Don't everybody go crazy, yet. The Bakken has been around for a long time and a lot of people are trying to figure it out from a technology standpoint. That article is a bit misleading, 200 Billion could be the oil in place number, which you will never see, far from it. It could be somebodys estimate of the recoverable reserves, but the write did not know enough to ask the right questions.

Either way, shale production is tough to make happen. Horizontal drilling is picking up in the bakken and is helping out a lot. But shales are tight, require lots of stimulation, and produce at low rates. So even if there is 200 Billion recoverable, it will take a LOOOOONG time to develop it and produce it.

As a FYI, oil reservoirs that produce from depletion drive (basically like a shrinking balloon as pressure is released) have a recovery efficiency of 10-15% MAX. Very strong water drives and effective water flooding can increase that to about 40-50%. I do not know the exact number on the Bakken but I imagine it is pretty low.

A good analogy are various tar sands, like Athabasca in Canada. There are billions of barrels but you can't get them out due to the nature of the oil. Those are worse case, you have to inject steam to make the gunk flow at all. Lots of heavy oil in California as well, requiring steam flooding.

And low quality oil does not get you $100. There are major price hits due to quality, location, transportation, etc.

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