The Bakken-Three Forks rig count dropped by two to 91 rigs running across our coverage area by midday Friday.
In recent Bakken news, Shareholders from Halliburton and Baker Hughes recently gave overwhelming approval for a mega-merger that would combine the two companies in a deal estimated at $35 billion.
Read more: Halliburton to Merge With Baker Hughes
The U.S. rig count fell another 40 to 988 rigs running as of today. A total of 225 rigs were targeting natural gas (an increase of three from the previous week) and 760 were targeting oil in the U.S. (52 less than the previous week). The remainder were drilling service wells (e.g. disposal wells, injection wells, etc.)89 rigs are running in the Williston Basin across MT, ND, and SD. 88 are in ND alone.
Bakken Oil & Gas Rigs
The number of oil rigs dropped to 89 as of by midday Friday. WTI oil prices increased $2.50 from the previous week, trading at $51.64/bbl on Friday afternoon. The WTI-Brent saw an increase of $2.92 by week’s end, landing at $57.87. There are currently no natural active gas rigs in the area and futures are trading at $2.51/mmbtu by midday.
McKenzie County continues to lead development and increased to 41 running rigs. Williams (16) and Mountrail (15) 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:
- 88 rigs are drilling horizontal wells
- 1 rigs are drilling directional wells
- 0 rigs are drilling vertical wells
Bakken Drilling by County
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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