It’s been a while since we checked in with what’s going on in southeast Saskatchewan.
Once an area heavily weighted to Bakken production, producers in southeast Saskatchewan are now more focused on the Midale and Frobisher formations, although production from 2 of the 3 main producing formations in this area has been in decline over the last decade.
The Bakken formation in southeastern Saskatchewan once produced more than 72 mbbl/d of oil, with that number falling to ~23 mbbl/d currently (Figure 1).
Figure 1 – southeast Saskatchewan Bakken production
The Midale formation in southeastern Saskatchewan once produced ~64 mbbl/d of oil, with that number falling to ~43 mbbl/d currently.
Figure 2 – southeast Saskatchewan Midale production
The Frobisher formation in southeastern Saskatchewan once produced over 52 mbbl/d of oil, and while current production is ~40 mbbl/d, that is actually slightly higher than it was a decade ago, making it the only formation of the big three that has seen growth in the last ten years.
Figure 3 – southeast Saskatchewan Frobisher production
To further identify some key trends, we narrowed down our search using BOE Intel to the area drawn on the map below (Figure 4).
Figure 4 – southeast Saskatchewan area polygon used for activity report in Figure 5
Using BOE Intel‘s activity report feature, it’s easy to identify a few key trends in this area:
- Licensing and spud activity over the last few years remain consistent.
- The Frobisher is far and away the most targeted formation, with 200 licences in the last year.
- Despite disposing of some of its Saskatchewan assets, Veren had the most licences in the area over the last year with 73 licences, followed by Whitecap (49), Saturn (43), and Surge (39). It’s worth noting that since closing the disposition on June 14, Veren only has 9 new licences in the area.
- Top production by formation shows the Midale, Frobisher and Bakken as the main three producing formations.
- Top production by company shows Whitecap, Veren and Saturn as the 3 dominant producers in the area, followed by Tundra, Surge and Vermilion. (see * below)
Figure 5- Activity report for area drawn in Figure 4 – BOE Intel
*Production by company is shown on a gross licensed production basis which assumes 100% working interest for all wells licensed to a company.