The price of oil has been going down for a couple months so could that affect activity in North Dakota?

The price for a barrel of oil was above $100 for six months.

Monday, oil dropped below that $100 mark and today crude oil closed at $97.88 a barrel.

That's almost 50-dollars below the record high set in July.

But the lower prices aren't scaring away oil producers.

Lynn Helms is the director of the North Dakota Oil and Gas Division.

He says operators are NOT planning on slowing down their activity.

Rick Ross with Whiting Petroleum out of Denver agrees.

Whiting has five drilling rigs operating in North Dakota right now and he have no plans to leave...

(Rick Ross, Whiting Peteroleum) "The changes we've seen in price so far, I don't think they'll affect activity significantly in the area we're developing, we're well into the program, very economic. I think we'll stay at it. There's a bottom but not at that point." (Lynn Helms / Dir. ND Oil & Gas) "The Dunn and Mountrail counties which are the hot spots are still going to be commercial down to $50 Barrel and the rest of the Bakken play is commercial down to $70. So we're well above those levels. In fact companies are making plans to bring additional rigs in."

Helms says operators are talking about expanding in North Dakota.

There are 84 rigs operating today last week there were 90 and Helms say that's because the six rigs are being moved to new locations. watch the video | save this article / add to your favorites list