CLR Has Completed Angus Federal 6-16H2; Older Well Back On Status; Small Jump In Production

A neighboring well has just been completed and is producing:

• 33965, SI/NC, CLR, Angus Federal 6-16H2, Elm Creek, 26,729 feet; producing as of 5/19; three Forks, second bench; t5/19; cum 568K 1/24;
  

The well:

• 20804, 329, CLR, Angus 1-9H, 30 stages; 2.7 million lbs, t2/13; cum 310K 7/19; offline as of 12/18; still offline 4/19; back on line as of 5/19; a middle Bakken well; cum 401K 1/24;
  

Recent production; small jump in production:

Pool	Date	Days	BBLS Oil	Runs	BBLS Water	MCF Prod	MCF Sold	Vent/Flare
BAKKEN	7-2019	31	4482	4166	3802	6872	3605	2877
BAKKEN	6-2019	27	3536	3840	3573	5553	2115	3149
BAKKEN	5-2019	9	1315	806	640	729	62	628
BAKKEN	4-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	3-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	2-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	1-2019	1	0	187	22	0	0	0
BAKKEN	12-2018	25	1625	1687	548	4847	4437	75
BAKKEN	11-2018	30	1952	2054	666	4360	3428	538

Notes From All Over, Part 2 -- September 23, 2019

Opportunities: if anyone has noticed, the US rig counts continue to drop. My hunch is that day rates for drilling have come way down. Those with rigs: the last thing they want to do is "lay them down." They will rent at lower prices to keep them active. Break-even costs in the Bakken, earlier this year. In Mountrail County, $8/bbl is the break-even price.

Making the Bahamas great: remember that story and pictures of that huge petroleum products terminal in the Bahamas before, during, and after Hurricane Dorian? Today, Rigzone is reporting:

Buckeye Partners, L.P. reported Friday that it has resumed full operations at its Buckeye Bahamas Hub.

Buckeye stated that BBH – the largest petroleum products terminal in the Western Hemisphere – sustained only minor damage from Hurricane Dorian, which devastated part of The Bahamas early this month.

The company added that its has completed inspections and repairs and that it found no indications of product release or environmental threats. Last week, Buckeye restored partial operations at BBH.

“On behalf of the entire company, I want to thank the Buckeye emergency response teams and al of our employees in The Bahamas for their dedicated work to safely restore operations at our Buckeye Bahamas Hub,” Khalid A. Muslih, executive vice president and president of Buckeye’s Global Marine Terminals unit, said in a written statement emailed to Rigzone.

Buckeye also stated that the company and its employees have been contributing to various relief and recovery efforts in the wake of Dorian.

Hyperbole, Mideast: whenever anyone says this -- the 2019 attack on Abqaiq -- was the biggest disruption in "oil" supplies in the history of the universe, I remind them of a) the Suez Crisis of 1958; and, b) the OPEC embargo in 1973. There were many, many more repercussions from those two events than what has occurred so far from "Abqaiq-2019."

Hyperbole, Texas: everyone said Imelda, September, 2019, barely a tropical storm according to DFW radio news outlet, was several times worse than Hurricane Harvey. Exxon shut down the largest refinery along the Gulf Coast. After Hurricane Harvey: massive shortages of gasoline in Texas; long lines; service stations running out of gasoline. After Imelda, the price of gasoline hardly rose, if at all, and there were certainly no shortages. Any rise in the price of gasoline was probably from "Abqaiq-2019" and even those increases were minimal.

Hyperbole: some said the attack on Abqaiq would cause price of gasoline to skyrocket, resulting in ... yes, the recession that is right around the corner.

Mea culpa: I'm not immune fro criticism. I thought the price of oil would jump much more than it did. But I'm still convinced, "the numbers don't add up."

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Corky

I hope Corky, seemingly ageless, will visit me when I'm in a nursing home.

The Permian Vs The Bakken -- Side-By-Side -- Mana A Mano -- September 23, 2019

I don't know if folks like to put windows side-by-side. I know it's a pain, sometimes impossible on a mobile device (phone, tablet) but on a laptop or desktop very, very easy.

Bring up this site and place it on the right half of your screen. It's the EIA production report for the Permian for September / October, 2019.

Place the following in the first window on the left side of the screen. Then compare what you see on the right with what you see below (link here):

Several other comments / observations:

• Oasis says it is using free cash flow from the Bakken to pay for its operations in the Permian
• as a basin, the Permian is beating out the Bakken, but they are in the same ballpark: the former is trending toward 5 million bopd (will hit 8 million bopd) and the latter is trending toward 2 million bopd, where it will probably max out
• wells are still more expensive to drill in the Permian compared to the Bakken (by half again as much in some cases)
• rigs
• the Permian with 400+ rigs
• the Bakken with 50 rigs
• income / royalties
• mom-and-pop mineral owners are loving the Bakken
• the mid-size operators who got into the Permian early are loving the Permian, as is COP
• folks late to the Permian game may have overpaid --whether they did or not, they certainly paid a log
• density
• operators in the Bakken seem to have figured out optimum density and optimum completion strategies, though those will continue to improve
• stories are still coming out of the Permian that density is an issue
• due to the way the basins were cut up, the norm for the Bakken is two-mile, 1280-acre spacing; in the Permian spacing, and length of laterals varies considerably
• natural gas production (MMCF) : crude oi production (bopd)
• Bakken: 3,000 : 1,500
• Permian: 15,000 : 5,000

Notes From All Over, Part 1 -- September 23, 2019

EVs: two stories --

• after $5 billion in losses, Nio (also referred to as China's "Tesla") fight to survive -- September 23 2019, Bloomberg
• from one  year ago -- Warren Buffett has made a killing off China's biggest electric car maker, BYD Co. -- traded on the Hong Kong exchange -- Fortune, September 26, 2018

Global warming: St Greta spreads the climate gospel -- op-ed, WSJ -- September 20, 2019

The High Church of Environmentalism has acquired many of the characteristics of its ecclesiastical predecessor. An apocalyptic eschatology warns that we will all be consumed by fire if we don’t follow the ordained rules. The notion that it is our sinful nature that has brought us to mortal peril—from the Original Sin of a carbon-unleashing industrial revolution to daily transgressions with plastic bottles and long-haul flights—is as central to its message as it was to the Catholic Church’s. But repentance is near. A gospel of redemption emphasizes that salvation lies in reducing our carbon footprint, with reusable shopping bags and bike-sharing. The secular authorities preach the virtues of abstinence. Meatless Fridays are no longer just for Lenten observance.

UN and global warming, link here: https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/un-climate-change-save-the-world-meeting-daniel-turner.

Regardless of the science, or lack thereof, one thing is certain: in order to tackle climate change, the U.N. needs a lot of meetings.

"Time affluence": embracing "time affluence" can maximize vacation (or retirement) happiness -- wellandgood -- September 22, 2019. This is why I don't have bucket lists. 

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China Has Already Lost The Trade War

China and the trade war, a very interesting read.

Link: https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/helen-raleigh-china-lost-trade-war.

China exempted U.S. farm products, including soybean and pork, from additional tariffs, effective Sept. 17. This announcement was seen widely as a goodwill gesture ahead of the October trade talks between U.S. and China. But this seems to be a desperate, self-serving measure, because all the other pork exporting countries combined couldn't fill China's supply shortage. Simply put, China has a need of pork from the U.S., and its suspension from additional tariffs is, in essence, a tactical and indirect acknowledgment that it won’t be able to sustain this trade fight for much longer.

If China had hoped that it could simply wait until Trump loses the 2020 presidential election to get out of the trade war, it has to think again. At the most recent Democrat presidential debate, not a single candidate proposed to remove the trade tariffs Trump imposed on China. So even if Trump loses, China likely would not get someone friendlier in the White House.

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Recession Is Right Around The Corner

Recession is just around the corner: stock market's eerie parallels to September 2007 should raise recession fears -- MarketWatch -- September 21, 2019. Talking us into recession.

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US Crude Exports Set To Hit New High Into Year-End: HFIR

HFIR analysis of what the attack on Saudi means for oil. From a contributor to SeekingAlpha.

Summary:

• The majority of the investment community following the Saudi news is fixated on the total production outage, but the more important issue is the crude quality issue.
• What happens then is that the market will look for a replacement, and the only place in the world today with excess crude storage is the US.
• US crude export arb signals very elevated US crude exports into year-end.
• We are seeing ~3 to ~3.3 mb/d for US crude exports in October with an all-time high for November.
• This now opens up the possibility US crude storage falls to ~350 mbbls by year-end widening our expected WTI forecast from $70 to $85/bbl.

Narrative: 

Keep in mind that Arab light and Arab extra light have API gravity of 33 to 38. So the ultra-light US shale oil won't be a replacement, but rather the ~38 API gravity WTI will.

Now if you look at the crude export arb, US crude exports will hit an all-time high in November. What will the total volume be? We don't know just yet, but we know that October is going to range between ~3 to ~3.3 mb/d.

We are currently seeing 7 VLCCs waiting for loading in October (4 in the Gulf, 3 incoming).

This combined with Corpus Christi operating at max capacity filling Aframax leads us to believe that US crude exports will likely be closer to ~3.3 mb/d for October.

In the event that US crude exports do average that high and using a conservative refinery throughput figure, we have -4.86 mbbls for October US crude storage figures.

[As usual, "m" in this story equals million.]

North Dakota Active Rigs Drop To 58 -- September 23, 2019

Wells coming off the confidential list over the weekend, today -- 
Monday, September 23, 2019: 59 for the month; 191 for the quarter:

• 35413, conf, Crescent Point Energy, CPEUSC Austin 5-17-20-158N-99W TFH, Ellisville, no production data, 
• 35037, SI/NC, Hess, BB-Charlie Loomer-150-95-0718H-4, Blue Buttes, no production data,
• 34820, SI/NC, XTO, Myrna Federal 21X-2EXH, Alkali Creek, no production data,

Sunday, September 22, 2019: 56 for the month; 188 for the quarter:

• 35702, SI/NC, Petroshale, Thunder Cloud 2MBH, McGregory Buttes, no production data,
• 35038, SI/NC, Hess, BB-Charlie Loomer-150-95-0718H-5, Blue Buttes, no production data,
• 34817, SI/NC, XTO, Myrna 21X-2B, Alkali Creek, no production data,

Saturday, September 21, 2019: 53 for the month; 185 for the quarter:

• 36003, 289, Hunt, Alexandria 161-100-22-15H 2, Alexandria, t8/19; cum --;
• 35039, SI/NC, Hess, BB-Charlier Loomer-150-95-0718H-6,  Blue Buttes, no production data,

Active rigs:

$58.07	9/23/2019	09/23/2018	09/23/2017	09/23/2016	09/23/2015
Active Rigs	58	66	57	33	69

RBN Energy: Cushing crude inventories drop amid shifting fundamentals.

Every week, traders far and wide watch inventories at the storage hub of Cushing, OK, for insight into the U.S. crude oil market. Cushing has long been the epicenter for crude trading in the U.S., and while that role has shifted as the Gulf Coast gains more prominence, inventories at the Oklahoma hub are still a valuable indicator for traders looking for supply and demand trends. Recently, we’ve seen Cushing stocks drop significantly, declining for 11 straight weeks since the beginning of July to their lowest levels since last Thanksgiving. Today, we review the recent drop at Cushing, and discuss how a few changes in supply and demand fundamentals, plus strong pricing motives, helped drag down stockpiles this summer....

The third and final big reason for the draws at Cushing was the change in Permian flows. Starting at the end of June with linefill beginning on Plains All American’s Cactus II pipeline, more and more Permian volumes were being attracted away from Cushing-bound pipes and toward the new pipelines to the Gulf Coast. Gulf Coast pricing has maintained a premium over Cushing of over $4/bbl since the beginning of June, making it the premier market for West Texas barrels. Add in the opportunity to move those barrels to even higher-priced overseas markets via export, and the Gulf Coast has been the place to be for Permian oil. Once Cactus II and EPIC began flowing this summer, it became harder and harder for Cushing markets to drag barrels north out of the Permian. This a big, fundamental shift in flows into the Cushing hub, and one that could have an ongoing profound impact on storage levels.

Focus on Fracking: Sunday update.