North Dakota’s oil production, prices outpace state budget forecasts

ND oil production, prices outpace budget forecasts

BISMARCK, N.D. — North Dakota’s budget director says the state’s oil production and prices are both well ahead of state forecasts.

Pam Sharp told the Legislature’s Budget Section committee that when lawmakers wrote the state’s two-year budget, oil production was expected to be just over 200,000 barrels a day now, with prices between $40 and $50 a barrel.

Last October’s production alone was close to 240,000 barrels a day, and prices were about $67 a barrel.

Sharp says the oil production and price numbers are causing state budget surplus projections to rise.

She says the surplus could exceed $600 million when the North Dakota Legislature meets in 2011, if oil production and prices stay at current levels.