3-Mile Horizontal Wells Drilled in North Dakota’s Bakken

While oil and gas exploration companies are drilling 2-mile laterals in Oklahoma, Exxon Mobil Corporation is drilling 3-mile laterals in the Bakken.

The company recently finished four wells in North Dakota that extend 3 miles. Bloomberg News reports that Paul Cheng, an analyst for Barclays Plc met with Exxon executives who told him they are closing in on the 4-mile mark.

Exxon has been drilling 2 and a half mile long laterals in the Permian Basin in Texas and New Mexico.

Deep and long drilling is nothing new for Exxon. In 2007 in the Far East of Russia, a company rig drilled a total of 7 miles down and then sideways before reaching a cluster of oil fields under the Sea of Okhotsk.