Do What You Came Here To Do: Work

New Montana State Fund campaign urges Bakken workers to take personal responsibility for safety.

March 28, 2013 — In recent years, tens of thousands of workers have converged in the Bakken oil fields, drawn by the allure of high-paying jobs. But with these jobs can come injuries. That’s why Montana State Fund, the state’s largest provider of workers’ compensation insurance, is launching a campaign that urges employees and employers alike to take personal responsibility for workplace safety.

SafetyFestMT comes to Sidney WHAT: Three-day safety conference offering workshops and classes to help employers and employees improve safety on the job. WHO: SafetyFestMT is organized by Montana Department of Labor and Industry in partnership with WorkSafeMT. WHEN: April 16-18, 2013 WHERE: Richland County Fairgrounds and the Montana State University Eastern Agricultural Research Center, Sidney, Montana COST: FREE REGISTRATION & MORE INFO: www.SafetyFestMT.com

“People who come to the Bakken often give up a lot in pursuit of good jobs. We want them to remain safe in those jobs,” said Mary Boyle, communications specialist with Montana State Fund. “Our message on radio, billboards, gas pumps, and in bar and café restrooms is to remind folks to stay focused, ask questions if they don’t understand their job responsibilities, and look out for the well-being of the guy next to them.”

To be sure, workplace safety issues aren’t confined to the oil fields. More employees are injured in Montana than in almost every other state, and workers injured in Montana stay out of work an average of 23 days longer than workers in the rest of the country.

Even so, conditions in the Bakken can challenge even the most skilled worker. Marathon shifts with few days off can lead to exhaustion. A culture that celebrates toughness, speed and self-reliance sometimes fosters a tendency to lose focus, which leads to injuries. Some people may fear they will lose their jobs for speaking up or asking questions about safety.

While workplace injuries are always disruptive, they can be particularly hard on workers in the Bakken, many of whom come to the region from elsewhere, leaving their support networks of family and friends behind.

New workers are particularly susceptible to injury in the Bakken. Employees in Montana’s petroleum and supporting industries who suffer injuries have an average of two years’ experience on the job, compared to five years’ experience in all other industries across the state, according to data from Montana State Fund-insured employers.

On a positive note, MSF-insured injured employees in the petroleum and oil industries are off work an average of 13 weeks, compared to 31 weeks for all injured employees in all industries across the state. This statistic highlights how well employers in the petroleum industry help their employees return to work in a timely manner.

Research shows that safety-conscious workers are more accountable and, thus, more productive. Safety-focused companies are five times more likely to be in the top 20 percent of their respective industries on productivity, quality, efficiency and employee satisfaction, according to a study published in the June 2010 issue of EHS Today, a worker and workplace protection publication.

Boyle offers some specific tips for workers in the Bakken:

• Slow down and focus. Working 12- to 16-hour shifts, 21 days straight, can zap you. Speed and lack of focus in almost any job can lead to recklessness; and recklessness leads to injury.

• Take breaks at regular intervals. Stop and walk around or stretch out. It improves circulation and helps you refocus once you’re back on task.

• Stay healthy. Eat fruits and vegetables, stay in shape and limit alcohol intake during long stretches of consecutive work days. This will help you maintain focus — and keep your job.

• Sleep. Given housing conditions, sleeping isn’t always easy. But try to get eight quality hours. It will give you the energy you need to remain attentive during the longest days.

• Ask questions if you don’t understand how to operate a particular piece of equipment or if you don’t know what you’re being asked to do.

Montana workers, managers and employers are encouraged to attend the upcoming free SafetyFestMT event in Sidney, scheduled for April 16-18, 2013. Focused around workplace safety issues and training specific to oil field workers, this three-day event offers sessions including HAZWOPER refresher training, PEC Oil & Gas Basic Orientation safety awareness, and 10-hour OSHA courses on construction and general industry safety. Registration for the Sidney SafetyFestMT is now open at www.SafetyFestMT.com.

Montanans can download posters and learn more about safety issues and tips relevant to working in the Bakken at www.safemt.com.

ABOUT MONTANA STATE FUND:

Montana State Fund is the leading provider of workers’ compensation insurance for Montana businesses and their employees. Through its safety and Return to Work programs, the organization works to improve the safety and well-being of all working Montanans. www.safemt.com

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Click here & be heard by US Secretary John Kerry. … do it right now, it only takes 30-seconds.

Please approve the Keystone XL pipeline as quickly as possible. Every day we continue to delay this important piece of U.S. energy infrastructure inhibits our economic growth and weakens American security.

As a military veteran and a well-known supporter of military personnel, veterans and their families, you understand the importance of protecting our national security. Approving the Keystone XL pipeline would directly enhance America’s security, diminishing our dependence on unfriendly foreign oil states and strengthening our relationship with our next-door neighbor and longtime ally, Canada.

The full Keystone XL pipeline would bring in an additional 830,000 barrels of North American oil per day, reducing our need to import oil from places like the Middle East. With Keystone XL, our crude imports from Canada could reach 4 million barrels per day by 2020, twice the amount we now import from the Persian Gulf.

Canada will develop and market their oil reserves regardless of what we do about Keystone XL. It just makes sense to approve this pipeline and bring that fuel to the U.S., to grow our economy, provide jobs for our workers and power our businesses and homes. Americans have waited nearly five years for this pipeline to be approved and for America’s government to increase our energy security. After all the delays, it is time to act.

For almost three decades you exhibited strong leadership in the U.S. Senate. Bring that same leadership to the Department of State and approve the Keystone XL pipeline without delay.

When the very first Williston Basin Petroleum Conference was envisioned back in 1993, it was planned as a meeting where researchers and industry leaders could sit down and discuss the latest technologies and science to help improve oil production in North Dakota and Saskatchewan.  That first conference in Minot, North Dakota – spearheaded by Dr. Malcolm Wilson who at the time worked for the Saskatchewan Ministry of Industry and Mines, as well as colleagues across the border at the University of North Dakota – sent out 70 invitations.  Over 160 people showed up.

From the get-go, Wilson and the original planners knew they’d come across something big.

“What can you say when you get almost triple the number of people you initially invited to the first conference asking to attend?” notes Wilson, now the CEO of the Petroleum Technology Research Centre in Regina, Saskatchewan. “As the conferences progressed – and began to be managed by the North Dakota Petroleum Council, the Saskatchewan Geological Survey and the PTRC – they expanded to include more and more companies.  It developed a significant tradeshow component, but it’s been very important to keep the technical and scientific sessions expanding as well.”

The conference now alternates, in even and odd numbered years, between North Dakota and Saskatchewan respectively.  In 2012 over 4000 people registered and attended the Bismarck incarnation (no mean feat, for hotel owners and restaurants in a city of under 60,000) and the 2013 event in Regina is expected to attract around 2500 attendees.

The exponential increase in numbers at the conference speaks to the rise of Bakken exploration and development – a formation that contains often difficult-to-access but high quality oil.  The Bakken has become the backbone of the explosive growth in oil production in North Dakota and southern Saskatchewan, and holds enormous potential for additional growth in southwestern Manitoba and Eastern Montana.

What’s in the works for the 2013 conference, which runs April 30 to May 2^nd at Regina’s Evraz Place?

“We’re excited by the technical presenters, and special guest speakers we have lined up for this year’s conference,” noted Melinda Yurkowski, assistant Chief Geologist at the Saskatchewan Geological Survey, the Government of Saskatchewan group that has been setting the technical program. “Aside from presentations on important emerging technologies, and  the latest in enhanced oil recovery happening in the Williston Basin, our first day of the technical sessions will also report on the latest news from industry and government players.”

To attend the presentations requires registering and paying a fee of 300.00 (this rate goes up on the day of the conference to 500.00, so register early!) but there are also a number of public presentations that don’t require conference registration and are open to everyone.  One of those, on hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) hopes to provide all the basic information on the technologies employed in this process and discuss in a frank way what it’s all about.  The conference also has two special workshops planned for the conference delegates for a small extra fee – one on core sampling and a second on rock mechanics.  Check out the Williston Basin Petroleum Conference website below for more information.

The some 300 tradeshow booths have been sold out since January, and the tradeshow itself will highlight the best in oilfield technologies.  Special events, a host of receptions, and conference lunches with special-guest speakers will also be provided.

The conference runs April 30 to May 2^nd at Evraz Place.  Visit www.wbpc.ca for full information.

Senate Tax heard Senate Bill 295, a bill to repeal the oil and gas “tax holiday” sponsored by Senator Christine Kaufmann (D-Helena) this morning.

Several turned out to testify in opposition of the measure which would kill the oil and gas production incentive passed by the legislature over a decade ago. The incentive, which lasts only the first 12-18 of production, was created to spur economic growth in Montana.

Proponents of SB 295 included the Montana Conservation Voters, Montana Environmental Information Center, and the Northern Plains Resource Council. The chief argument for the bill was that incentives are no longer necessary, and that production taxes are needed to cover the cost of production impacts. Opponents of the bill, however, believe that repealing the incentive would directly impact production and Montana’s economy.

“Exploration in the Bakken is occurring only because of the tax holiday,” said John Alke, opposing the bill on behalf of Fidelity Exploration and Production Company. Alke explained that wells across the border will produce three to four times the volume of those in Montana. “If you eliminate the tax holiday you will not affect the tax burden, but determine where companies will drill for oil.”

Testifying against the bill was Dave Galt for the Montana Petroleum Association who presented information showing a decline in recent production. Montana’s rig count is down to 12, representing a 31.6% drop since last year. Meanwhile, North Dakota’s rig count is more than 175 as of this week.

Also opposing SB 295 was the Montana Contractors Association, Northern Montana Oil & Gas Association, Montana Taxpayers Association, Montana Association of Oil, Gas & Coal Counties, the Montana Chamber of Commerce, and several oil and gas employers.

“Tax breaks exist to create jobs,” explained Nancy Schlepp of the Montana Taxpayers Association. Oil and gas projects have created nearly 30,000 jobs statewide, from Sidney to Kalispell, from oilfield employment, to construction, to retail and hospitality.

“These companies are generating a lot of tax dollars in a log of other ways,” said Webb Brown, President of the Montana Chamber of Commerce. Oil and gas companies paid more than 200 million last year in taxes to fund government programs and local schools, while property taxes paid by the Billings refineries represented one fourth of all property taxes paid in the city. Since 1999, when the production incentive was created, the state has collected over a billion dollars from oil and gas companies.

Bob Gilbert of the Montana Assoc. of Oil, Gas and Coal Counties presented impassioned testimony.  “Let us in Eastern Montana survive,” exclaimed Gilbert. “A skeptic would say this bill is designed to slow down or stop production of oil and gas in Montana; and I’m a skeptic.”

Retreived 3-5-2013. The Montana Petroleum Association, Inc.  A voluntary, non-profit trade association, serving a membership of oil and natural gas producers, gathering and pipeline companies, petroleum refiners, service providers and consultants.

BILLINGS – Area farmers and ranchers will learn how to save the family farm for the next generation at a farm and ranch meeting hosted by Rocky Mountain College, March 20, 2013, from 7:30 a.m. – 12:00 noon, in the Great Room of Prescott Hall.

“The speakers at this meeting are addressing issues that are very important to farmers and ranchers in Montana and Wyoming. The topics are relevant to our everyday lives,” said Sam’s Club Manager and landowner Cody Mitchell, who is also a sponsor for the event.

Dr. Marsha Goetting will speak about the legal implications of passing down the family farm or ranch. Dr. Goetting is a professor with the Montana State University Extension and an economics specialist. She has presented more than 800 workshops reaching more than 25,000 Montanans with her financial and estate planning information. Dr. Goetting has authored over 76 MontGuides and bulletins and has received national, regional, and state awards for her financial management and estate planning programs.

Andy Lohse, a 2008 RMC graduate, now working with RDO Equipment will address the technological advantages of using GPS in farm equipment; Darla Rhodes of the Billings Farm Services Agency will discuss the implications of the extension of the previous Farm Bill; and Carrie La Seur, an attorney with Baumstark Braaten, who will advise about handling land and mineral rights dealing with, but not limited to, the Bakken Oil Formation.

This event is organized by RMC’s Enactus Students In Free Enterprise. The cost for the event is $35 for those who register ahead of time, and $40 for registration at the door. To register, please visit the web site FARM.Rocky.edu.
Breakfast will be included, and there will be plenty of door prizes. Sponsors include: Sam’s Club, Rocky Mountain College, RDO Equipment, MasterLube, Town & Country, Grains of Montana, Shipton’s Big R, Scheels, and Montana Seed, Grain and Chemical.
For more information, email RMCFarmMeeting@gmail.com or call 406.633.5518.

ROCKY MOUNTAIN COLLEGE TO HOST FARM AND RANCH EVENT
Contact: Kimberly Ferguson, (Project Manager) / 406.633.5518 / RMCFarmMeeting@gmail.com

Bob McTeer, Contributor
A former Dallas Fed president, I cover the economy.

The direct way fracking can reduce the budget is by stimulating economic activity and thus tax revenues. This is obvious.

This piece is about another, less obvious, less intuitive, indirect way fracking can reduce the budget deficit. It is based on the fact that the sum of the budget deficit, the capital inflow to finance the trade deficit, and the difference between domestic saving and domestic investment equals zero. If you expand or shrink any of these three imbalances, it puts pressure on the others to expand or shrink to maintain the net zero balance.

As fracking expands domestic oil and gas production, it likely will reduce U.S. demand for energy imports and shrink our trade deficit. This reduces the net capital inflow required to finance the trade deficit. The reduced capital inflow will tend to reduce the gaps between domestic investment and saving and government expenditures and tax revenue—the deficit in question.

Let me back up and elaborate. Income minus consumption gives us saving, by definition. Income minus consumption also gives us investment, since investment represents output not consumed. Therefore, taking consumption out of the equation, total saving must equal total investment.

National saving is composed of personal saving, business saving, and government saving, i.e. an excess of tax revenue over expenditures. Personal saving, as we know, is low but positive these days. Business saving is moderately positive. However, net negative government saving (the budget deficit) overwhelms the others and make total national saving negative. Since we invest more than we save domestically, the saving deficit must be made up by importing foreign saving in the form of the capital inflow that finances the trade deficit. (See the postscript for a further explanation of this.

Therefore, I repeat, these three variables—the investment saving imbalance, the government spending-taxing imbalance and the inverse of the export-import imbalance are linked together (they total zero) and are mutually determined. Other things equal, the reduction in the trade deficit due to fracking will reduce imported capital and put pressure on investment relative to saving and government spending relative to taxing. At least some of the correction is likely to lead to a smaller budget deficit.

Got it?

P.S. In a closed economy with no government, income will adjust to make saving and investment equal in equilibrium. Introducing, government spending and taxing, the two injections into the income stream (other than consumption) will be investment and government spending while the two leakages will be saving and taxing. Therefore, the sum of the injections will equal the sum of the leakages in equilibrium, although there is no requirement for a separate balance of taxing and spending and saving and investment. Introducing foreign trade, exports become a third injection while imports become a third leakage. In equilibrium, investment plus government spending plus exports will equal saving plus taxes plus imports. In our recent past, the excess of government spending over taxes requires a net capital inflow (to finance the excess of imports over exports) to finance the excess of domestic investment over saving. If fracking reduces the excess of imports over exports the other two imbalances must adjust, thus putting downward pressure on the budget deficit.

Retrieved 3-4-2013. Forbes.

What Opportunity Looks Like: Big Mountain meets the Bakken

“The Bakken has definitely been a huge help and a huge source of revenue to us.”

For many Montanans the Bakken boom has provided a plethora of opportunities. For the Gearhart family of Whitefish, the growth in the oil patch has meant growth in their family-owned business, Big Mountain Glass (BMG).

The company, owned by Chris and Kathy Gearheart, has been in Montana for 41 years and has provided commercial glazing on projects such as the Metra in Billings, the new UM Native American Studies Center in Missoula, the Marcus Daly Memorial Hospital in Hamilton, and the Whitefish Emergency Service Center, to name a few. BMG has twelve full time employees, including son and MSU graduate Scott Gearhart. Scott’s the Commercial Project Manager for the company. Scott’s wife is a full time nurse, and works part time at Big Mountain Glass as well. They also have a seven year old daughter.

With a degree in Construction and Engineering Technology from Bozeman, Scott explained that working for the family business was always part of the plan, saying that it only took a few years of working outside of Montana to realize it was where he wanted to return to work and raise his family.

Before the downturn in the local economy, says Scott, Big Mountain had twenty one full time employees. With the recent resurgence of job opportunities in North Dakota and Eastern Montana, however, he said, “The Bakken has definitely been a huge help and a huge source of revenue to us.”

The first Bakken project for Big Mountain Glass started three years ago. The Gearharts’ business has done everything from small glass instillation projects for schools, strip malls, and NAPA stores in Watford City and around Williston, to a couple of large scale projects in Dickinson and Bismarck.

“We were actually sought out to bid the penitentiary expansion job in Bismarck,” said Scott. Big Mountain not only bid the job, they won it. “This is a major project of over a million dollars in glass,” said Scott. Some of the other large scale projects they’ve worked on include housing complexes for Halliburton. Big Mountain is also waiting to hear back on a medical clinic job they bid recently in Dickinson.

Scott explains that compared to Montana, there is such a shortage of contractors bidding jobs in North Dakota that there’s almost no competition. New contractors are moving into North Dakota with no subcontractor base. The growth is outpacing the workforce, creating job opportunities for contractors, truckers, builders, skilled laborers, small businesses, and many others far beyond North Dakota.

Estimating revenue from the Bakken alone, Scott says oil patch projects account for 15% of his family’s business. Luckily for Scott, he only has to leave the Flathead about once every four months to check on jobs in North Dakota to make sure things are running smoothly. For Scott’s younger brother Tyler, however, the story is quite different.

Tyler Gearhart, like his brother, graduated from MSU in Bozeman where he lives today. He received his degree in Marketing and Entrepreneurship and now works as a MWD Field Technician for The Directional Drilling Company. He was recommended for the position by his uncle, who Tyler says has worked in the oil fields for the better part of two decades. Tyler’s main responsibilities include assembling tools for down hole monitoring, setting up surface gear, and taking surveys. Like most true blue Montanans, the Gearhart brothers spend their free time outdoors fishing and skiing (pictured above).
“It was always a goal of mine to stay in Montana after college,” said Tyler, who describes the worse part of his job as the long periods away from home. He says the best thing about his job is the people.

“Don’t make assumptions about what goes on in the oilfields,” said Tyler, “Come out and experience things before you jump to conclusions.”

Retrieved 27 February 2013. The Montana Petroleum Report. For more information contact: Jessica Sena, 590-8675

Industry Clips from the Montana Petroleum Association, Inc.

Study of state’s renewable‐power mandate has support of environmentalists, utility companies (Jan. 17, Helena IR)Utility companies and environmental groups alike Thursday spoke in favor of a proposed legislative study of Montana’s nearly 8‐year‐old mandate for utilities to produce renewable power, saying it’s time to evaluate its impacts on industry, consumers and the state.

Sen. Alan Olson, R‐Roundup, the sponsor of Senate Joint Resolution 6, which calls for the study, said there’s been much discussion about the mandate, pro and con, since it began. A legislative study over the next 18 months can help “make a determination, one way or the other” on its effects, he said. It will “give us a firm, good grasp on where we’ve been and where we’re going,” Olson said.

Montana’s Unemployment Rate Falls, Flathead’s Ticks Up (Jan. 18, Flathead Beacon)Northwest Montana continues to have some of the highest jobless rates in the state, with Lincoln County leading
the way at 14.8 percent, followed by Sanders County at 14.1 percent. (A link within the article pulls up a report showing the lowest unemployment rate in Eastern Montana)

DRIESSEN: Obama’s wishful thinking on green energy (Jan. 18, Washington Times) Fracking translates into competitive advantages and more jobs, economic productivity and tax revenues. IHS Global Insight calculates that this revolutionary technology has already created 1.7 million new jobs, pumped hundreds of billions of dollars into the U.S. economy and generated more than $60 billion in federal, state and local tax receipts during 2012 alone. By 2035, it could create another 2 million jobs, rejuvenate American manufacturing, inject more than $5 trillion in cumulative capital expenditures into the U.S. economy, and generate $2.5 trillion in additional government revenues.

Obama’s Second‐Term Energy And Climate Agenda Taking Shape (Jan. 18, Huffington Post)The natural gas boom “puts the administration in an interesting position. They can be aggressive and look at natural gas for the possibilities it brings, or they can bow to the environmental community, which is not interested in more natural gas drilling,” said Frank Maisano, a Washington spokesman for a range of energy producers from coal to wind. The emergence of cheap, plentiful natural gas in particular poses a dilemma for Obama, who supports gas development as a cleaner alternative to fossil fuels that trigger global warming.

‘FrackNation’ documentary exposing the truth about fracking in the U.S. set for release next week (Jan. 18, Red Alert Politics)McAleer considers fracking to be a human rights issue more than anything else. That is why he focuses on the human aspects of fracking, such as the hardships that many farmers face financially if they aren’t allowed to lease out their land to oil companies. According to McAleer, there is a “mass movement for fracking” more so than there is a mass movement against it.

The inaugural Rocky Mountain Oil & Gas Awards will be held in Denver on Tuesday 12 March 2013 at the Grand Hyatt Hotel.

The senior industry executives judging the Oil & Gas Awards have had a busy December reviewing almost 300 entries from around 200 different companies and casting their votes.

The awards celebrate the achievements of upstream & midstream companies, service providers and suppliers, twinned with the industry’s commitment to H&S, Environmental Stewardship and Corporate Social Responsibility.

Congratulations to the following companies that have been voted as finalists in the 2012 Rocky Mountain Oil & Gas Awards:

• A&W Water Service, Inc.
• AbTech Industries, Inc.
• Ames Savage Water Solutions
• Antea Group
• Aon Corporation
• Aqua-Pure Ventures
• BeneTerra
• Black Hills Exploration and Production, Inc.
• Bonanza Creek Energy, Inc.
• Bradsby Group
• Brady Trucking, Inc.
• Burleson LLP
• Carrizo Oil & Gas, Inc.
• Cobra Manufacturing & Sales LLC
• Coldsweep Inc.
• Davis Graham & Stubbs LLP
• Davis & Davis Company
• ECO AFS
• Ecocion, Inc.
• Encana Corporation
• Enviro Voraxial® Technology, Inc.
• Frank Henry Equipment USA, LLC
• FTS International
• Gold Spur Trucking
• Herbrick Agency
• High Sierra Energy, LP
• Honeywell Analytics
• IMA, Inc.
• KLJ
• Marquis Alliance Energy Group
• McPherson & McVey
• Nexus Staffing Solutions, LLC
• ONEOK, Inc.
• Precision Placement Services, Inc.
• Produced Water Solutions, Inc.
• PTI Group USA
• QEP Resources, Inc.
• Questar Pipeline Company
• Ryckman Creek Resources, LLC
• Savage
• Spartan Engineering Inc.
• Stellar Recruitment
• Target Logistics
• TaxOps LLC
• TEEMCO, LLC
• TETRA Technologies, Inc.
• Vacuworx® Global
• Venoco, Inc.
• Westcon, Inc.
• Zavanna, LLC

The winners will be announced at the Rocky Mountain Oil & Gas Awards gala dinner ceremony at the Grand Hyatt Hotel in Denver on Tuesday 12 March.

The list of all finalist companies can be found at www.oilandgasawards.com as well as information about table bookings for each gala event. For information on sponsorship opportunities and to reserve your table for what will be a fantastic night of celebration please call Marc Bridgen on +1 (210) 591 8475 or email marc@oilandgasawards.com.

Harold Hamm is a big advocate of the potential of the Bakken field and it appears his confidence in the play is well placed. Continental Resources has increased its estimates by 57%, to the tune of 903 billion barrels of original oil in place. There’s been no word on what the recoverable rate would increase to with this new data.

Earlier this year, Continental estimated the Bakken holds 24 billion Boe of recoverable reserves. With the US Geological Survey slated to complete its reassessment of the Bakken in 2013, it seems these numbers will only go up if the trend continues.

OKLAHOMA CITY, Dec. 3, 2012 – Continental Resources, Inc. (NYSE: CLR) announced today it successfully completed the Charlotte 3-22H (91% WI), the first horizontal well to test the third bench (TF3) of the Three Forks zone in the Bakken field of North Dakota and Montana.

The Charlotte 3-22H flowed 953 barrels of oil equivalent per day (Boepd) at 1700 psi on a 28/64 choke in its initial one-day test period. Located in McKenzie County, North Dakota, it was drilled to a total depth of 21,324 feet, including a 9,701-foot lateral section, and was completed with Continental’s standard 30-stage fracture stimulation design.

“We’re very pleased with the initial performance of the Charlotte 3-22H,” said Harold Hamm, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. “The well has been producing for 15 days and its performance compares favorably with other first bench (TF1) and second bench (TF2) producing Three Forks wells.”

Continental has been a pioneer in the discovery and development of the Three Forks reservoir in the Bakken field. The Company was the first to demonstrate incremental reserves from the TF1 in 2008 and the first to establish commercial production from the TF2 in 2011. Establishing production from the TF3 is yet another significant milestone in the growth of the Company’s assets in the world-class Bakken oil field. If the Charlotte 3-22H continues to perform in line with the second bench Charlotte 2-22H, it will be the first well to establish commercial production in the third bench.

“This could be a real game-changer,” Mr. Hamm said. “The Charlotte 3-22H is the first well in a 14-well program that we plan to complete by year-end 2013 to test productivity of the second, third and fourth benches of the Three Forks over a broad area of the play.”

The 1280-acre Charlotte unit is the first unit in the Bakken field to have wells producing from three separate horizons – the Middle Bakken, TF2 and TF3 zones.

Continental estimated in late 2010 that the Bakken field would eventually yield 24 billion barrels of oil equivalent (Boe), based on technology available at that time. This estimate included 20 billion barrels of oil and 4 billion Boe of natural gas, and assumed 577 billion barrels of original oil in place in the Bakken and TF1. With the addition of oil found in the lower Three Forks benches, which includes the TF2, TF3 and TF4, the Company now estimates the field has 903 billion barrels of original oil in place, a 57 percent increase.

“The successful completion of the Charlotte 3-22H is another step in our efforts to assess the productivity and reserve potential of the lower benches of the Three Forks which is one of the goals of our 2013 drilling program” said Jack Stark, Senior Vice President of Exploration. “The results are very encouraging and indicate there may be upside to our estimate of 24 billion Boe of recoverable reserves for the Bakken field.”

Retrieved 1-3-2013. Dakota Oil Jobs.