Shaun Polczer, WILLISTON, NORTH DAKOTA: It's a cold night in Williston, North Dakota. The wind whips snow through the air, diffusing the harsh light from gas flares, giving the deepening dusk an ethereal glow. In every direction, dots of orange flicker on the horizon and blue-tinged columns of light from drilling-rigs' flood lamps pierce the night sky. The Bakken Shale – the largest onshore oilfield in the US Lower-48 states – is in the eye of a growing storm.
The town of Williston lies at the centre of hundreds of thousands of square kilometres of oil-prone shales, a crossroads leading into neighbouring Montana and north into the Canadian province of Saskatchewan, where unconventional drilling has unlocked an almost immeasurable treasure of light crude oil. The US Geological Survey (USGS) is reviewing its previous estimate of 4.3 billion barrels of recoverable reserves in the Bakken. Some believe this desolate patch of North...