Bakken Regions Gains Rigs this Week
The Bakken-Three Forks rig count was up by two this week with Baker Hughes reporting 28 rigs running across our coverage area by midday Friday.
In recent Bakken news, ND Tax Commissioner Ryan Rauschenberger released first quarter 2016 report revealing a 33% drop in taxable sales and purchases state-wide.
Read more: Taxable Sales Decline 33%
A total of 439 oil and gas rigs were running across the United States this week, an increase of 10 over last week. 88 were targeting natural gas (one less than the previous week) and 351 were targeting oil in the U.S. (10 more than the previous week). The remainder were drilling service wells (e.g. disposal wells, injection wells, etc.) 28 of the rigs active in the U.S. were running in North Dakota.
Bakken Oil & Gas Rigs
Bakken oil rigs were at 28 this week with Bloomberg reporting WTI oil prices declining to $45.24 on Friday afternoon. WTI-Brent fell back below $40 a barrel ending the week at $46.63. The Bakken has zero natural active gas rig in the area this week with futures trading at $2.80/mmbtu by midday.
McKenzie County leads development with 12 rigs running this week, far outpacing other counties. View the full list below under the Bakken Drilling by County section.
Activity continues to be dominated by horizontal drilling:
- 28 rigs are drilling horizontal wells
- 0 rigs are drilling directional wells
- 0 rigs are drilling vertical wells