We need to learn quickly to keep up with the massive change around us so we don't get run over. We need to outrun change.
A few indications appear that employment may be trending up in Williston and the surrounding area. Also, the direction of people moving into and out of the state finally shifted to net out-migration in 2016.
12/18 – The Million Dollar Way – Job Shortage Looming in The Bakken – Pointer to following article describing an uptick in hiring for oil jobs in Williston. Biggest specific increase is for fracking crews, which need around 45 or 65 people for each crew.
Production saw a big increase in October. Output climbed from 971,760 in September (final) to 1,043,207 (preliminary). That is a 7% jump, moving production across the 1M point. That is a big increase. Why? Then some comparisons, then a couple of graphs.
Lynn Helms attributes the increase to operators opening up wells that had been throttled back and a few big wells coming on line, according a quote in the Wall Street Journal, North Dakota Crude Oil Output Rises to a Five-Month High. Yeah, the WSJ quoted Mr. Helms. They ran an article the day of his press conference to discuss the monthly report. How ‘bout that?
That is an increase of 71,447 bopd, the largest increase in one month going all the way back to 1989. Other months with increases of 40K bopd or more were:
That is an increase of 7.35%. Going back to 1989, the only months with a higher increases on a percentage basis were:
Some graphs…
Continue reading “North Dakota oil production increases 7.3% in October 2016”
A few articles of late:
9/27 – Williston Herald at Dickinson Press – Two Williston hotels closing their doors – An owner of two hotels with total of 105 rooms will be closing them this week. Both are on the market, for $3.0M and $3.2M. One of them reportedly had drugs sales and prostitution on site during the boom.
Don’t worry too much about capacity. There’s a huge number of hotels open in Williston, especially compared to three or four years ago. Also, those hotels won’t be going anywhere. When the drilling picks up, someone else can pick up those empty hotels for a real bargain. When the space is needed, they will be open.
10/10 – Amy Dalrymple at Oil Patch Dispatch – Williston Breaks Ground on New $240 Million Airport – Construction is underway for the new airport. It will have a 7,500 foot runway and four gates at the terminal. The new airport will be able to handle planes that can hold 165 passengers instead of the 50 passenger jets in use at the current airport.
Currently there are five daily flights into Williston, which is down from 11 at the busiest time of the boom.
12/4 – Million Dollar Way – The Bakken: How Things Stand Near the End of the Year 2016 – The productivity increase in the last few years is staggering. Here are a few tidbits from the article, which is a survey of recent quarterly releases from the drilling companies.
Estimated Ultimate Recovery, EUR, is the amount of oil to be drawn from the well, I believe with only primary recovery. A few years ago (2011), the typical EURs were 550K barrels from middle Bakken and 450K from Three Forks bench. Continue reading “Random updates from Bakken”
First article below says that predicting oil prices is a fool’s errand. The payoff of trying to do so, it seems to me, is it requires diving into the dynamics and trying to understand the production and demand aspects underlying the price of oil. Second article below delves into the dynamics.
11/28 – The Million Dollar Way – Musings on Shale as We Anticipate the “OPEC Meeting” – Discussion points me to the next article, which I would have missed otherwise.
Mr. Oksol agrees with the major points: OPEC’s effort (meaning Saudi Arabia) to shut down shale producers has been unsuccessful. They tried this once before back in the 1980s.
On the second point, he agrees shale producers will respond fast to any rise in prices.
Author agrees that the phrase “big bet” is an acceptable way to describe the Saudi strategy to take out shale producers but thinks a more accurate description would be “trillion dollar mistake.” As for me, either description works well.
11/28 – Mark Mills at Forbes – Shale Wars: Whither Oil Prices As Saudi Arabia Lets The Big Bet Play Out? – The author, to whom you need to pay serious attention if you are otherwise reading my blog, asks two questions on his way to sort out where oil prices are going:
Continue reading “Musing on oil prices and the oil industry; future for shale is looking good”
Just got back from a visit to Williston to see family during Thanksgiving week. Had a delightful time. Even got to drive around the oil field a little bit.
Got lots of new photos. A lot!
I reeeeeeally lucked out and glanced out the window at just the right time. Got a bunch of photos of the wing-toasting facilities at Ivanpah.
For example:
During the rain and overcast that start afternoon on Saturday and ran until around sundown on Sunday, the towers probably weren’t quite so bird-killing white-hot.
Drilling rigs
There is one rig in the city of Williston and two rigs a mile or two north of town.
Continue reading “Visit to Williston during Thanksgiving 2016”
Previous post showed the oil production in North Dakota through August 2016. Here is some more info on production in the state. Data is extracted from the monthly “Director’s Report” and historical production data.
Average sweet crude prices for North Dakota oil. This reflects a discount from the West Texas Intermediate due to transportation costs.
Here is the value of monthly production based on actual output multiplied by the average sweet crude price rolled into the preceding graph:
Above graph shows the average daily production in North Dakota statewide and in the Bakken field. Output in August dropped from 1,029,734 barrels of oil per day (bopd) (revised) to 981,039 bopd (preliminary), a change of 48,695 bopd, or 4.73%.
This is the first month with average daily production below 1 million bopd since March 2014.
Here is the average daily production by month since 2004:
In contrast to the horrible news mentioned yesterday from Venezuela, consider the the amazing news from the open frontier of energy production. The benefits produced by fracking just don’t seem to stop.
9/23 – The Million Dollar Way –Update On The Bakkan – Lynn Helms – A few highlights in the article from a radio interview I found particularly fascinating:
9/23 – The Million Dollar Way – FAQ: How Much Oil Can One Reasonably Expect That A Bakken Well Will Produce Over The Lifetime Of That Well? – Astounding information.
More articles on wind power in North Dakota.
8/5 – Dickinson Press – Power generated by wind adds to grid, but it’s still backup to coal in North Dakota – If you are just tuning in to energy issues, check out this article. It provides background to the idea that the electricity we need all the time is from what is called base load, which comes primarily from coal plants in North Dakota.
Total crude oil production in the state dropped 20,419 bopd, going from 1,047,003 bopd in May to 1,026,584 bopd in June. That is a decline of 1.95%. I’ll make a guess that another month or two will see production cross the one million point.
The Director’s Cut is guessing the low prices, and consequent low rig count, will last through third quarter this year or second quarter of next year.
Just one graph today:
Here is a recap of the North Dakota rig count. All of the data is from Million Dollar Way. The number of rigs isn’t as important now as it was a year or three ago, but it is still one indicator of activity. One rig today creates a well that produces a lot more oil that a few years ago, and in less time, and at lower cost.
Some older data repeated for context: Continue reading “Rig count in North Dakota during summer of 2016”
A few updates on Williston:
Check out the by-lines. You will see the news out of the North Dakota oil patch I find most interesting typically has one name. How does one person generate so many good articles?
8/9 – Amy Dalrymple at Dickinson Press – Williston crew camps get Sept. 1 deadline to close – City Commissioners voted 5-0 to force all crew camps within their reach to close in three weeks, remove facilities by May 1, 2018 and restore sites by August 1, 2018.
Several articles on the increasing number of slice-and-dicers in the state.
Also, ethanol lobbyists want the feds to force customers to buy more of their food-based power; this is cronyism in action. That customers don’t want to burn more corn in their cars and don’t want the higher prices and don’t want to risk damaging their engines is not a factor in the lobbying.
6/16 – Forum News Service at Bismark Tribune – N.D. utility regulators approve wind farm project – The state PSC approved the Brady Wind Energy Center I near Dickinson. There has been a lot of public opposition to the project for quite some time.
Continue reading “More wind power coming on line in North Dakota”
Oil production in North Dakota dropped about 6.3% in April and recovered a little in May, increasing about 0.5%. Here is the average daily production for last three months:
Here are a few graphs that show the picture:
Continue reading “North Dakota oil production recovers a bit in May 2016”
For long-term archive purposes, here is a timeframe for the Bakken boom.
6/28 – The Million Dollar Way – The Bakken Is In Its Manufacturing Stage – Bruce Oksol provides a useful long-term perspective on how Bakken production has developed:
- 2000: the Bakken boom begins in Montana
- 2007: the Bakken boom begins in North Dakota
- 2012: the Bakken hits its stride
- early 2014: the Bakken setting new records, almost every month
- late 2014: the Saudi Surge
- 2015: the Bakken re-trenches
- 1Q16 taxable sales 50% greater than 1Q10
- mid-2016: the Bakken bottoms out — at least that is what the tea leaves suggest
For more perspective, here is the average daily production for each of the above years. I calculated the following from data pulled from the state website: Continue reading “Timeline of Bakken oil production”