North Plains Energy, LLC, Reports a Nice Well in Sand Creek -- Bakken, North Dakota, USA

Updates

November 20, 2011: reminder -- KOG bought North Plains Energy assets, to close January, 2012.

September 24, 2011 -- permits since 19096 --

• 21529, CONF, Newfield, Pittsburgh Federal 153-96-3-2H,
• 21530, CONF, Newfield, Pittsburgh Federal 153-96-3-3H,
• 19708, CONF, North Plains, Federal 4-7H
• 19889, 1,678, Denbury Onshore, Sand Creek 21-10SH; t5/11; cum 131K 4/12;
• 20522, CONF, North Plains, Federal 16-30-1H
• 20523, CONF, North Plains, Federal 16-30-2H
• 20084, CONF, Newfield, Garvey Federal 153-96-29-2H, 17K in 3/12; 10K in 4/12;
• 20336, 1,162, BR, Sun Notch 43-23H, t9/11; cum 7K 4/12;
• 20777, CONF, BR, Renegade 34-10TFH,
• 19814, PNC, XTO, Flatland 24X-11,
• 20832, 1,200, BR, Outlaw Gap 34-23TFH, t1/12; cum 34K 4/12;
• 20812, CONF, BR, Hammerhead 31-26MBH, 4K in April, 2012;
  

May 26, 2011: A nice Newfield well in Sand Creek:

• 19096, 2,862, Newfield, Helsingborg 1-22H, Sand Creek, Bakken; t2/11; cum 99K 4/12; 

Original Blog

The North Plains well:

• 18787, 801, North Plains Energy, LLC, Sorenson Federal 15-5H, Sand Creek, Bakken; t1/11; cum 63K 4/12;

What is interesting is that this well appears to be in a very nice oil field that has been "under the radar." The field is now mostly spaced for 1280-acre units, but the early wells were short laterals, and placed on 640-acre spacing.

No, this new North Plains Energy well is not a thousand-barrel IP, but for a small company in an obscure field, this is pretty good.

The Sand Creek oil field is in a fairly non-descript area of the Basin. It is located a bit farther east of the Stockyard Creek oil field and is on the south side of the river (the Stockyard Creek is on the north side).  It is immediately west of the very nice Charlson field. 

It is a small field, only about one township in size: half of two townships -- T153N-R96W and T153N-R97W.

As an example of how good this field might be:

• 18282, 1,947, BEXP, Strand 16-9 1-H, extended short lateral, spudded10/09; tested 11/09; total as of 4/12, 133K 

Denbury is currently drilling a well that is sited only 422 feet to the east of the BEXP well. I assume it will be a horizontal running in the opposite direction (running south).

• 19889, 1,678, Denbury, Sand Creek 21-10SH, t5/11; cum 131K;

BR is currently drilling another well in the field:

• 20336, 1,162, BR, Sun Notch 43-32H; t9/11; cum 8K; problems?

There are some very nice wells in this field, in addition to the BEXP well noted above (the early ones are short laterals; I assume most of the new ones will be long laterals (remember, once they reach 100,000 bbls, it is likely that the wells will pay for themselves at some point):

• 18662, 2,145, BR, Old Hickory 43-34H, long lateral running east to west; spudded 2/10; tested 5/10; 158K as of 4/12, but has pretty much been off-line during the past three  months (weather?). In 8/10 it was still producing 13K per month. This is one of the better BR wells that I have seen in the Bakken
• 18414, 2,861, Newfield, Sand Creek Federal 1-27HA, short lateral; spudded 9/10; tested 11/10; 116K as of 4/12; one doesn't see many short laterals any more and this was just drilled
• 17758, 617, Newfield, Alice Federal 1-28H, short lateral, spudded 7/09; tested 8/09; 58K as of 4/12. Look how soon after spudding, fracking completed and tested; seems to have leveled off at about 1,200 bbls per month
• 18323, 2,654, Newfield, Sand Creek Federal 1-21H, short lateral, spudded 12/09; tested 3/10; 110K as of 4/12; off-line much of 1/11 (due to weather?);
• 17811, 2,825, Newfield, Garvey Federal 1-29H, short lateral, spudded 12/09; tested 5/10; 124K as of 4/12 (not taken off line during 1/11 -- so maybe something other than weather for the others)