells Reporting Updated; Statoil With A Huge IP -- Almost 5,000 BOPD

I'm in the process of updating wells that were reported in 4Q13. When wells come off the confidential list, a lot of the better wells go directly to "DRL" status. Three to six months later, the well is completed, tested, and reported, so periodically, I need to go back and update previously reported wells.

I just noted this recently completed well:

• 24360, 4,884, Statoil, Knight 35-26 2H, Banks, t12/13; cum 12K 2/14;

A couple points, especially for newbies:

• scroll through the 4Q13 wells -- these are huge wells; and the cost of wells keep coming down
• look at wells in the Banks oil field -- a source in the Bakken told me a couple months ago to keep an eye on the Banks oil field
• look at some of the spectacular HRC wells in Antelope oil field

Meanwhile -- 

Question #9 over at the FAQ page: What is the record IP to date in the Williston Basin? 

Statoil reported an IP of 5,417 on September 26, 2013: #23992, Beaux 18-19 7H, Banks oil field.

Statoil reported an IP of 5,387 on July 19, 2013: #23387, Beaux 18-19 4H, Banks oil field. This might be a new record (this is the IP for crude oil only).

The initial production of any well, self-reported by the producer, is becoming less meaningful over time. Having said that, it looks like the record IP for a Bakken well is now 5,200, a Newfield well (July, 2011): 18691, 5,200, NFX, Wisness Federal 152-96-4-2H, Westberg, Bakken.

Statoil reported on July 10, 2013: 23385, 5,070, Beaux 18-19 6H, Banks, t6/13; cum -- ; 7 days to drill the lateral; I did not see completion data; 31 swell packers planned; 

Two earlier wells: a Whiting well which had an IP of 4,761 boepd: file #17612, 4,761 boepd IP, Whiting, Maki 11-27H, Mountrail County, Sanish field.  This is still current as of February 20, 2010. Since then, BEXP claims to have set a record with the Sorenson 29-32 1-H, #18654, with a 24-hour flowback of 5,133 bopd. However, the NDIC reported an IP of 2,944. BEXP also reported the Jack Cvancara 19-18 #1H (this site is down) in the Ross project area with a 24-hour flowback of 5,035.

New record in the Bakken, November 3, 2011. The Tarpon Federal 21-4H is a Whiting  Petroleum operated well and had a 24-hour initial production (IP) rate of 7,009 barrels of oil equivalent (BOE), setting a new Williston Basin record for a Bakken well.

Whiting said this was a record TFS well at the time, early 2012, file #20526, Smith 34-12TFH, 2,446, 102K in first 4.5 months.

A corollary: what is the best Bakken well? For 2012, click here.

This Just About Sums Up My Internet Experience ...

Updates

Later, 7:15 p.m. Central Time: and, of course, Apple, Inc., was never affected by "Heartbleed." But it sure as hell looks like it affected Yahoo!Mail, and it was reported earlier that Cisco systems were infected. Why does this not surprise me. 

Later, 1:04 p.m. Central Time: the information in the original post is more accurate than I even realized when I wrote it. It appears that I get no e-mail during the day. It is all batched and then re-sent from Yahoo (or the NSA) between midnight and 3:00 a.m.

Moments ago I just received a note from my wife that she sent on April 8 -- that was three days ago. It had the word "questionnaire" in it. I assume the Obama administration has flagged the word "questionnaire" for further evaluation. In this case, the "questionnaire" had to do with our younger granddaughter and a school project. It had nothing to do with ObamaCare. LOL. Of course, this is all tongue-in-cheek. I assume this is simply a Yahoo glitch that will be corrected over time.

This reminds me of a story. Following my original application to join the US Air Force back in 1972 or 1973 or thereabouts, I received a note from the government: "Please provide additional detail regarding your trip to East Germany in 1965" (or whenever it was, 1964, 1965, or 1966, I forget). I did not mention the trip to East Germany on the application. I was in Norway and Germany as an eighth grader with my dad. Like every tourist then, we took a side trip through Checkpoint Charlie. But the government knew I had been there.
 

Original Post

My Yahoo!Mail account is pathetic. Suffice it to say Yahoo!Mail is too unreliable for my needs.

For the most part Time Warner Cable - wi-fi does not work at our apartment which is why I seldom blog from there. 

I rode into South Lake this morning -- five miles on bicycle -- to an alternate Starbucks -- their wi-fi was dead. I enjoyed listening to iTunes music and reading American Caesar, the incredible biography of Douglas McArthur by William Manchester.

This about sums up my internet experience (LOL):

Bulletproof, La Roux

I'll never let you sweep me off my feet,

I won't let you in again.

The messages I tried to send,

My information's just not going in.

I won't let you turn around

And tell me now.

 I'm much too proud

To walk away from something when it's dead.

And, so we are off to find another connection somewhere....

In the meantime, I'm going to listen to a lot of music. On my iTunes collection. No wi-fi connection needed.

EU Agrees -- Renewable Energy Too Expensive -- Exempts German Steel Industry;

Disclaimer: this is not an investment site. Do not make any investment decisions based on what you read here or what you think you may have read here. 

ArgusMedia is reporting:

The European Commission has opened the way for Germany to continue exempting steelmakers from some of the effects of the country’s renewable energy levy. German steelmakers’ association WV Stahl has welcomed the move, but warns that further discussion is needed before the government finalises its planned reforms.

The steel industry — and other energy-intensive sectors — currently qualify for exemptions from parts of Germany's renewable energy levy. The commission has now agreed to the legality of these exemptions, following concerns over unfair state aid. The German government is in the process of reforming its renewable energy act (EEG) and, in tandem with the commission’s decision, has drafted proposals that existing embedded industrial power generation — a particular concern for the energy-intensive steel sector — will remain levy-free.

WV Stahl said the commission’s decision will help ensure that competitive steel production “remains possible” in Germany. But other aspects of the EEG continue to burden the sector with high energy costs, relative to competitor nations. And WV Stahl urged more dialogue before Germany finalises its EEG reforms, particularly on the exemption status of new-build embedded power generation capacity.

Friday -- April 11, 2014; World's Largest Truck Wash In The Bakken (South Of Williston); Wicked Witch Of The West Resigns

Active rigs:

	4/11/2014	04/11/2013	04/11/2012	04/11/2011	04/11/2010
Active Rigs	190	187	208	173	105

RBN Energy: The road to New England. A continuation on the natural gas constraints in New England. There is NO natural gas storage in New England. Talk about NIMBYs.

There are more and more stories suggesting that the Bakken experience won't be replicated outside of North America. Now another story today: the Financial Post is reporting that Statoil is disappointed with shale outside of the United States. The second story line is how much money Statoil has spent in exploration only to come up empty.

In a push to find new shale basins globally as it expands outside its traditional base, the energy major has invested in shale acreage in Russia with Rosneft, in Germany with Wintershall and in Australia with PetroFrontier Corp .

The company, which has made huge conventional discoveries off Brazil and Tanzania and in Canada in the past few years, is also scouring regions from Argentina to China for more shale opportunities as U.S. acquisition prices have soared.

Another record smashed in the Bakken. This is an incredible story. The world's largest truck wash is located south of Williston, in Alexander, North Dakota. Bakken.com is reporting:

Old records get smashed just about every day in the oil patch, so it’s no real surprise that it now may be home to the world’s largest truck wash.

At least that’s owner Jeff Schutz’s take on the scale of the Kwik n Kleen at the corner of U.S. Highway 85 and N.D. Highway 68 just outside Alexander.

He’s developed wash stations throughout the Midwest and a fleet of mobile wash units and he’s sure there isn’t a bigger truck wash anywhere on the planet in terms of speed and water capacity. He opened Kwik n Kleen four days ago, good timing since just about every rig out there is sporting a few layers of mud and grime from greasy roads and springtime slush.

If the $6 million wash is one for the Guinness World Records book, like Schutz says his research finds, it stands to reason everything about it is sized off the charts.

Trucks roll through a 200-foot-long wash bay spaced with electronic eyes that start and stop all the wash, chemical and rinse cycles along the full length.

But besides the sheer length and height of the wash, which occupies the highway corner with same dominance an indoor sports arena would, for Schutz, it’s all about the water.

There’s not a drain in the wash and he purposely designed it that way.

It likely is, considering a full semi truck wash requires 30,000 gallons of water at the rate of 450 gallons per minute when both truck wash bays and a car wash bay are running at the same time.

All that water isn’t cheap and nor is there an overwhelming supply off the Western Area Water Supply pipeline, which transports Missouri River water treated at Williston throughout the oil patch.

So the wash is all about recycled water.

An area between the two truck bays has all the pumps, tanks and pipes of a municipal water treatment facility, including a large-scale reverse osmosis plant that provides the streak-free water that’s used in the final rinse.

But most of the space is used to collect used wash water in a settling pond bigger and deeper than a swimming pool where dirt and debris fall to the bottom and the cleanest surface water overflows into a separate pond that’s filtered and reused in the wash cycles.

Schutz says 98 percent of the water used in the wash is recycled and only 2 percent is fresh water used in the rinse cycles.

There's a lot more at the link.

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

The Wall Street Journal

Top story: the stock market sell-off yesterday. It was all about tech, and health services.

Ms Sebelius to resign. Fail.

Insider trading coming from the Obama administration. Market-sensitive information vitally important to health-insurance companies has once again reached Wall Street before the public, and this time it appears to have come from the government itself.

At least nine people killed in a three-vehicle crash involving a bus carrying high-school students on a visit to college. FedEx truck crosses median and slams into bus, head-on collision.

Sebelius exits, but health-care war endures.

GOP budget plan narrowly passes House. I've pretty much given up on the House. Lots of talk; little action. Mr Boehner needs to join Ms Sebelius in retirement.

NATO says Russia is ready to strike. Of course, Obama's BLM has already struck -- moving an army of soldiers on to a Nevada ranch to kill a few cows, capture Ma and Pa Kettle.

Uninterestingly, the WSJ reports that the "west" is divided over whether to do anything about Russia, the Crimean, the Ukraine. It's all about money, of course.

According to a report cited in the WSJ, air safety reaches new highs. The global accident rate for arline flights in 2013 was the lowest on record.  Of course, one cannot count as accidents when pilots commit suicide/homicide by flying their planes into the ocean.

GM's recall costs keep rising.

Heartbleed bug found in Cisco routers, Juniper gear. This probably explains why my Yahoo!Mail service is down. I no longer get e-mail in real-time through Yahoo! Yahoo's outages are incredible.  We're starting out another morning with Yahoo! being down I see.

This is why folks in Tennessee don't want to see their automotive plant unionized. Teamsters union members in Louisville, KY, overwhelmingly rejected a part of a contract iwth United Parcel Sercie, creating more headaches for the company as it looks to end months of labor negotiatins.

Regulators tell banks to plug "Heartbleed" security hole.

Natural-gas prices rise as supplies look lean. 

The future of Dollar Stores is dire: the chain will close outlets; reflects rising competition fromthe likes of Wal-Mart and a falling rural population.

The Los Angeles Times

Crash kills ten (10); high school students on bus involved. Struck by a FedEx truck on I-5 in orthern California. Both drivers are killed; three chaperons are killed. Five students killed. The LA Times: Shortly after 5:30 p.m. Thursday, a FedEx truck crossed the grassy median that separates Interstate 5 here and slammed into the bus packed with students en route to visit Humboldt State University, about 200 miles north of the crash site." It looks like FedEx, like CBR, needs to put two drivers in the front cab to prevent single-point failures.

The South Bay high school superintendent, earning $675,000 last year, is put on leave. I assume "paid leave."

Finally, and long overdue, Rock Hall of Fame welcomes KISS, Nirvana, and Linda Ronstadt, among others.  A must-read story.

Boeing will increase its workforce in Long Beach, Seal Beach.

HHS Sebelius resigns. Good riddance. Should have been top story. Buried at the bottom.

Pennsylvania school stabbing suspect "doesn't fit the mold." There's a mold for these psychopaths?

The Dickinson Press

Killdeer farmers, ranchers upset; want local CENEX to "start over." They say the CENEX caters too much to the oil field.

Sebelius: "I'm responsible for the debacle." Resigns. Truly the wicked witch of the west. (Previously the governor of Kansas. Clearly in over her head from the beginning, like most of Obama's administration.)

Natural-Gas Prices Rise As Supplies Look Lean -- Said To Be "Very Disconcerting"; Analysts Expected 14 BCF Injection, Only 4 BCF

Link at The Wall Street Journal:

Natural-gas prices climbed on Thursday after new data raised some concerns about producers' ability to meet future demand. Gas for May delivery rose 6.9 cents, or 1.5%, to settle at $4.655 a million British thermal units on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

Trading was volatile—after falling early in the day, prices soared as much as 4% following the release of U.S. inventory data.

Last week, more gas flowed into storage than was taken out for the first time this year. Analysts had expected the increase would be 14 billion cubic feet; instead, stockpiles grew by 4 billion cubic feet, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said in its weekly storage report.

"This is very disconcerting. It's a slow start," said Teri Viswanath, natural-gas strategist at BNP Paribas.

"The industry is going to have to work that much harder to ensure" there is enough gas in storage before the start of next winter, she said. The U.S. consumed a record amount of natural gas last winter, as freezing temperatures spurred demand for gas-fired heating.

About half of U.S. households rely on natural gas to heat their homes, according to the EIA.