Bakken

A coalition pushing for separating all liquids from Bakken crude oil supplies is taking its case to lawmakers, firefighters and emergency managers in North Dakota, pushing the process known as “stabilization,” or stripping of natural gas liquids (NGL).

Calgary-based Aux Sable Liquid Products LP plans to spend $130 million to increase processing capabilities at its facilities in Channahon, IL.

Marathon Oil Corp.’s U.S. resource plays can hold their own in a low-price environment, and the company’s U.S. drilling program is expected to proceed essentially unchanged from plan, executives said Tuesday.

Occidental Petroleum Corp. (Oxy), which soon will spin off its California assets into a new company, currently has more of a sales mindset, but if oil prices continue to decline it could quickly switch to a buying mode regarding U.S. domestic assets, particularly in the Permian Basin, CEO Stephen Chazen said Thursday on a 3Q2014 earnings conference call.

Continental Resources Inc. (CLR) executives made one thing clear during an investor conference on Thursday: the Bakken Shale may have brought it to the dance, but Oklahoma is taking it back home.

As industry players continue to expand their ability to move North Dakota’s Bakken crude oil via rail, state officials on Monday were making final plans for a public hearing and eventual rulemaking regarding crude-by-rail shipments.

As the industry moves along its steep learning curve dealing with the shale revolution, it is becoming clearer there is no real comparison between California’s Monterey Shale and North Dakota’s Bakken Shale. They are night-and-day opposites, according to several industry speakers at a hydraulic fracturing (fracking) conference Tuesday in Los Angeles.

A final third-party report on the characteristics of light, sweet oil from the Bakken/Three Forks region again shows that the supplies from North Dakota are not more volatile or flammable than other crude oils.

In what is a mixed bag for the oil and railroad industries, the U.S. Department of Transportation (DOT) on Wednesday unveiled proposed rules to improve the transport of crude oil via rail, proposing enhanced tank car design specifications, fuel classification and operational requirements for handling crude.