North Dakota said Thursday that production of crude oil fell in January from all-time highs the previous month amid a slide in global oil prices. The state, which has become Continue Reading
Production of oil in North Dakota—home to the vast majority of all wells sunk into the Bakken shale oil formation—declined in January, the latest month with data available directly from the state. The state of North Dakota has yet to release their own compilation of production statistics for January 2015—those are due out March 12 (tomorrow, as of this writing). I expect they will likewise show a drop. This runs counter to expectations from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) that Bakken oil production would continue rising through March, only starting to decline in April. It also raises questions about whether total U.S. oil production may already be declining—and that the decline simply hasn’t shown up yet in available data. To find this out, I compiled the production data from the state, and show it split into three groups: 1. the old wells (mainly conventional drilling), 2. the new wells, […]
How tight is trucking capacity getting? KISSIMMEE, FL. Analyst John G. Larkin , managing director and head of transportation capital markets research for Stifel, Nicholaus and Company, delivered both good news and sobering insights to the audience assembled here this week for the 77 th annual Truckload Carriers Association convention. He had plenty of “things are improving, but…” figures to share on issues such as freight capacity constraints, the state of the U.S. labor force and the declining middle class: Auto and light truck market: This market segment has seen “quite a rebound,” Larkin said, although the average age of vehicles in this segment is still 11.4 years, so replacement has not been overwhelmingly strong. In fact, the age of vehicles has increased every year since 2002. There is also good news, at least for OEMs, in these geriatric fleet metrics, however. All those older units represent “a still […]
No, despite the popular narrative that we keep hearing, the U.S is not running out of crude oil storage. Yet there are those who are predicting that oil prices are going to fall to $20 or $30 a barrel, pointing to the crude oil storage numbers and suggesting that we are near maximum capacity and therefore a price collapse is imminent. (Although Goldman Sachs did some backpedaling on their forecast this week). The argument goes something like this: US running out of room to store oil; price collapse next? “The U.S. has so much crude that it is running out of places to put it, and that could drive oil and gasoline prices even lower in the coming months. For the past seven weeks, the United States has been producing and importing an average of 1 million more barrels of oil every day than it is consuming. That extra […]
PITTSBURGH— U.S. Steel Corp. Thursday announced more layoffs as it struggles to contend with surging imports and declining demand for the energy sector, saying it will temporarily idle one of its iron ore operations in Minnesota, affecting 412 workers. The move is the latest in a series of retrenchments by the 114-year-old steelmaker as it attempts to navigate rough waters for the industry in the U.S., and pursue a longer-term strategy of repositioning itself as a smaller, more nimble steel company. U.S. Steel last year posted its first annual profit since 2008, but like other steelmakers is now having to cope with the triple whammy of a strong dollar that makes imports cheaper, weak oil prices that are killing the market for energy-related steel, and a surge in exports from China. The idling of the plant in Keewatin, Minn., which directly ships to U.S. Steel mills, will take place […]
The United Steelworkers union and oil companies have reached a tentative deal to end the largest U.S. refinery strike in 35 years, the labor group and people familiar with the Continue Reading
The plunge in US drilling should help the oil market recover faster than had been expected, says an Oppenheimer analyst. In a research report on the oil field services industry, Continue Reading
Following years of legal wrangling, ExxonMobil Corp. has resumed drilling in the high-pressure Point Thomson gas-condensate field on Alaska’s North Slope near the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). Development of Continue Reading
Sign up for our daily Energy Newsletter Shell says it expects to proceed with drilling program in arctic waters off the coast of Alaska this year. Photo by Kyle Waters/Shutterstock THE HAGUE, Netherlands, March 12 (UPI) — Drilling in the arctic waters of Alaska should proceed this year assuming timely approval from the U.S. federal government, Royal Dutch Shell said Thursday. Shell’s preliminary drilling program in arctic waters offshore Alaska in 2012 was plagued by problems, including a grounded drilling rig, violations of air pollution limits, engine failures on a tow ship and an oil spill containment system damaged during testing. Shell Chief Executive Ben van Beurden said in an annual report , published Thursday, the Interior Department was reviewing a supplementary environmental impact statement on operations in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas. "We anticipate that the Department of Interior will continue to work in accordance with their proposed […]
ENLARGE As crude prices retreat, oil companies have cut the rates they pay contractors who work at sites on North Dakota’s oil-rich Bakken formation by 20% or more. A drilling site outside of Williston, N.D. Photo: Reuters BISMARCK, N.D.—At least eight workers have died since October in North Dakota’s oil fields, more than in the preceding 12 months combined. The uptick in fatalities comes as many oil companies are responding to plummeting crude-oil prices by dialing back their drilling activity in the state, one of the hubs of the U.S. energy boom. Some federal safety officials say they suspect oil’s plunge might be a factor in the accidents because it puts cost-cutting pressure on oil-field services companies, whose employees do much of the work at drilling sites. The rash of accidents in North Dakota, which has the highest workplace death rate in the country, began around the time the […]
