Re: Is the Bakken a Bust?
"Isn't that an argument that water flooding should start sooner rather than later,"
Yes. In theory, best to begin waterflood before reservoir pressure drops below bubble point and free gas begins to form in the reservoir. Many of the water floods I worked on over the years had dropped well below the bubble point on primary recovery and yet still managed to perform pretty well (good response).
"or do the added water processing costs outweigh he improvements in ultimate resource recovery? "
In conventional reservoirs, secondary recovery (water flood) can be equal to primary recovery. Water processing not a real big cost factor (compared to drilling new injectors or converting oil producers to injectors).
There isn't a whole lot of data yet on waterflooding unconventional reservoirs. Some WF pilots being done in the Bakken. Not sure what results have been. Pore throats are so tiny may be tough to push water through and get good sweep. Outside my experience. EOG have some pilots in the Eagle Ford injecting gas to improve recovery. Methane molecules are much ~8x smaller than H20 and move more easily through the smaller pores.