Thanks for the bump! A lot of the current tech has been developed in the Bakken Three Forks/Sanish play up here. It has made marginal wells into attractive prospects--and done wonders for the regional economy. Horizontal drilling has been used up here for nearly 25 years, and that has advanced by leaps and bounds as well.
It should be no surprise that the Chinese want to tap that knowledge and use it for themselves, and they have been cutting deals for exploitable resources around the world.