North Dakota Sour crude oil is worth nothing

Oil is so plentiful and cheap in the US that at least one buyer says it would need to be paid to take a certain type of low-quality crude.

Flint Hills Resources, the refining arm of billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch’s industrial empire, said it would pay -$0.50 a barrel on Friday for North Dakota Sour, a high-sulfur grade of crude. That’s down from $13.50 a barrel a year ago and $47.60 in January 2014. While the negative price is due to lack of pipeline capacity for a particular variety of low quality crude, it underscores how dire things are in the US oil patch.