Bakken News
3/28/2016
Drilling activity in North Dakota has slowed considerably over the last year. At present here are less than 40 active drilling rigs in North Dakota. This number is so low it is hard to believe. At the peak there were around 200 active rigs in North Dakota. The the North Dakota Department of Mineral Resources Website keeps track of many different statistics regarding the drilling industry. Here is a link to their Website. North Dakota Active Drilling Rig List.
3/23/2016
Emerald oil emeraldoil.com on their Website gives information on their decision to seek chapter 11 protection in conjunction with what they describe as a “Fast Track Restructuring”. They state they are trying to preserve the value of the company.
Emerald Oil states they have received $20 million in post-petition debtor in possession financing which, subject to Bankruptcy Court approval. Emerald Oil is one of the most recent casualties of the downturn in crude oil prices.
3/30/2016
Blackridge Oil and Gas announces a company restructuring. Blackridge Oil and Gas has become another victim of low oil and gas prices in the North Dakota Bakken Oil region. Oil prices have been persistently low for the last few months after declining from over $100 per barrel in 2014.
Black Ridge Oil and Gas has been running their company as a “Non Operator” which helped keep some of their costs down, but the downturn in Crude Oil Prices was just to much in the long term.
4/1/2016
According the the latest Baker Hughes Rig count dated 4/1/2016 the the number of rigs drilling for oil in the United States dropped by 10 to 362. This is an extremely low rig count, and may lead to production falling faster than it has so far.
The number of rigs drilling in the Bakken fell by 2 to 29. This level of rigs should see Bakken oil and gas production start to fall at an increasing rate. 29 is well below the number of rigs needed to maintain production, and should impact the statistics used by the Energy Information Administration.
4/8/2016
According to the Weekly Baker Hughes Rotary Rig Report, the number of Rigs drilling for Oil dropped by eight (8) in the latest reporting week to 354. One year ago according to the same report there were 760 rigs drilling for oil in the United States. Even though the number of rigs drilling for oil has dropped over fifty (50) percent, production has stayed relatively high.
As a result of persistent oversupply of crude oil, Crude oil prices are hovering just below $40 per barrel.
10/02/2016
OPEC Shocker Sends Oil Stocks Soaring. At the recent meeting of the OPEC Cartel they seem to have finally come to an agreement to limit production. Even though the cuts in production do not start untill November, 2016 the shock waves have sent oil prices higher.
The stock prices of many exploration and production companies has risen sharply as a result. There may be a short squeeze happening in some of these stocks.
12/02/2016
OPEC Shocks the oil market by setting the stage to reduce oil production. Two (2) years ago almost to the day Saudi Arabia let production rise to capture market share. Now they seem ready to bring production back in line with demand. On November 30th the price of oil rose dramatically on news of the preliminary agreement.
The prices of most exploration and productions rose in response to higher crude oil prices.
12/16/2016
VaporKote.com increases ROI of oil Field equipment using a propritary boriding process to reduce pump wear. This reduces wear and downtime increaseing profits for drilling companies in the Bakken.
06/15/2017
Oil markets are well below $50 per barrel for WTI. Because of crude oil prices dropping, the stock prices of many oil companies are falling. Among the hardest hit companies stocks were Whiting Petroleum Corporation and
07/28/2017
Oil refining and Crude oil production severly impacted by huricane Harvey. Standard and Poors estimated 2.2 millions barrels a day of oil refining capacity had been taken ofline because of the storm. About 22% of Gulf oil production offline because of storm.