Category: Energy

How much water does it take to frack all the wells in Bakken for a year? Less than one day’s discharge from Garrison dam.

One of the worries about fracking is the humongous huge amount of water it takes to frack a well. Around 4,000,000 gallons for just one well. That’s more than I could drink in a lifetime.

Let’s put that in perspective. I mentioned this before here, but let’s take another look.

The Garrison dam at the end of Lake Sakakawea provides hydroelectric power. You can get some background info here.

Bruce Oksol provides some background at his post Water For Fracking In the Bakken.

His conclusion?

Less than a day’s worth of discharge from the Garrison Dam should be enough water to frack all the wells that will be fracked in the North Dakota Bakken this year.

I’ll backstop his calculations below, which confirm his calculation.

Continue reading “How much water does it take to frack all the wells in Bakken for a year? Less than one day’s discharge from Garrison dam.”

In 3 years, oil production in Oklahoma, New Mexico, Wyoming, Colorado and Utah is up 56% of North Dakota’s increase – Can we call that a half-Bakken?

Seems that oil production of a new find or the increase in a field is often compared to what’s going on in the Bakken. Haven’t seen others use Bakken as a unit of measure, but I’m having a kick doing so.

Story I’ve not been following is that horizontal drilling and fracking has increased production quite a bit in states other than North Dakota and Texas.

Continue reading “In 3 years, oil production in Oklahoma, New Mexico, Wyoming, Colorado and Utah is up 56% of North Dakota’s increase – Can we call that a half-Bakken?”

Superb background on Bakken – an industry not a boom

“This is an industry, not a boom.”

“It is going to last for a very long time!”

Million Dollar Way pointed out this great Powerpoint slide from Williston Economic Development on what’s going on in Bakken. Tom Rolfstad is the director.

If you are following the new frontier of energy on my blog, you will want to check out this presentation. It’s superb. Great points that are told without a speaker:

Continue reading “Superb background on Bakken – an industry not a boom”

It’s okay to kill California condors. As long as you are running a wind farm. Or building luxury homes. In the middle of condor habitat.

And as long as you didn’t really mean to off them.

The Los Angeles Times reports Companies won’t face charges in condor deaths.

The federal Fish and Wildlife Service told the operators of Terra-Gen Power’s wind farm in the heart of condor habitat they

…will not be prosecuted if their turbines accidentally kill a condor during the expected 30-year life span of the project.

Continue reading “It’s okay to kill California condors. As long as you are running a wind farm. Or building luxury homes. In the middle of condor habitat.”

How much has oil production increased in Texas over the last 16 months? 1 Bakken. (I think that’s a unit of measure, by the way.)

I’m starting to get a kick out of the idea that we measure humongous amounts of oil in terms of Bakkens.

Here’s the latest example, in terms of explaining the magnitude of what’s happening in Texas:

In just the last 16 months since October 2011 when the state produced 1.598 million bpd, Texas oil output has increased by almost 700,000 bpd to 2.295 million bpd in February, which is the equivalent of adding an entire new oil field the size of the North Dakota Bakken formation to the US oil supply (based on February production in the Bakken of 715,000 bpd).

Output increase in Texas over 18 months equals one Bakken.

That’s point number 3 at Carpe Diem’s post explaining The meteoric rise in Texas oil output continues and is one of the most remarkable energy success stories in US history.

Continue reading “How much has oil production increased in Texas over the last 16 months? 1 Bakken. (I think that’s a unit of measure, by the way.)”

Construction underway in North Dakota for first new refinery in lower 48 states since 1977

Amazing.

RBN Energy has a report, If You’ve Got the Money We’ve Got the Crude – new Refineries in North Dakota, that explains

North Dakota’s only refinery produces less than half the diesel the State consumes. To help remedy that disparity the first new refinery to be built in the Lower 48 since 1977 is under construction today and two more new refineries are planned.

Very cool. There is more demand for diesel in the state than the one refinery there can produce.

Here’s my simple summary: 

Continue reading “Construction underway in North Dakota for first new refinery in lower 48 states since 1977”

Texas wants oil riches, California doesn’t. We’d rather skip the jobs & taxes and slaughter golden eagles to get our clean energy.

You don’t have to realize any benefit from humongous amounts of oil in the ground.

California isn’t. California doesn’t want to.

A great Wall Street Journal editorial summarizes Texas wanting oil and getting much wealth while California doesn’t want either:  A Tale of Two Oil States.

The editorial says Texas pumps more oil than the next four largest states combined and could double their production by 2016 and triple in another decade.  Production in California is declining.

The editorial points out there about 400K oil jobs in Texas but only around one-tenth that, or 40K, in California.

Warning: sarcasm alert. I try to avoid destructive humor. When I look at foolishness about energy, ridicule obviously becomes a great tool to point out the foolishness.

There is a lot of oil here: Continue reading “Texas wants oil riches, California doesn’t. We’d rather skip the jobs & taxes and slaughter golden eagles to get our clean energy.”

More explanation why drilling costs are going down in Bakken

There are a lot of factors explaining why drilling costs are higher in Bakken than elsewhere. Multiple factors explain why costs are dropping.

Seeking Alpha, by Michael Filloon, explains in Bakken Update: Bakken Well Costs Are Decreasing Faster Than Companies Indicate.

Just a few reasons costs are higher: The formations are deeper, infrastructure hasn’t had decades to develop so isn’t as strong as elsewhere, the extreme cold weather makes drilling more difficult, the spring thaw makes truck deliveries slower because of lighter loads.

A number of factors beyond pad drilling and growing efficiency are at play to reduce costs. The article’s conclusion: Continue reading “More explanation why drilling costs are going down in Bakken”

Dropping production costs in Eagle Ford mentioned in 2013 Eagle Ford Impact Report

I mentioned the dropping costs of production in Eagle Ford in this post.

Here’s the graph in the presentation slide deck for the 2013 report from the University of Texas San Antonio:

Eagle Ford production costs

Thanks to R.T. Dukes of EagleFordShale.com for permission to repost his graph. Thanks to Professor Thomas Tunstall for a copy of the slide presentation.

Continue reading “Dropping production costs in Eagle Ford mentioned in 2013 Eagle Ford Impact Report”

California may ban drilling technique that has been used for only 60 years

“I can’t make this stuff up” should be trademarked by Million Dollar Way.

Bills are moving through the California legislature to halt fracking in the state until it is studied to the legislator’s satisfaction. Reported by the AP in Lawmakers advance bill to halt oil fracking.

Fracking has been used in California for 60 years. Six decades.

Continue reading “California may ban drilling technique that has been used for only 60 years”

Another Bakken’s worth of oil discovered. And it’s underneath the current Bakken. Oh, and what Peak Oil?

The USGS updated their estimate of the amount of oil that is undiscovered, technically recoverable in the Bakken field. Second paragraph of their press release says:

The USGS assessment found that the Bakken Formation has an estimated mean oil resource of 3.65 BBO and the Three Forks Formation has an estimated mean resource of 3.73 BBO, for a total of 7.38 BBO, with a range of 4.42 (95 percent chance) to 11.43 BBO (5 percent chance). This assessment of both formations represents a significant increase over the estimated mean resource of 3.65 billion barrels of undiscovered oil in the Bakken Formation that was estimated in the 2008 assessment.

This means the mid-point (statistically correct phrase: mean) of the total oil that is technically recoverable with current technology is 7.4 billion barrels of oil. Their assessment is that the probability is 95% that there will be at least 4.4B and the probability is 5% that there could be as much as 11.4B.

Continue reading “Another Bakken’s worth of oil discovered. And it’s underneath the current Bakken. Oh, and what Peak Oil?”

“Bakken Assembly Line” – drilling will continue for 3 more years at the current pace

Bruce Oksol provides a voice of calm in response to an alarmist editorial in the Bismarck Tribune. The editorial mentions that the state government expects 6,000 wells to come on-line in the next three years. That will lead to huge increases in drilling, truck traffic, and overall activity. At least according to the paper: Prepare for a “big surge” in Bakken.

Actually, that would be a continuation of the pace of drilling that is going on now. Today. More Details on the Coming Surge in The Bakken: 6,000 Additional Bakken Wells Over The Next Three Years reminds us that the current production rate is already 2,000 new wells a year.

Continue reading ““Bakken Assembly Line” – drilling will continue for 3 more years at the current pace”