Pumpjacks taken out of production temporarily stand idle at a Hess site while new wells are fracked near Williston, North Dakota November 12, 2014. Crude oil production data published by the state of North Dakota on Friday contained something for both bulls and bears. Bears can point to the unexpected resilience of shale production in the face of lower oil prices while bulls can point to the fact that production is no longer growing after five years of tremendous gains. The state pumped an average of 1.2 million barrels per day (bpd) in May, an increase of 32,000 bpd compared with April, according to the Department of Mineral Resources ( link.reuters.com/kan25w ). Production remained steady with an average of just 80-90 rigs drilling in May, far fewer than the 120-130 rigs the department forecast at the start of the year would be necessary to maintain 1.2 million bpd. By […]