Politics

I heard Sen. Cassidy of Louisiana today on the business news suggest a theory on why the Russians would sabotage their own pipeline: supposedly the gas contracts with Europe have a clause requiring a minimum delivery or pay clause. By taking the line out, the Russians can claim force majeure and avoid payment for failing to deliver gas
 
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ISW's assessment of Putin's options is particularly timely in light of the annexation gambit.

 
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One of the greatest minds of the modern age. Can you imagine what their pub discussions must have been like!?
I probably would not have been able to comprehend many of their conversations, but it would have been fun to listen.

A few years back, we gave the kids a choice of pubs while in Oxford. They chose The Bear which was over 700 years old. Need to slip back some time to The Eagle and Child just for the nostalgia.

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OK, so here's some silly thought that I had this morning in the shower. I used to work fracking in the Permian, so I understand a bit of what's required. Note, this is not from a "Market" perspective. This is experience (I was responsible for sourcing water for fracking) based completely on what it takes to add a well.

Suppose I assume, for the sake of the discussion, that the executive branch has done a complete 180 on their stated policies and has decided to add to US production in order to make money. That in itself would require a huge leap of faith, and assumption of facts not in evidence, but let's go with it.

One fact in evidence is this: The US has not built new pipelines to transfer gas from the fields to LNG Terminals to load for shipping. Nor have they expanded the terminals they do have, which are running near capacity. Also, LNG and propane are currently running at high cost right now, so "easing" European supply carries with it a similar reduction of US supply... unless you drill additional wells.

So, to take advantage of this "opportunity", you decide to drill an additional well. Consider this:

I'm going to pretend two hours have gone by, and it's now 1 October. That makes the maths easy.

1 October is "spud day" for a new well. Actually, it's not. To drill this well, I need about 10,000 barrels (a barrel is 42 gallons... Don't blame me for the lack of SI units, blame Mr. Rockefeller). Considering a "good" water well in the Permian is about 2500 bbl a day, and an average well is about 1500 a day, we can't spud on 1 October, because no one knew this was coming. Wait, there's an important point: I need to construct the pad, the drilling pit, and a frack pond. If you're really good at managing water, you can reduce the cost/time to build a frack pond by using one nearby. Your transfer costs go way up, but it's still cheaper than the $750,000 or so to build the pond... a pond that needs to be filled at a rate of 2500 bbl/day.

So you make the decision to drill on 1 October, assuming a lease is available, and you have all the appropriate permits in hand. Spud day is now 1 November. On Spud day, you have a viable pad, a viable drilling pond, and the rig in place. What you don't have is a full frack pond. To frack a well, you need about 10,000 barrels per stage. You want to be sure you have that in the pond, because you don't want to stop in the middle of a job. You started filling that pond on 1 October, by 1 November, you've only put in about 75,000 bbl. A "standard" (actually short) job is going to require about 15 stages... so either find more water (non-trivial, in the Permian) or wait. Let's suppose, just to speed things along, you've drilled additional water wells. Assuming you've found good water, and assuming they are also average (or you were able to tap into an existing well), we've put away enough water to spud on 1 Nov. Just to keep things easy.

So you spend about a week, maybe 10 days drilling the well. Go with a week. You're drilling over 5,000 feet into the earth, a good portion of that horizontally. It's now 7 November. You planned ahead, there are no issues, and the Completion Team gets there on 8 November. They have a full Frack Pond, all the appropriate equipment, and are ready to go. The job starts. They are really good at their job. They are only doing 15 stages, and they can complete about five stages a day. The Water Guy did his job, and water is available. The special proprietary mix of sand and other chemicals are there. The well is completed in three days. It's now 11 November. Are we producing yet?

Well, we are producing... some gas, some oil, and an awful lot of that frack mix we sent down there. That frack mix is going to be coming out for the next 25 - 30 days, before you are making oil and gas that can be sold. In the mean time, that mix is all being transported to a disposal well. Your original "Go" date was 1 October, your Spud date was 1 November, and your Put On Line (POL) date is now about 15 December.

But now you need to compress that gas (there are some pipelines, but they don't go all the way to Galveston or Houston), load it in rail cars, and ship it. Add a few days there. It's now almost Christmas, and the gas you first hoped to get out of the ground on 1 October is now getting loaded on to a ship. And that ship needs 20 to 30 days to cross the Atlantic, to make it to Europe. It's now mid-to late January. Assuming there were no "issues" along the way.

I see nothing in the industry press that indicates a sudden increase of drilling rigs in the Permian. Keystone is a bad dream. There are no pipelines crossing from Pennsylvania into other east coast ports.

If there were a nefarious plot for the US to bail out Europe and increase their own profits over this winter, NS pipe sabotage should have happened at least 3 months ago, if not more. On the other hand, poor planning on Hunter's part I can believe.

I have no idea about the Permian, but have some knowledge about the Eagle Ford. There are already drilled water wells all over and water ponds everywhere. Pad site are everywhere, and most pad sites can still take more wells. The operators run water pipe everywhere, even where you tell them not to run it. There are gas lines all over at least where EOG has wells. It’s sour gas , and the stripping plant in Tilden runs three tracks, from there the gas can go anywhere. Very short distance to Corpus Christi and a port. It would not take much to ramp up. Other than a drilling permit from
The rail road commission and finding a move a drilling rig.
 
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These guys are so good at this. :E Lol: :E Lol:

 
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My old mentor Jack Keane was on with Bret Bair. One of the most thoughtful political military minds in a couple of generations. Wish Tucker would have him on, but he doesn't fit the narrative.

I caught that, it was excellent.
 
Wish Tucker would have him on, but he doesn't fit the narrative.
I like Tucker but I do tire of his ax grinding against some of the persons that he takes issue with. I recall the prescription drug campaign that he had. Increased scrutiny of prescription pain meds happened to coincide with increased deaths from people obtaining pain meds outside the prescription process. Does Tucker mention this? no, just as he continues to wage a campaign against the Ukraine involvement, does he ever present any alternative views? No, which it seems he should, considering his sign-off baloney.
 
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I heard Sen. Cassidy of Louisiana today on the business news suggest a theory on why the Russians would sabotage their own pipeline: supposedly the gas contracts with Europe have a clause requiring a minimum delivery or pay clause. By taking the line out, the Russians can claim force majeure and avoid payment for failing to deliver gas

This is completely true.
 
I have no idea about the Permian, but have some knowledge about the Eagle Ford. There are already drilled water wells all over and water ponds everywhere. Pad site are everywhere, and most pad sites can still take more wells. The operators run water pipe everywhere, even where you tell them not to run it. There are gas lines all over at least where EOG has wells. It’s sour gas , and the stripping plant in Tilden runs three tracks, from there the gas can go anywhere. Very short distance to Corpus Christi and a port. It would not take much to ramp up. Other than a drilling permit from
The rail road commission and finding a move a drilling rig.
You could have stopped after "Permian".

When I was in the Permian, many people came from Eagle Ford and said "What's so hard about this?". Then they saw.

And that's just the water challenge.

How long to get a permit and move a rig? And once that's done, do they drill faster in the Eagle Ford? Does it take less time to complete a well? Is there no need to recover the frack fluid in the Eagle Ford? Do your grits boil faster than other people's grits?

 
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My old mentor Jack Keane was on with Bret Bair. One of the most thoughtful political military minds in a couple of generations. Wish Tucker would have him on, but he doesn't fit the narrative.
I'm sure Tucker would attempt to prove to the world that he had a better grasp of military affairs/strategy than Keane. That's generally what he does.

I gave up watching him long ago, he's a legend in his own mind.
 
This is a translation of the meat of Putin's annexation speech. Won't find much about Nazis or Ukraine in it.

And the irony of doing this on the same date that Hitler annexed the Sudetenland in 1938 is almost overwhelming.

Additionally the Ukrainian army just completed the encirclement of around 5 thousand Russian troops in the city of Lyman on the same date - in one of of his annexed states.

Wow! Talk about 100% unadulterated bullshit propaganda. I almost fell out of my chair laughing.
 
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