The Bakken-Three Forks rig count remained flat this week with Baker Hughes reporting 27 rigs running across our coverage area by midday Friday.
In recent Bakken news, North Dakota Gov. Jack Dalrymple took action last week against the mounting protests in his state over the Dakota Access Pipeline. In light of what he characterized as 'significant public safety concerns', Dalrymple issued an emergency declaration for southwest and south central North Dakota
Read more: Dalrymple Issues State of Emergency
A total of 487 oil and gas rigs were running across the United States this week, a decrease from last week of two. The losses were from rigs targeting natural gas, leaving 81 gas rigs running (two less than the previous week) and 406 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.) 27 of the rigs active in the U.S. were running in North Dakota.
Bakken Oil & Gas Rigs
Bakken oil rigs were at 27 this week with Bloomberg reporting WTI oil prices dipping to $47.64 on Friday afternoon. WTI-Brent also fell backwards with Bloomberg reporting $49.92. The Bakken has zero natural active gas rig in the area this week with futures trading at $2.87/mmbtu by midday.
McKenzie County leads development with 12 rigs running this week. View the full list below under theBakken Drilling by County section.
Activity continues to be dominated by horizontal drilling:
- 27 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.
