The Bakken-Three Forks rig count declined by one to end the week at 75 rigs running across our coverage area.
In recent Bakken news, North Dakota’s oil trigger was expected to take place June 1st, but rising crude prices mean it won’t be implemented and producers will miss out on an estimated $480 million over the next six months.
Read more: Rising Crude Prices Derails Bakken Tax Trigger
The U.S. rig count fell by seven, ending with 868 rigs running by midday Friday. A total of 222 rigs were targeting natural gas (down three from the previous week) and 642 were targeting oil in the U.S. (four less than the previous week). The remainder were drilling service wells (e.g. disposal wells, injection wells, etc.)76 rigs are running in the Williston Basin across MT, ND, and SD. 76 are in ND alone.
Bakken Oil & Gas Rigs
The Bakken oil rigs stayed at 75 rigs this week with Bloomberg reporting WTI oil prices trading at $59.13/bbl on Friday afternoon, a $1.08 decrease from the previous week. WTI-Brent decreased $2.08 landing at $63.31. The Bakken has zero natural active gas rig in the area this week with futures trading dipping to $2.59/mmbtu by midday.
McKenzie County continues to lead development but fell to 3o running rigs this week. Williams (18) and Mountrail (13) counties are the next closest producers. View the full list below under the Bakken Drilling by County section.
Activity continues to be dominated by horizontal drilling:
- 74 rigs are drilling horizontal wells
- 0 rigs are drilling directional wells
- 1 rigs are drilling vertical wells
Bakken Drilling by County
Bakken Oil & Gas News
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What is the Rig Count?
The Bakken Shale Rig Count is an index of the total number of oil & gas drilling rigs running across Montana and North Dakota. The rigs referred to in this article are for ALL drilling reported by Baker Hughes and not solely wells targeting the Bakken formation. All land rigs and onshore rig data shown here are based upon industry estimates provided by the Baker Hughes Rig Count.
Read more at bakerhughes.com