It's Always Something -- December 16, 2014

Rigzone is reporting:

Environmental permit delays are likely to set back the Brazilian offshore drilling activities of French oil company Total SA by about a year.

Total, which has stakes in 13 Brazilian offshore blocks and runs drilling activities in seven of them, is grappling with the a slow environmental approval process that has become a recurring complaint for many in the industry.

"Environmental licensing takes a long time. Drilling will only take place in 2016 or 2017. Licensing makes things a little harder ... exploration and production is a long-term job, that takes a long time in general."

Oil prices have fallen to their lowest levels in six years, prompting oil firms to seek cut costs and improved efficiency. Lower prices could force oil companies to reconsider some investments. Even so, Brazil continues to be a "priority" for Total. 

And so it goes. It's always something.

3/4 Wells Go To DRL Status; Fourteen (14) Wells Approved For "Tight Hole" Status; Eighteen (18) New Permits -- Wednesday -- December 16, 2014

Wells coming off the confidential list Wednesday:

• 28220, drl, Slawson, Stallion 6-1-12TFH, Big Bend, no production data,
• 28283, 786, Hess, BW-Hedstrom-149-100-1201H-3, Ellsworth, t11/14; cum 2K 10/14;
• 28311, drl, XTO, Hoffmann 14X-12B, Siverston, no production data,
• 28369, drl, BR, CCU Pullman 6-8-7MBH, Corral Creek, no production data,
• 28439, conf, Liberty Resources, Gohrick 158-95-17-8-4MBH, McGregor, producing,

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 28283, see above, Hess, BW-Hedstrom-149-100-1201H-3, Ellsworth:

Date	Oil Runs	MCF Sold
10-2014	1712	0

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Wells coming off the confidential list today were posted earlier; see sidebar at the right.

Eighteen (18) new permits --

• Operators: HRC (8), CRL (8), Whiting (2)
• Fields: Four Bears (McKenzie), Crazy Man Creek (Williams), Antelope (McKenzie), Sanish (Mountrail), Banks (McKenzie)
• Comments: Two more Antelope oil field wells

Active rigs:

	12/16/2014	12/16/2013	12/16/2012	12/16/2011	12/16/2010
Active Rigs	183	191	181	199	165

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For Investors

EOG declares its quarterly dividend; it appears to be unchanged from the previous quarter.

Apple Not Guilty In Huge Case -- December 16, 2014

Tweeting now: Jury finds Apple not guilty of harming consumers in iTunes DRM case; says iTunes 7.0 was a 'genuine product improvement' - @verge

Over at MacRumors:

Jury deliberations for the iPod antitrust lawsuit Apple faced in court last week began on Monday, and it appears the jury has already reached a verdict just a day later. As reported by The Verge, the jury has sided with Apple, finding the company not guilty of harming consumers with anticompetitive practices.

In the class action lawsuit, the plaintiffs argued that Apple had deliberately crippled third-party music services by locking iPods and iTunes to its own ecosystem, which in turn artificially raised the price of Apple's products. At issue was a specific iTunes 7.0 update that disabled the DRM workarounds put in place by RealNetworks, a competing music service, allowing its music to be played on the iPod. 

Yes, Virginia, this is huge.

I don't know if you've ever served on a jury on a big case, but after weeks of hearing testimony, the jury begins to deliberate. The first thing the jury needs to do is get organized, select a foreman, go over the rules of a jury, determine seating arrangements, and order lunch. To come to a verdict in one day suggests they must have done all that and then took a preliminary vote -- when it was unanimous, the foreman must have said, "that's a wrap."

Abraxas, December, 2014, Corporate Update; Silver Linings Among The Clouds, December 16, 2014

Link here.

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Silver Linings Among the Clouds

The headline is scary but close reading of the story makes the story less scary than it sounds:

The Energy Information Administration (EIA) foresees a pull back in onshore drilling activity because of less-attractive economic returns in both emerging and mature oil production regions.

As of Friday, however, projected oil prices "remain high enough to support development drilling activity in the Bakken, Eagle Ford, Niobrara and Permian Basin, which contribute the majority of U.S. oil production growth."   

EIA now expects U.S. crude oil output to average 9.3 million b/d in 2015, an increase of 0.7 million b/d from 2014, but down from the projected growth of .09 million b/d that EIA had forecast in November.

Random Look At How Incredible The Antelope Oil Wells Are In The Reservation; CLR's Changing Completion Strategies -- December 16, 2014

Updates

July 27, 2015: the CLR Salers Federal wells are a major topic of discussion by Micheal Filloon, this date, particularly with regard to the halo / communication effect of fracking neighboring wells.
 

Original Post

 

There is so much in the Bakken I simply cannot keep up. Hopefully, the slump in oil prices will slow things down.

Just how good are the wells and just how fast are completion strategies changing? Over at the sidebar at the right, I have a link to oil fields in the North Dakota Bakken.

A couple days I started updating the Antelope oil field in the reservation (NOT the Antelope Creek oil field west of Watford City). I updated a lot of the field, but there is much more left to do. In the process I came across a Continental Resources well with an example of their new completion strategy:

• 28330, 1,716, CLR, Salers Federal 3-27H, six days to vertical depth; six days to drill the lateral, target zone 11 feet to 23 feet below the top of the middle Bakken (so I assume the middle Bakken thickness in this area ranges from 20 to 40 feet), background gas was averaged about 650, though there were spikes to 2750; 50 stages; 19 million lbs; 14 days spud to TD, t10/14; cum 41K 10/14;

I don't recall the largest amount of sand EOG has used on a well, but 19 million lbs of sand/ceramic has to be a record for sand/ceramic mix. EOG uses only sand as far as I know. Almost all off the proppant used by CLR in #28330 was sand, however, I believe less than 2 million lbs ceramic;

NDIC File No: 28330     API No: 33-053-05917-00-00     CTB No: 128330
Well Type: OG     Well Status: A     Status Date: 9/18/2014     Wellbore type: Horizontal
Location: NENE 27-152-94    Latitude: 47.962331     Longitude: -102.688017
Current Operator: CONTINENTAL RESOURCES, INC.
Current Well Name: SALERS FEDERAL 3-27H
Total Depth: 20534     Field: ANTELOPE
Spud Date(s):  6/8/2014
Completion Data
   Pool: SANISH    Comp: 9/18/2014     Status: F     Date: 10/2/2014     Spacing: 2SEC
Cumulative Production Data
   Pool: SANISH     Cum Oil: 40983     Cum MCF Gas: 47241     Cum Water: 17612
Production Test Data
   IP Test Date: 10/2/2014     Pool: SANISH     IP Oil: 1716     IP MCF: 1193     IP Water: 670

Monthly Production Data

Pool	Date	Days	BBLS Oil	Runs	BBLS Water	MCF Prod	MCF Sold	Vent/Flare
SANISH	10-2014	31	32388	32759	15252	43189	24922	18267
SANISH	9-2014	8	8595	7748	2360	4052	0	4052

Regular readers might be surprised at what CLR is doing.

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Here's an EOG well in the same field:

• 24337, 2,519, EOG, Hawkeye 3-2413H, 28 stages; 10 million lbs sand, t5/13; cum 452K 10/14;
• EOG says it will be utilizing "up to 4 NGL stripping skids on this pad in an effort to reduce VOC volumes. Spud date, December 16, 2012; TD, January 11, 2013. Thickness of middle Bakken appears to be about 50 feet at this location.  

Yes, that's almost a half-million bbls in less than 18 months (including one month with NO production; and with three months on-line for only about 50% of the time). And, yes, it's tracked on the "Monster Well" page.

NDIC File No: 24337    
Well Type: OG     Well Status: A     Status Date: 5/15/2013     Wellbore type: Horizontal
Location: SESE 24-152-95    Latitude: 47.964492     Longitude: -102.771760
Current Operator: EOG RESOURCES, INC.
Current Well Name: HAWKEYE 3-2413H
Total Depth: 20626     Field: ANTELOPE
Spud Date(s):  12/8/2012
Completion Data
   Pool: SANISH     Perfs: 10816-20572     Comp: 5/15/2013     Status: F     Date: 5/17/2013     Spacing: 2SEC
Cumulative Production Data
   Pool: SANISH     Cum Oil: 451928     Cum MCF Gas: 894900     Cum Water: 59607
Production Test Data
   IP Test Date: 5/17/2013     Pool: SANISH     IP Oil: 2519     IP MCF: 4060     IP Water: 669

Monthly Production Data

Pool	Date	Days	BBLS Oil	Runs	BBLS Water	MCF Prod	MCF Sold	Vent/Flare
SANISH	10-2014	31	13034	12257	3269	55690	43161	9010
SANISH	9-2014	30	14109	14406	3349	50355	33802	13126
SANISH	8-2014	31	16476	16508	4166	60760	27406	32735
SANISH	7-2014	26	16956	16835	3479	60252	24858	34905
SANISH	6-2014	30	18214	18241	2846	50086	17343	32150
SANISH	5-2014	31	24017	23957	3524	65169	26116	38433
SANISH	4-2014	27	31057	30927	3828	48901	10965	37403
SANISH	3-2014	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
SANISH	2-2014	21	16165	16329	1976	37920	202	37623
SANISH	1-2014	31	24436	24815	2953	51779	415	51217
SANISH	12-2013	31	27300	27301	2940	51362	590	50772
SANISH	11-2013	30	31877	32028	3214	59465	0	59316
SANISH	10-2013	31	40483	40529	3815	71259	0	71106
SANISH	9-2013	30	43917	43941	3907	76231	0	76087
SANISH	8-2013	31	45849	46421	4712	78445	0	78292
SANISH	7-2013	31	49395	49130	6144	69907	0	69753
SANISH	6-2013	12	24333	23709	1802	3898	0	3842
SANISH	5-2013	17	14310	13379	3683	3421	0	3342