April 10, 2013

 
In This Issue
Ground broken for diesel refinery in North Dakota....
ND up 100K jobs since 2000....
GOP strips Oil Patch funds out of House bill.....
FOTB.....
Our View.....
North Dakota, A Portrait of An Oil Boom....
ND Legislature.....
Oil Bill that may Help Landowners.....
Lawmakers say 3 bills address landowners problems....
North Dakota Accomplishing What Hasn't Been Done Since 1976
Quick Links
  
  
  
  


Join Our Mailing List
Dickinson Logo
Find us on Facebook

Visit Our Sponsor
Quick Links

Ground broken for diesel refinery in North Dakota

 

 

A green field project and a cold brown field made history in Dickinson on Tuesday. 

 

For more information

 

ND up 100K jobs since 2000

 

Jobs in North Dakota have grown by almost a third since 2000, increasing by 100,000 during that period and by 33,000 in 2012 alone, the Department of Commerce announced last week.

 

For more information

GOP strips Oil Patch funds out of House bill

 

Sen. Dwight Cook said Tuesday that some funding was stripped out of a bill to help cities deal with effects of the oil boom, in part to get those cities to justify why they need the extra funding.

 

 For more information

 

FOTB: Missing rural North Dakota; Leaders of landowner group active at Capitol

 

Farmers Myron Hanson and Troy Coons miss the rural North Dakota they used to know. That's why they're volunteering their time at the state Capitol this legislative session to advocate for farmers and ranchers who are being significantly affected by the oil boom.

 

For more information

 

 

Our View:  Refinery a symbol of national progress  in Dickinson
  
On Thursday afternoon, the Dickinson Museum Center sent a photo to The Press showing a 1955 aerial view of what is now the busy area around the intersection of State Avenue and Villard Street.

 

North Dakota, a Portrait of an Oil Boom

 

North Dakota's oil boom has been called everything from the region's equivalent of a gold rush, to its version of Silicon Valley. And it's all thanks to a the Bakken formation, a 360 million year old shale tectonic plate sitting underneath much of the northwestern part of the state, which is thought to hold around 18 billion barrels of oil.

But the good times have not come without a price: The state has run up against a serious shortage of housing for the thousands who have poured in looking for work. The method of extracting the oil is controversial, too. Hydraulic Fracturing, more commonly known as fracking, is the bête noire of many environmentalists nationwide. The process sees workers inject pressurized fluid into the ground in order to release natural gas from the shale.

 

For more information

ND Legislature:  Oil taxes tops in Capitol
 
In the waning weeks of the North Dakota Legislature, conference committees are hard at work reconciling differing versions of bills that have been endorsed in the other chamber.
   
   
Oil Bill that may Help Landowners
  
The North Dakota legislature is close to finalizing a package of bills that protect landowners in oil country.

 

Lawmakers say 3 bills address landowner problems.

 

Landowners and mineral producers should be able to settle their disputes easier with three bills Republican lawmakers say will create a benchmark for other states to look to when it comes to oil and gas development.

   

For more information 

North Dakota Accomplishing What Hasn't Been Done Since 1976

  

Another first for North Dakota:  Not since 1976 has a refinery been built in the U.S.


However, in just 20 months, construction of a new refinery will be
complete.  

 

What hasn't been done in nearly 40 years is about to happen in Dickinson, North Dakota -- a new refinery will make history.  Not only hasn't it been done in decades, North Dakota was told it couldn't be done.  "I can't tell you the number of people, when you say, 'we're going to build refineries in North Dakota,' who tell me, 'it can't get done.  Nope, you're not.'  And I'm always struck, because that is never the first reaction of a North Dakotan," says U.S. Senator Heidi Heitkamp (D) North Dakota.

 

But against the odds -- in just over a year -- the new diesel refinery went from a mere idea to groundbreaking.  Upon completion in about 20 months, the

 

Dakota Prairie Refinery will process 20,000 barrels per day of Bakken

 

crude oil.  Currently, North Dakota imports over half its current diesel
fuel needs, which is more than 53,000 barrels per day.

"Nearly $300 million dollar investment allows us to use our own Bakken crude, right here in the State of North Dakota, but it also is going to produce a huge amount of diesel fuel that our farmers and our truckers are going to be able to take advantage of," says Governor Jack Dalrymple (R) North Dakota.

The refinery will employ 100 people full-time, but officials say the facility will have a much greater employment impact.  "There's four more jobs for every job at that refinery that your community really benefits from and that's the multiplier effect of a refinery," says Gaylon Baker, Executive Vice President, Stark Development Corporation.

What does North Dakota have that other resource-rich States like California lack?  "I think in California, you look at things and say, 'well that can never happen,' or 'that would be bad,' instead of saying, 'what part of this really could work?'. . .This is going to be state of the art, best-available control technologies on this plant; meaning, that it is as green as a refinery can be and it just represents what we need to more of in America," says Heitkamp.  

"It's never been so cool to be from North Dakota as it is right now," says U.S. Representative Kevin Cramer (R) North Dakota.

The Dakota Prairie Refinery in Dickinson is a joint venture between MDU Resources Group and Calumet, a refinery operator.
  
Source:  KX News