Crude oil production in the Bakken shale in North Dakota has been experiencing some major challenges lately, but it is firmly on the growth path, said the state’s Department of Mineral Resources Director Lynn Helms in an interview for S&P Global Platts. Helms identified as the biggest challenges growing production in the Permian as well as a hypothetical ending of the OPEC production cut agreement. While the first challenge is very real, with the Permian still being the star of the shale patch, the latter challenge is more likely than not to remain hypothetical for the foreseeable future. Of course with oil, the foreseeable future is usually no longer than a couple of months, but according to Helms, E&Ps in the Bakken will continue to pump more than 1 million bpd but less than 1.1 million bpd until the end of the year and into 2018. “We should see […]