My family is from Crosby, ND. Right near Williston, which is boom-town for Bakken play right now. It's unbelievable up there right now. My little family town of Crosby which has a couple gas stations, grocery store, and a hardware store, now has tons of gas stations, convenience stores, restaurants, new bars, and for the first time in a long time a new hotel and new apartments (there's never been apartments). My family sold my Grandmas old perm-trailer home she lived in for $250,000. Before the Bakken, valued at a modest $30-40k.

In Williston, Wal-Mart is paying $21+ an hour. Same with Denny's and Mcdonalds. Because anyone who was making minimum wage, was a fool to not take a job of some kind in the oil pay that was offering $25/hour starting, hell people just driving oil trucks (since there is no pipeline yet) are making $80k/year. Not to mention anyone who had land mineral rights probably got 2-4 wells on their property, and they are all making money from doing nothing, my family included. There's also worker camps, everywhere. All the little small towns have huge plots of land next to them with mobile homes, RVs, and campers all set up. Sometimes numbering in the hundreds or thousands. Experienced oil types who follow the booms around, lots of people from Texas and Colorado everywhere for example.

But even despite this windfall of money, jobs, and oil, the people up there know it's a boom. They've been through a couple booms before, and they've all seen it before. No one is spending their money even if they are hitting it rich. One guy had a record setting well on his property and he's now making $1.2mil a year in royalties, all he said was "I'm gonna buy my wife a new truck", and that's all he's done with it.

There's always been oil in that area, but it was shallower reserves, and after they were exhausted, the towns dwindled. Then again in the 70s they saw another boom and bust, same results. The Bakken is big, but not that big. But there are other formations under it as well. It's known as "The Three Forks Group" now, and it's not JUST the Bakken. So like MK said, the Bakken isn't as big as it was once thought, but combined with the other formations they are estimating between 7-10 Billion Barrels out of these formations (And that's just the Three Forks Group, I linked some others as well). Most properties in the area, as a result, get multiple wells right next to each other, anywhere from 2-3. One in the Bakken, and then another 1 or 2 in one of the other formations which lie below the Bakken. So if you look at just Bakken numbers, you aren't getting the bigger picture.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Forks_Group

And then there's group, which oil amounts remain to be seen.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saskatchewan_Group

But I completely agree, regardless of whether it's 2 or 20 billion barrels, it will run out. Also, that kind of extraction relies on certain oil prices, so if demand takes a big hit and we see a drop in barrel prices, it won't be a matter of running out, it will be a matter of drilling stopping and the wells getting shut off and the owners putting up a "GO HOME" sign. I believe the break even price is somewhere between $80/$90 a barrel... and right now we're at about mid $90s a barrel. A country like Saudi Arabia could up production intentionally undermining our oil plays.

Nobody is going to stay in ND for the weather.

The worker camps will disappear, a few stores will close, like always, but North Dakotans will march on. Most of the people are there because they love their state, they love the countryside, and they love working the land. My family would never leave, they've lived there their whole lives and will be buried there, oil is just an added bonus for the locals there. They won't shed any tears when all the out-of-staters leave, they'll just be a little richer, and go back to the times when there were no strangers in town and you know everyone's name at the bar. :)

But don't get me wrong... I wouldn't want to live there. But North Dakota is a very special place to me, and I do love visiting.