Bakken Shale Montana

The Bakken Shale covers an area of approximately 200,000 square miles in the Williston Basin. The Bakken Shale covers the northeastern portion of Montana.

Bakken Shale Companies

Significant producers within the Bakken Shale are:

• BTA Oil Producers
• Burlington Resources
• ConocoPhillips
• Continental Resources
• Denbury Resources
• Encore Acquisition
• Enerplus Resources
• EOG Resources
• Exxon Mobil
• Hess Corp
• Hunt Oil
• Marathon Oil
• Murex Petroleum
• Petro-Hunt
• Slawson Exploration
• St. Mary Land & Exploration
• Whiting Petroleum
• XTO Energy
• Zenergy

Bakken Shale Geology

The Bakken shale is from the Devonian Mississippian age. The widespread Upper Devonian-Lower Mississippian Bakken formation consists of an upper and a lower shale member with a mixed siliciclastic carbonate middle member, that is usually referred to as a dolomitic sand (or a sandy dolomite). Both the upper and lower shales are organic-rich marine shale of relatively consistent lithology. These shales are both the petroleum source rocks (organic rich) and seal for the reservoir. The Bakken has also sourced the Three Forks Sanish formation, an underlying dolomite, in much of the Williston Basin. In 2008, the USGS estimated technically recoverable reserves from the Bakken could reach as high as 4.3 billion barrels of oil.

Bakken Shale Location

The Bakken Shale is located in the following Montana counties:

• Daniels County MT
• Dawson County MT
• Fallon County MT
• Garfield County MT
• McCone County MT
• Prairie County MT
• Richland County MT
• Roosevelt County MT
• Sheridan County MT
• Valley County MT
• Wibaux County MT

Additional Reading

• Oil & Gas 101 – General information for mineral rights owners.
• Bakken Shale North Dakota - Short article describing geology, location & counties within the Bakken Shale of North Dakota. Written for oil and gas mineral rights and royalty owners in ND.