The Bakken rig count fell three rigs this past week to settle at 180 running in the region. The rig count is down for the fourth week in a row even though worldwide oil prices have rallied and held above $100/bbl during that time.
The U.S. rig count is up six to 1,776, of which 181 are running in the Williston Basin. A total of 369 rigs are targeting natural gas and 1,401 are targeting oil in the U.S. The remainder are drilling service wells (e.g. disposal wells, injection wells, etc.).
We highlighted North Dakota Pipeline Authority statistics that show almost 70% of Bakken crude oil is moving by rail. That's more than 600,000 b/d compared to less than 100,000 b/d in 2010. You can read the full story in the article Railroads Are Moving 70% Of Bakken Oil Production
Note: The NDIC reports 180 rigs are active in North Dakota. That is 9 more than Baker Hughes reports. The difference is likely accounted for in the number of rigs actually working. On any given week, a certain number of rigs are in route to the next well location or idle waiting to drill the next well. Those rigs are not counted in the Baker Hughes census.
Bakken Oil & Gas Rigs
The number of oil rigs running fell by three to 180 in the region. WTI prices have held well above $100 per barrel over the past three weeks. The oil benchmark was trading over $104/bbl on Friday. Williston Basin Sweet crude traded at $95.69/bbl on July 24th.
The natural gas rig count in the region held flat at zero. Natural gas futures (Henry Hub) were trading near $3.56/mmbtu on Friday afternoon.
McKenzie County led development with 67 rigs running. Dunn, Mountrail, and Williams counties are the only other counties with more than 18 rigs running. View the full list below.
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Bakken Drilling by County
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 and/or Smith Service Co's (Schlumberger) Smith Rig Count.