USGS Estimates/Production Stats

The Bakken/Three Forks Shale play climbed to the top of the charts in the 2000s to become the hottest oil play in the US and Canada.

The formation extends through North Dakota and eastern Montana in the US into Saskatchewan and southwestern Manitoba in Canada. It even stirred exploration in northwestern Montana and the Horn River Basin of northeastern British Columbia.

Technically, it is not a shale play. The Upper Bakken and Lower Bakken zones feed oil and gas to the Middle Bakken, down into ...