‘Bakken Bump’ already showing on land

Posted May 15, 2012

Maybe well locations now multiply more like rabbits than humans

In my first post a comparison was made between a baby developing in the womb and the progress of an oil well site from beginning to end. Much to my surprise, however, there is already no way to hide the fact that sweet crude will soon be born out of the once scenic farm and range land pictured below. Maybe they still won’t drill for several weeks, but all indications say that the due date has been drastically moved up from late June into May. Since the rig erected in the background is on a different new location, perhaps it would be appropriate to relate the escalation in well numbers to that of rapidly reproducing bunnies.

When the pumping begins, the bump stays

Whether it’s a woman or doe, neither normally continue to look pregnant after giving birth. Unfortunately, that isn’t the case for Bakken well sites in western North Dakota as the massive plateau of manually moved earth you see above will remain indefinitely. During the past few years thousands of these have sprouted up in areas that were able to maintain some aesthetic value until now. Imagine waking up one day to hundreds of supposedly harmless rabbits destroying your lawn, consuming your flowers and pillaging your garden. And, you had absolutely no power to stop or even slow the colony down.

The boom’s pace is quite hurried

My dad supervised a drilling crew back in the late 70s/early 80s boom and oil exploration progressed more methodically during that time. It took several months instead of one month’s worth of days to strike oil in that era. Also, there was always the potential that their efforts would result in a dry hole. You really can’t classify the drilling in western ND as exploratory anymore because somebody would really need to mess up for a well not to produce worthwhile amounts. This a huge reason for the entire region being overrun.

The Bakken well success rate is triple that of in-vitro

There’s good reason for those who own a difference making amount of Bakken mineral rights to get excited about the physical appearance of having a well on the way. A proven 99 percent success rate allows them to almost completely disregard the possibility of a miscarriage. Without technological advancements in horizontal drilling and fracturing processes the ND oil industry would still be shooting too many unprofitable blanks. In contrast, some couples who struggle to have a child sometimes utilize the technology of in-vitro, which only works anywhere from 6 to 35 percent of the time. No wonder “Bakken bumpers” can now much more confidently look forward to a stork flying their way.

Liudahl is one of several bloggers contributing posts to patchlife.areavoices.com

Tags: news, energy, oil