Bakken Shale Loses Rigs
The Bakken-Three Forks rig count fell back this week with Baker Hughes reporting 35 rigs running across our coverage area by midday Friday.
In recent Bakken news, The Hess Corporation announced its 2016 third quarter results, which included a drop in Bakken production.
Read more: Hess Corp Adds bakken Rigs
A total of 567 oil and gas rigs were running across the United States this week, a gain of zero over last week. 115 rigs targeted natural gas (two less than the previous week) and 452 were targeting oil in the U.S. (two more than the previous week). The remainder were drilling service wells (e.g. disposal wells, injection wells, etc.) 35 of the rigs active in the U.S. were running in North Dakota.
Bakken Oil & Gas Rigs
Bakken oil rigs were at 35 this week with Bloomberg reporting WTI oil prices dropping $.67 to $43.46 on Friday afternoon. WTI-Brent also fell, with Bloomberg reporting a per barrel price of $44.79. The Bakken has zero natural active gas rig in the area this week with futures trading at $2.62/mmbtu by midday.
McKenzie County leads production in the region with 15 rigs running this week. View the full list below under the Bakken Drilling by County section.
Activity continues to be dominated by horizontal drilling:
- 35 rigs are drilling horizontal wells
- 0 rigs are drilling directional wells
- 0 rigs are drilling vertical wells
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.