Friday, June 5, 2015

Greek Tragedy's Fifth Act Extended Until The End Of The Month; We Got Ourselves A Convoy -- June 5, 2015

Do you remember these numbers and dates? Posted on May 17, 2015, just a couple of weeks ago:
  • June 5: 300 million
  • June 12: 300 million
  • June 16: 550 million
  • June 19: 300 million
  • June 19: 100 million 
So, the first payment was due, 300 million Euros today. So, the question is, did Greece make the payment. Nope, they negotiated to kick all of June's payments to the end of the month, June 30. 

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Fracking Poses No "Widespread" Risk To Drinking Water -- EPA

The Dickinson Post is reporting the Reuters story.

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Breaking News

OPEC maintains production.


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More Breaking News

Sunrise this morning was 5:27 a.m. for New Yorkers.

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Flooding In The Bakken
Seems Like a Late Spring

Link here.  The Missouri River near Williston is forecast to rise above flood stage by Friday evening and remain above flood stage into next week as mountain snow melt runoff and recent heavy rainfall across Montana coming off the Yellowstone River makes its way into North Dakota.

The NDIC has ordered some wells shut in due to risk of flooding.

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Convoy

For those who oppose pipelines, this is what it will get you. 

From The Los Angeles Times: 
Exxon Mobil officials are seeking permission to truck the oil through Santa Barbara County after a ruptured pipeline sent oil spilling into the Pacific Ocean and brought the company's oil transportation operations to a halt.
The company told Santa Barbara County officials Thursday that it wants to send a fleet of 5,000-gallon tanker trucks along U.S. 101 at a frequency of eight trucks per hour, 24 hours a day, every day.
5,000 gallons / 42 = 120 bbls (rounded) * 8 = 1,000 bbls / hour (rounded) = 20,000 bbls daily. The Enbridge Sandpiper will carry 225,000 bbls/day, or about 10x that amount, or about 80 trucks/hour using the same parameters.

Whatever. [I often make simple arithmetic errors. If this is important to you, go to the source.]


Convoy, CW McCall

The version I was more familiar with:

Convoy, CW McCall

Thursday, June 4, 2015

From The Williston Wire -- June 4, 2015

Williston's job market continues to grow. In 2013, the City surpassed Minot to become the fourth largest in the state and last year it moved up to number three surpassing Grand Forks County.
Williams County had the highest average weekly wage at $1,593 followed by McKenzie County at $1,498. In other 2014 labor market totals: employment rose by 4.2 percent, an increase of 17,549 jobs and weekly wages were up 6.4 percent, an increase of $978.

North Dakota's labor market is beginning to feel effects from the recent downturn in crude oil prices, but the impact may be less than initially feared. The March unemployment rate, not seasonally adjusted, was 3.8 percent compared to 3.4 percent for March of the previous year. And while there are some job losses in the energy sector, other occupational groups in the state are showing employment gains.

With oil rigs in North Dakota hitting a new low Monday at 80, skies may seem dark for airline prospects with a recent statewide drop in passenger departures. Still, officials in Williston are pushing onward with the $250 million airport relocation project, sending the city's final environmental assessment during the week to the Federal Aviation Administration. The FAA is expected to approve the plan in August, which places the city into a position to sell the current 800-acre Sloulin Field International Airport and purchase 1,500-acres of land set northwest of the city truck reliever route to build -up the recently named Williston Basin International Airport by 2017. 

Despite some wet weather, the road construction at the intersection of Main Street and Broadway is scheduled to be completed on Wednesday, June 10, 2015. The announcement was made by Knife River officials during their weekly public meeting regarding the Main Street Reconstruction project in downtown Williston.  

Eight (8) New Permits -- North Dakota, USA -- June 4, 2015

Active rigs:


6/4/201506/04/201406/04/201306/04/201206/04/2011
Active Rigs81193189214171

Eight (8) new permits --
  • Operators: Crescent Point (5), EOG (3),
  • Fields: Dublin (Williams), Parshall (Mountrail)
  • Comments:  I track the Dublin oil field here; it looks like the new wells might be pad drilling; see below. 
General area of proposed Crescent Point wells. This is my guess but I could be way wrong; if this information is important to you, go to the source.


Four (4) producing wells completed:
  • 24791, 708, Whiting, Smokey 16-7-19-16H3M, Pembroke, t8/13; cum 37K 4/15;
  • 24792, 1,445, Whiting, Smokey 16-7-19-16HA, Pembroke, t8/13; cum 86K 4/14;
  • 28592, 2,024, Zavanna, Simmental 2-11 2TFH, Long Creek, t5/15; cum --
  • 29816, 1,354, Hess, SC-Norma-154-98-0706H-7, Truax, t5/15; cum --
Comments: I have no idea why #24791 was reported today; 
 it seems to have been around "forever." I bet the same for #24792. Long Creek is south of Stockyard Creek, east of Williston, and just north of the river; it's obviously going to be a great field, but it's location (near the river) and the size (very small) will minimize activity.
Hess renewed four (4) permits, all in McKenzie County: HA-Sanford wells.

Wells coming off the confidential list Friday:
  • 27460, 2,056, HRC, Fort Berthold 148-95-26B-35-5H, Eagle Nest, t12/14; cum 84K 4/15;
  • 28961, drl, Newfield, Skaar Federal 153-96-29-10H, Sand Creek, no production data,
  • 29368, 1,130, CLR, Gjorven Federal 2-21H, Brooklyn, 30 stages, 3.4 million lbs; t5/15; cum 3K 4/15;
  • 29425, SI/NC, BR, Kings Canyon 5-8-34UTFH,  Camel Butte, no production data,
  • 29581, 2,204, BR, Aiden 3-3-13UTFH,  Haystack Butte, t4/15; cum 14K 4/15;
  • 29996, 401, Slawson, Shakafox 5-28-21TFH, Big Bend, t3/15; cum --
  • 30063, drl/NC, Statoil, Enderud 9-4 5H, Banks, no production data,
  • 30064, drl/NC, Statoil, Enderud 9-4 8TFH, Banks, no production data,

Natural Gas Fill Rate -- Evidence Of Huge Switch From Coal To Natural Gas -- June 4, 2015

NG fill rate: 132 (a dynamic link).

Working gas in storage was 2,233 Bcf as of Friday, May 29, 2015, according to EIA estimates. This represents a net increase of 132 Bcf from the previous week. Stocks were 751 Bcf higher than last year at this time and 22 Bcf above the 5-year average of 2,211 Bcf. In the East Region, stocks were 115 Bcf below the 5-year average following net injections of 73 Bcf.

Two comments:
  • yes, the US natural gas stocks are slightly -- but very slightly -- higher than the 5-year average, and this is occurring despite huge production; it simply shows how fast the industry is switching from coal to natural gas
  • second, it's the northeast region that is most concerning; they need a huge positive number going into winter, particularly if it's a cold winter or a prolonged winter, and right now the East Region is below their 5-year average

Graphing The Bakken Phenomenon; NOAA Fudges The Data -- June 4, 2015

I find these two graphs fascinating. The first graph is the amount of crude oil stores in the US (not including the Strategic Petroleum Reserve). The Bakken boom began in 2007; the Eagle Ford came along a bit later; the Permian, one time a declining, aging field, came along even later. So, the US is puttering along, but then, look at that spike that occurred at the end of 2014 and in early 2015. The increase between 2007 and 2014 was subtle, not much more than background noise, and then suddenly, in November, 2014, and continuing until March, 2015, an unprecedented spike:



The second graph is the number of days of US crude oil supply, jumping from 22 days to 29 days, almost an entire full week of additional supply. Again, what is most fascinating is the sudden jump noted in the oval, occurring seven years after the North Dakota Bakken boom began:


You can see the first graph without the annotations at this link.

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Apple Page

Apple retains its ranking at #5 based on revenues. Macrumors is reporting:
Fortune has released its annual Fortune 500 list of the top U.S. corporations based on gross revenue, which together accounted for $12.5 trillion in revenues, $945 billion in profits and $17 trillion in market value. Apple maintained the 5th spot in the rankings for the second consecutive year after steadily rising from 6th place in 2013, 17th place in 2012, 35th place in 2011 and 56th place in 2010. 
Walmart, Exxon, Chevron, Berkshire Hathaway, Apple. 
Apple recorded operating revenue of $182.79 billion during the 2014 fiscal year, a 7% year-over-year increase. Walmart, Exxon Mobil, Chevron and Berkshire Hathaway topped the list with between $194.6 and $485.6 billion revenue, although it's worth noting that Apple finished ahead of all four of those companies with $39.5 billion in profit and recently posted two record-breaking quarters.
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Global Warming

Wow, talk about incredible. A US government agency "fixing" the data. The Daily Caller is reporting:All that work and we're talking 0.012 degrees.
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists have found a solution to the 15-year “pause” in global warming: They “adjusted” the hiatus in warming out of the temperature record.
New climate data by NOAA scientists doubles the warming trend since the late 1990s by adjusting pre-hiatus temperatures downward and inflating temperatures in more recent years. “Newly corrected and updated global surface temperature data from NOAA’s [National Centers for Environmental Information] do not support the notion of a global warming ‘hiatus,'” wrote NOAA scientists in their study presenting newly adjusted climate data.
To increase the rate in warming, NOAA scientists put more weight on certain ocean buoy arrays, adjusted ship-based temperature readings upward, and slightly raised land-based temperatures as well.
Scientists said adjusted ship-based temperature data “had the largest impact on trends for the 2000-2014 time period, accounting for 0.030°C of the 0.064°C trend difference.” They added that the “buoy offset correction contributed 0.014°C… to the difference, and the additional weight given to the buoys because of their greater accuracy contributed 0.012°C.”
We used to to the same thing in college biology and chemistry when our experimental results did not meet our expectations -- it was called a fudge factor. It's quite incredible the NOAA would do this. If the original data had fit their story, would they have gone back and re-jiggered the data. If they had and the re-jiggered data did not fit their story, would they have published the study. LOL.

0.03 degrees; 0.064 degrees; and, then, the 0.012 degrees. Not reproducible. Not by a long shot. Nor statistically significant. Anthropogenic global warming is a cult or a religion; it is not science.

Regular readers can see through this. First, of all, this is all relative. If they're going to change data from sites in 2014, they need to change data from sites going all the way back to 1 million BC; probably not doing to happen.

What I find most comical: the researchers got exactly the number they were looking for. If one knows what "number" one wants, it's not all that difficult to change the data until the number comes out exactly as "predicted." This study will be met with derision, except by Bill Nye, the science guy. And Neil DeGrasse Tyson, the First.