# March Issue National Geographic/ND



## Dick Monson (Aug 12, 2002)

I would urge you to pick up the new issue of National Geographic magazine. The feature article is the oil boom & consequences in ND. Difficult to read. If you don't want to buy it stop in at your local library. 8,000 wells drilled, another 42,000 on deck.


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## dakotashooter2 (Oct 31, 2003)

I can't understand the "rush" to drill every hole possible. It makes far more sense to me to drill an alloted number of hole then drill replacements as they tap out. One would think long term that would provide for the stability and longevity of the resource and the cash flow that comes with it..............


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## shaug (Mar 28, 2011)

I hear ya dakota,

Why do they do clear cuts in forests? Can't they just harvest the trees as they become old or have trained specialists go out there and determine which trees need to be thinned. Those thinned trees could then be air lifted out with sky crane helicopters. Of course our big ideas would cost "them" the saw mills millions upon millions.

Oh, that forest plan is nothing new and now our pulping plants have left the country and no amount of begging them to come back is working while our forests burn, rot and get eaten by bugs.

Do we have a shortage of paper because of this? No, we import our paper. There are companies abroad who more than likely funded the spotted owl activists so that while we were shutting down our sawmills, they were firing up theirs.

Which companies, what companies? You will never know as it is extremely bad form for owners of multibillion dollar natural resources firms to fund radical groups trying to destroy other (their competition) natural resource-producers.


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## KurtR (May 3, 2008)

they are trying to clear cut oil rigs?


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## shaug (Mar 28, 2011)

No sir Kurt,

Business is about competition. He who produces the best product for the lowest price wins the contract.

However if a company can't compete they may take the low road. For example: Hugo Chavez wants to sell Venezuellan oil here but the Bakken is getting in the way. How about if he gave a little money to the enviros or NATGEO to do some negative press.

Or if Hugo partnered with the Saudis to accomplish the same. You will never know as it is extremely bad form for owners of multibillion dollar natural resources firms to fund radical groups trying to destroy other (their competition) natural resource-producers.

The truth may be stranger than fiction.


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## dakotashooter2 (Oct 31, 2003)

My thought is that we want to have enough production to keep foreign oil prices at a reasonable level then we use foreign oil and have our own as backup. All this oil isn't going to do any good anyway if the govt wont let us build refineries to process it...............


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## Hunt Fish Sleep (Apr 8, 2013)

Well said about needing new refineries. The new diesel refinery that they recently broke ground on West of Dickinson will be the first new refinery since the mid 70's!

I actually work in the oil industry, on a rig. I am a Bismarck native though, not an out-of-towner. There are several reasons why they continue to drill wells instead of just let the ones we have die out, then drill more. The biggest reason is because it is economically viable to drill in North Dakota right now. If they wait five years or more for the well production to drop, oil prices might have dropped by then and it wouldn't be worth it to drill. There are also logistical reasons in that if a company already has rigs up here drilling, the company would prefer to keep the rig up here and drilling rather than lay it down and deal with the difficult process of starting back up.

There are of course bad things that come with the oil boom: mostly increased traffic, crime, and severe shortage of housing. But we are still lucky to have such problems. Most every other part of the country would kill to have our problems up here due to the boom. When I first started on a rig, I expected to see the land destroyed, waste and oil spilled all over, and worse. But honestly, it's relatively little impact on the land. A four well pad takes up about an acre of land. Every place I've drilled, there's still farmers growing wheat, and ranchers' cattle grazing like nothing is going on. My biggest complaint is all of the light that comes off of the rigs and flares at night-- I love to star gaze, but all the light hampers that.


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