Bakken Rig Count Falls
The Bakken-Three Forks rig count fell by one this week landing at 26 rigs running across our coverage area by midday Friday.
A total of 432 oil and gas rigs were running across the United States this week, which is a drop of 11 over last week. 81 were targeting natural gas (eight more than the previous week) and 351 were targeting oil in the U.S. (three less than the previous week). The remainder were drilling service wells (e.g. disposal wells, injection wells, etc.) 26 of the rigs active in the U.S. were running in North Dakota.
Bakken Oil & Gas Rigs
The Bakken oil rigs were at 26 this week with Bloomberg reporting WTI oil prices trading at $40.36 on Friday afternoon. WTI-Brent increased this week to $43.10. The Bakken has zero natural active gas rig in the area this week with futures decreasing to $1.90/mmbtu by midday.
McKenzie County continues to lead development with 14 rigs running this week, far outpacing other counties. View the full list below under the Bakken Drilling by County section.
Activity continues to be dominated by horizontal drilling:
26 rigs are drilling horizontal wells
0 rigs are drilling directional wells
0 rigs are drilling vertical wells
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Bakken Drilling by County
County
State
Previous Week
Current Week
County
State
Previous Week
Current Week
MCKENZIE
ND
15
14
VALLEY
MT
0
0
DUNN
MT
5
5
WIBAUX
MT
0
0
MOUNTRAIL
ND
3
3
BILLINGS
MT
0
0
WILLIAMS
ND
2
2
BOTTINEAU
MT
0
0
DIVIDE
MT
1
1
BURKE
MT
0
0
MCLEAN
ND
1
1
GOLDEN VALLEY
MT
0
0
DANIELS
ND
0
0
MERCER
ND
0
0
DAWSON
ND
0
0
RENVILLE
ND
0
0
FALLON
ND
0
0
STARK
ND
0
0
RICHLAND
ND
0
0
WARD
ND
0
0
ROOSEVELT
ND
0
0
MCHENRY
ND
0
0
SHERIDAN
MT
0
0
MCHENRY
ND
0
0
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.
Read more at bakerhughes.com