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66 | Frac Sand Insider May 2015 www.rockproducts.com Domestic Frac Sand the frac sand consumed among all of the major plays listed in Table 2 and shown in Figure 2. Frac sand comprised about 95 percent of the proppant consumed in the play owing to the relatively shallow depths of the reservoirs and local sources of comparatively low- cost sand. In respect to proppant use, the horizontal wells developed in the Bakken Formation hosted in the Williston Basin of Montana and North Dakota are an exception with the lowest percentage of sand used relative to other proppants among the current oil and gas plays in the United States. Figure 7 illustrates the Bakken For- mation in the Williston Basin in Western North Dakota and Eastern Montana and the general trend for the use of proppant related to depth. The Bakken Formation has been estimated by the to contain a mean resource of 3.65 billion barrels of undiscovered recoverable oil and trillions of cubic feet of natural gas and is producing about 1 million barrels of oil per day (EIA, 2014; U.S. Geological Survey, 2013). It is anticipated by some analysts that the portion of the Formation located in North Dakota will produce about 1.6 million barrels of oil per day, plus natural gas in 2017 (Reuters, 2013). In mid-September, 2014, there were approximately 197 active drilling rigs in the Bakken-Three Forks Basin (189 of these in North Dako- ta) of which 178 rigs were drilling horizontal wells (Bakken Shale, 2014). About 69 percent, by weight, of the proppant used in the Basin was frac sand, 24 percent was ceramic, and 7 percent was RCS (PacWest, 2014b). The high heat and pressure associated with wells developed in the deepest part of the Williston Basin limits the use of frac sand to well depths of about 2,500 meters (m). In order to maximize production and longevity, the use of mixtures of proppants in differing proportions of sand, RCS, and ceramic proppant predominate at well depths deeper than 2,500 m. Most of the deepest wells in the Basin use a mix of RCS and ceramic proppant, which exhibit superior performance under higher pres- sure-temperature conditions than most sand, but at a higher cost per unit (PacWest, 2014b). In 2008, most horizontal drilling in the Bakken Formation con- centrated on the eastern margins of the Williston Basin, reaching depths of about 2,100 m. By 2013, some wells were exceeding 3,000 m and the horizontal portion of these also increased sub- stantially from about 1,500 m, with 10 stages, to about 3,000 m, with 32 stages. A stage is an interval within the wellbore in which Major producing and active ex- ploration and development plays for unconventional oil and gas State(s) or region with activity Million tons of frac sand consumed (rounded to two signifcant fgures) 1 Percentage share of total frac sand consumed among selected basins 1 Estimated share of frac sand to total proppants consumed in play (percent) 1 Eagle Ford-Woodbine (East Tex- as Basin) Texas 9.5 30 95 Appalachia (includes Marcellus and Utica shales) Northeastern U.S. 6.8 22 100 Permian New Mexico, Texas 5.3 17 90 Bakken Montana, North Dakota 2.2 7.0 69 Anadarko Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas 2.1 6.6 91 Denver-Julesburg Colorado, Kan- sas and Nebraska; Wyoming; and South Dakota 1.3 4.2 98 Haynesville-Brown Dense Arkansas, Texas 1.3 4.1 93 Barnett Texas 0.90 2.9 99 Fayetteville Arkansas 0.45 1.5 100 Uinta Utah 0.32 1.0 89 Piceance Colorado 0.26 0.84 96 Other Various 0.83 2.7 91 Total -- 31 99.8 2 Table 2. Major unconventional oil and plays in the United States and estimated metric tons of frac sand consumption. 1 based on data for the last three quarters of 2013 and 1st quarter of 2014. 2 All estimates are subject to revision. Data from PacWest (2014b).