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Increases in North Dakota's crude oil production have resulted in increased associated natural gas production from oil reservoirs, especially in the Bakken region. Because of insufficient infrastructure to collect, gather, and transport this natural gas, about one-fifth of North Dakota's natural gas production is flared rather than marketed. North Dakota's Industrial Commission (NDIC) has established natural gas capture targets in an effort to reduce the amount of flared gas, and they recently issued a revision to the flaring targets in response to faster-than-expected gas production growth in the Bakken region. North Dakota's current target is to capture and sell at...

New federal data shows that the Energy Department expects drillers in the Permian Basin to push oil production in the shale play above 2 million barrels per day for the first time ever this November. The U.S. Energy Information Administration’s monthly Drilling Productivity Report released Monday, which covers seven of the biggest shale plays in the country, projects production in the Permian to jump by 17,000 bpd this month. That increase would bring the play above the 2 million bpd mark. In December, the EIA expects the play to grow again by 11,000 bpd. But the Permian is one of...

One person was seriously injured in a shooting Monday night at a Clayton State University student apartment building. The shooting at the Clayton Station Apartments happened shortly after 8 p.m. in the 3000 building of the Clayton Station Apartments, university spokeswoman Maritza E. Ferreira said in a statement. The victim is not a student, but is believed to be the relative of a student, Ferreira said. Police were still searching for the suspect Monday nigth, she added.

When President Obama announced he was killing the Keystone XL pipeline, he said he was agreeing with the State Department’s assessment that the pipeline from Canada “would not serve the national interests of the United States.” The fact is that it would not have benefitted the personal financial interests of friend and economic mentor, Warren Buffett, who can rest assured that oil from Canada and the nearby Bakken formation in North Dakota will continue to be transported by a railroad he owns. As Investor’s Business Daily noted in a 2011 editorial: Killing the Keystone XL pipeline may help one of...

Only 1% of the Bakken Play area is commercial at current oil prices based on my analysis that follows. Only 4% of horizontal wells drilled since 2000 meet the EUR (estimated ultimate recovery) threshold needed to break even at current oil prices, drilling and completion, and operating costs. The leading producing companies evaluated in this study are losing $11 to $38 on each barrel of oil that they produce, the very definition of waste. Although NYMEX prices are about $46 per barrel, realized wellhead prices in the Bakken are only $30 per barrel according to the North Dakota Department of...

Universities have come a long way from the days of yore when they proclaimed that part of their mission was the search of truth. At the Heritage Foundation recently, Brooklyn College history professor KC Johnson noted that “in the last decade…the two most significant…rape hoaxes in the United States happened on college campuses” at Duke University and at the University of Virginia. The men’s lacrosse team was accused of rape at Duke, while at UVa, “to their great shame, the student body and student newspaper rushed to the side of the accusers.” Neither of the accusers were raped, as they...

Drillers in a few of the biggest shale plays in the country are set to scale back their oil production dramatically next month, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s forecast released Tuesday. The EIA said in its Drilling Productivity Report that overall U.S. oil production would fall 93,000 barrels per day to 5.12 million bpd total in November, the largest decrease recorded in the agency’s data going back to 2007. The drop would also mark the seventh-straight month of production pullbacks. Three of the largest U.S. shale plays — the Eagle Ford, Bakken and Niobrara — together could lose...

A U.S. judge on Friday approved a deal between conservationists and Montana officials to restrict road-building and logging in roughly 22,000 acres of state forest lands that make up core habitat for federally protected grizzlies. The agreement resolves a lawsuit brought by conservationists after the state had sought to open 37,000 acres , mostly in the Stillwater State Forest, to timber harvesting despite what environmentalists said would be the destruction of prime grizzly bear territory. ... U.S. District Judge Donald W. Molloy in a decision last year found the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service violated the Endangered Species Act by...

For the top U.S. shale plays that once seemed immune to the downturn, persistently low oil prices are starting to take their toll. The lingering crude slump is expected to drive down production next year in the nation’s premiere oil patches — West Texas’ Permian Basin, South Texas’ Eagle Ford and North Dakota’s Bakken shale — as operators spend less to stay within cash flow, according to a report by investment banking firm Tudor Pickering Holt & Co. With oil hovering around $50 per barrel, or less than half the price it fetched last year, output from the so-called Big...

Real estate developers were too late to the party in North Dakota. Just a few years after fracking sparked a shale oil frenzy that lured thousands of unemployed workers to North Dakota in the hopes of landing high-paying jobs, plummeting oil prices have sapped some oomph from the boom. As workers streamed into North Dakota, temporary camps popped up to meet the demand, and real estate developers followed suit with plans to create thousands of permanent apartments. Related: The North Dakota Boom That’s Going Bust After Oil’s Plunge But crude oil prices have fallen more than 50 percent in the...

An F/A-18 fighter jet aircraft has crashed west of Naval Air Station Lemoore. The crash, which happened Monday, was north of Highway 198 in a dirt field just east of the Kings/Fresno county line, about two miles west of NASL, according to Adam Barresi, a spokesman for the California Highway Patrol. The pilot reportedly ejected from the aircraft in mid-air, parachuted to the ground, landed and walked over to emergency responders on scene, according to Kings County Fire Chief Bill Lynch. Lynch said the crash happened around 4 p.m. The pilot's name wasn't immediately available. The parachute was reported as...

BISMARCK – Some of the money set aside by North Dakota lawmakers to defend the state against legal challenges to its abortion laws will instead be used to cover attorneys’ fees awarded to lawyers for couples who challenged the state’s gay marriage ban. The state Emergency Commission voted 5-1 Wednesday to approve a request by Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem to transfer $75,000 from the abortion litigation fund to a separate fund for general litigation expenses. Last month, the state agreed to pay $58,000 in attorneys’ fees and costs in a federal lawsuit filed on behalf of seven same-sex couples who...

The cleanup of a massive 2013 oil spill in northwestern North Dakota is being hampered by a lack of natural gas needed to power special equipment that cooks hydrocarbons from crude-soaked soil, a state regulator said. Crews have been working around-the-clock to deal with the Tesoro Corp. pipeline break that spilled more than 20,000 barrels of oil into a Tioga wheat field two years ago this month. Bill Suess, an environmental scientist with the state Health Department, said Wednesday that workers will be at the site at least another two years baking oil from the soil using a process called...

A federal judge on Friday declined to halt the Obama administration's controversial water rule nationwide, rebuffing the request of 13 states that are battling with the Environmental Protection Agency.Judge Ralph Erickson of the North Dakota U.S. District Court ruled that there are “significant prudential reasons to limit the scope” of the injunction he already gave the 13 states last week. Other courts have denied injunctions, he said, and some states want to implement the “Waters of the United States” rule. “On the one hand, there is a desirability for uniformity regarding a national rule with national application,” Erickson wrote. “On...

North Dakota Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, a Democrat whose seat could likely be a top target for national Republicans in 2018, will soon announce whether she will pursue a political path that could take a re-election campaign out of the picture. Evers since the state’s Republican governor, Jack Dalrymple, announced he would not seek re-election next year, Heitkamp has been mulling a run. Speaking on her brother’s radio show on Wednesday, Heitkamp said she would reveal her decision in the next five to seven days. “I think she’s a 50-50 at this point,” said one Democrat familiar with her thinking, adding...

Robust oil and gas activity helped several states grow their economies in 2014, with the fastest growing states all heavy energy industry players, according to Commerce Department data released Wednesday. The Texas economy grew the second most among the states last year after it saw its gross domestic product increase 5.2 percent, making it one of a handful of states to outpace the U.S. economy overall. Only North Dakota was ahead of Texas last year after its GDP grew 6.3 percent. Wyoming, West Virginia and Colorado rounded out the top five. The steep fall in the price of U.S. crude...

SPOKANE, Wash. (AP) — Idaho was among seven states where the number of unauthorized immigrants increased between 2009 and 2012, according to a report released Tuesday by the Pew Research Center. The report also found the number of unauthorized immigrants decreased in 14 states, including Oregon, in that time period. The number stayed relatively stable in the remaining states, including Washington. Nationally, the number of unauthorized immigrants remained stable at 11.2 million between 2009 and 2012, the report found. The number of such immigrants peaked in 2007 at 12.2 million, the report said. But changes occurred within states. Idaho, for...

 Drones can now legally fight criminals in the United States with non-lethal weapons thanks to a recently amended bill in North Dakota. The law’s author, Representative Rick Becker, originally wanted to require police to secure a warrant for drone surveillance.But, then local law enforcement managed to sneak in the right to equip drones with tasers or rubber bullets by amending the original prohibition against lethal and non-lethal force to just limiting lethal weapons. Becker worries that this new franken-bill will have dramatic unintended consequences.“I think it’s important to maintain the humanity in making decisions to deploy weapons against another individual,” he...

The very same crew which recently dumped three million gallons of toxic sludge out of an abandoned mine and turned the Animas River in Colorado the color of a yellow banded poison dart frog for roughly a week has just issued a whole new set of rules to “protect” small pools of water. They would also like you to know that these rules are going into effect even though a federal judge put them on hold in 13 states, too. This new batch of regulations is going to “protect” bodies of water which may include the ditch in front...

BISMARCK, N.D. — A federal judge in North Dakota on Thursday blocked a new Obama administration rule that would give the federal government jurisdiction over some state waterways. U.S. District Judge Ralph Erickson of North Dakota issued a temporary injunction against a the rule, which gives the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Army Corps of Engineers authority to protect some streams, tributaries and wetlands under the Clean Water Act. The rule was scheduled to take effect Friday. “The risk of irreparable harm to the states is both imminent and likely,” Judge Erickson said in blocking the rule from taking effect....