Marcellus Shale Field - Natural Gas Formation Location Marcellus Shale Formation States: New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia
Marcellus Shale Play is located in the following counties: PA: Erie,
Warren, McKean, Crawford, Mercer, Vanango, Lawrence, Forest, Clarion, Butler, Beaver, Armstrong, Elk, Clearfield, Indiana,
Cambria, Somerset, Westmoreland, Fayette, Allegheny, Washington, Greene, Bedford, Potter, Tioga, Bradford, Susquehanna, Wayne,
Pike, Lycoming, Sullivan, Wyoming View Map. Looking for a Job in the Marcellus Shale? View Here
History and Facts: The Marcellus Shale Natural Gas Field Formation,
which extends through Pennsylvania, New York, Ohio, and West Virginia, is a part of the Devonian Black Shale Field. The Marcellus Shale play is hinted to hold a huge amount of
natural gas, causing companies to go on a gigantic mineral rights land grab! This shale rock formation was named after the town of Marcellus, New York due to the outcrop formation
in the shale. The Marcellus shale extends over 575 miles and has a thickness of up to 900 feet. Also known
as the Pennsylvania Shale ( or New York Shale, West Virginia Shale, Ohio Shale ) this geologic natural gas shale
was reported to hold more then 1.9 trillion cubic feet back in 2002. This did not cause much excitement because the
amount that could actually be extracted was low. Combined with the fact that natural gas prices were very low, drilling in
the Marcellus Shale was not economical. One company, Range Resources, showed up to Marcellus Shale
back in 2003 in hopes to extract natural gas. Range drilled a well in Washington County, PA and found that this natural
gas well was very promising. Like many companies now a days, Range Resources used techniques and experience from
the Barnett Shale in Texas for the Marcellus Shale natural gas field. The first well that produced production in Marcellus
Shale for Range was hit in 2005. Range Resources ( RRC ) now has drilled over 100 natural gas wells in the Marcellus
Shale play. Range now has rougly 900,000 acres. See more about companies drilling at Marcellus Shale below.
A new survey issued by Terry Englander, a geoscience professor at Pennsylvania State University, and Gary Lash, a
geology professor at the State University of New York at Fredonia, surprised everyone as these men think the Marcellus
Natural Gas Shale Field could hold up to 500 trillion cubic feet of Natural Gas. 50 TFC would be
a realistic amount that could be recovered. All of this is made possible by more advanced technology which
includes fracturing & drilling techniques involved with horizontal drilling, thus making the Marcellus Shale Natural Gas Field
very valuable! The price of Natural Gas has risen sharply over the years and these new techniques allow companies to
drill better and faster. A horizontal well in the Pennsylvania, New York, Ohio, and West Virginian Shales back in 1970
might have taken up to 3 months to drill. Now a rough estimate is 30-45 days.
The United States produces
roughly 30 trillion cubic feet ( 30 TFC ) of natural gas every year. If research reports are correct and the Marcellus
Shale holds 50 TFC's of recoverable natural gas, this would put the Appalachian Basin Natural Gas Shale into a different
league. The Marcellus Shale Deposit would be dubbed a natural gas super giant and would be one of the biggest natural
gas fields in the United States. The Haynesville Shale is a similar Natural Gas Shale.
How is Natural Gas extracted from Marcellus Shale? Horizontal
well drillers can get natural gas from vertical fractures of the shale, through the shale pores in which natural gas is trapped,
and through absorbed minerals and grains in the shale. The problem with Horizontal Drilling is the cost. A vertical
drilled well in the Marcellus Shale Zone costs around $810,000 while a horizontal drilled well at Marcellus will
cost you roughly 3-5 Million Dollars. In the Marcellus Shale, a horizontal well is drilled using multi stage fracturing
techniques ( frac jobs ). Large amounts of water are combined with sand which is blasted at the shale in order to get
a fracture. This water is then pumped back out but in most cases is contaminated. There have been some environmental
issues with regard to the Marcellus Shale.(See Below).
Marcellus
Shale in 2009: By now you must have gotten the point, no land brokers knocking on your door, or your phone
ringing off the hook. The marcellus shale has the flu due to the current economic crisis. Scarce bank lending
combined with falling natural gas prices have companies pulling back their operations in a huge way. $3,000 per acre
leases are a thing of the past in the Marcellus Shale! Don't expect this to change until the economy comes around.
Even when this happens, most companies already have enough acres to last them for a long while. The recent drop
in natural gas prices has effected the amount of drilling in the Marcellus Shale and the other shale formations below.
As natural gas prices hover in the $5 - $6 range, companies have shut down drilling production. When you see natural
gas prices move above $8 again, the drilling in the Marcellus Shale formation will come alive once again! Don't forget to check out these other shale plays just as hot as Marcellus. Haynesville Shale -Horn River Shale - Bakken Oil Shale - Fayetteville Shale - Brazil Oil Field - Woodford Shale - Barnett Shale - Chattanooga Shale - Utica Shale
Pennsylvania Warns Gas Companies to respect Natural Treasures at Marcellus
Shale:
Pennsylvania has an estimated 2.8 trillion cubic feet of proved natural gas reserves in
the ground awaiting development, according to the Pennsylvania Oil and Gas Association. Developing the Marcellus Shale
formation requires large amounts of fresh water to fracture the shale in order to extract the natural gas. Recent inspections
by DEP and its partners have uncovered violations that threaten the state's water resources and its environment. Department
of Environmental Protection Secretary Kathleen McGinty had this to say:
"Over the past few weeks, DEP
inspectors have observed a number of violations at drilling sites operated by companies that were new to Pennsylvania,"
said McGinty. "In light of those discoveries, we acted quickly to stop this harmful activity and felt it was necessary
to bring all current and potential operators together to meet directly with the agencies responsible for protecting our water
and other natural resources." Full Article Here
Companies Involved in the Marcellus Shale - Marcellus
Shale Stocks
- Chesapeake Energy CHK - Marcellus Shale (West Virginia, Pennsylvania and New York):Chesapeake is the largest leasehold owner in the Marcellus Shale play
that spans from northern West Virginia across much of Pennsylvania into southern New York. The company expects to end 2009 as the most active driller and the largest
producer of natural gas from the play. Chesapeake is currently producing approximately 30 mmcfe net per day (45 mmcfe gross
operated) from the play and anticipates reaching approximately 100 mmcfe net per day (220 mmcfe gross operated) by year-end
2009. The company has achieved attractive drilling results in the play to date, including two recent wells that began producing
at rates above 6 and 7 mmcfe per day, respectively, and is planning to significantly increase its Marcellus drilling activity
during 2009 and 2010. Chesapeake is currently drilling with 11 operated rigs and anticipates operating an average of approximately
14 rigs in 2009 and 28 rigs in 2010 to drill approximately 85 net wells in 2009 and 160 net wells in 2010 to further develop
its 1.3 million net acres of Marcellus leasehold. During 2009 and 2010, 75% of Chesapeake’s drilling costs in the Marcellus,
or approximately $650 million, will be paid for by its joint venture partner StatoilHydro (NYSE:STO, OSE:STL). The company’s
estimated pre-tax rate of return from a targeted 3.75 bcfe Marcellus Shale well drilled for $4.0 million (excluding the benefit
of drilling carries) is approximately 38% assuming current NYMEX natural gas and oil strip prices. If you have a lot
of land in the Marcellus Shale fairway and want to sell your mineral rights, give Chesapeake a call. More on CHK
.
- XTO Energy XTO XTO Energy buys Marcellus Shale stake from Linn Energy LINE - CEO in last earnings call --If you look at kind of how we looked at Linn it was 145 Bs of reserves that we
quoted. Linn had about 200 Bs on their own reserve report. And if you just look at that, that means in general, if you believed
Linn then we paid $3 in them with almost nothing for the Marcellus,
and if you look at what we did, it's something like a thousand or so dollars an acre for the Marcellus. All of those were very low cost for entry points into one of these kind
of plays. I mean so we don't need the Marcellus
to pan out to be a fantastic thing, we think it probably will and that's why we are in this early. XTO has acreage in southwest Pennsylvania and north West
Virginia which there is alot of good well data coming out. XTO Energy now has 280,000 Marcellus Shale Acres. XTO May 2009
Update: Last but not least, Marcellus Shale.
We are running one rig. We are currently completing our first horizontal and drilling our second, we’ve almost tidied
our second and they look good, shows look very good, we are excited about them. And so, we think we’ll get our 10 to
15 horizontals drilled and if we can, we will bring a second rig into the Marcellus in the back half of the year and take it up to Northeast Pennsylvania. We are excited about
what we are seeing in the Marcellus well. No
well data at this point, but you should see something in the next quarter. More on XTO
- EOG Resources EOG - Regarding the Pennsylvania Marcellus Shale Play, in total, we have 220,000 net acres. On our previous quarterly
call we indicated we proven up about 40,000 acres in Bradford County by drilling two wells with two net Bcf of reserves each.
Additionally, we recently proved up additional acreage, we own via an NFG farmout by successfully testing the COP 409 #3H
well in Elk County which we believe is a 1.6 Bcf net well. We plan to operate one rig in Pennsylvania this year.
More on EOG
- Penn Virginia PVA PVA is testing some ideas we have in Boone County, West Virginia and We continued to add acreage in the Marcellus Shale in the third quarter of 2008, primarily in Pennsylvania, with current holdings of approximately
40,000 net acres. Initial exploratory drilling is expected during the second half of 2009. In Marcellus Shale, we still kind of have a well drilled by the end of the year we just finished up on a 50 mile
2D seismic acquisition that will hit the processing here real soon. Of course we are going to utilize that to help pick us
locations from the structural standpoint, up in the Northern part of the state of PA. So we are still on track to try to get
those couple of wells drilled before the end of the year.
- Rex Energy REXX - We increased our Marcellus Shale fairway acreage by 107% to approximately 62,000 net acres. We successfully completed at least
one vertical test well in each of our core Marcellus
operating regions with encouraging results. We recently completed and put into production our third vertical well in southwestern
Pennsylvania and are pleased to report that the well tested at a peak rate of 1.8 million cubic feet per day and an average
rate of 1.4 million cubic feet per day over a 24 hour period. Rex
Energy REXX has drilled three vertical test wells in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania. The company anticipates
drilling an additional two vertical test wells in Clearfield County, Pennsylvania during the fourth quarter of 2008, and participating
for 50% with its partner in two vertical wells in Butler County, Pennsylvania.
2009 Update: "I'm pleased to report that our 2009 Marcellus Shale horizontal drilling program is now underway. We have now completed
drilling our first horizontal Marcellus well and are rigging up on the second. We expect to fracture, stimulate and put the
first well into line during the month of June."
- Southwest Energy SWN - In the first quarter of 2009, the company purchased approximately 21,715 net acres in Lycoming County,
Pennsylvania, for approximately $8.2 million. As a result, Southwestern currently has approximately 138,600 net undeveloped
acres in Pennsylvania under which it believes the Marcellus Shale is prospective. During 2008, the company drilled its first
four wells (three vertical and one horizontal) on its acreage in Bradford and Susquehanna Counties, three of which have been
production tested. In 2009: Southwestern plans to invest approximately $80 million in various unconventional,
exploration and New Ventures projects, including the Marcellus Shale play in Pennsylvania.
- Unit Corp UNT- In the Marcellus Shale, we have now participated in two vertical wells located in Somerset County, Pennsylvania. The
Shale (inaudible) segments in these wells came in as expected and completion work on these two wells should begin mid to late
May. In addition, we'll participate in one more vertical well and two horizontal wells during the remainder of 2009 at
approximate net cost of about $8 million. Anticipated first gas wells from these wells should occur later this year.
In
this Somerset area we own approximately 180,000 gross and 55,000 net acres.
Marcellus Shale Map - Marcellus Shale Fairway
Marcellus Shale
Marcellus Shale Jobs
ExxonMobile XOM - XOM has a small position in the Marcellus Shale. Exxon has 19,400 acres in Lycoming & Tioga Counties in Pennsylvania
- Anadarko Petroleum APC - Anadarko APC holds rights to more than 650,000 gross acres in the Marcellus Shale play. In the Marcellus shale in north central Pennsylvania, our second horizontal well in the Chesapeake
joint venture was tested and is currently flowing to sales at about 7.6 million cubic feet per day. We have two other
wells began testing at the end of the first quarter and three that are awaiting completion activities. Given the success of
the Marcellus program, we're currently moving
the rig to the area to begin drilling in operated horizontal well program beginning in the second quarter. More on APC
- Range Resources RRC - During the first quarter, the Marcellus Shale division continued to make solid progress. In
2008, Range ordered six custom-designed drilling rigs for the Marcellus. The first two of the custom-designed rigs have
been delivered and are now on location and drilling. These rigs, which come equipped with crawlers, can traverse a drill
pad in a matter of hours versus days for the older rigs. Since Range is now drilling multiple laterals from a single
pad, these rigs are expected to save both time and money. Range plans to drill more than 60 horizontal wells in the Marcellus
Shale play in 2009.
Last week, Range announced that the second phase of the Marcellus infrastructure was completed. This
includes a new cryogenic gas processing facility, which added an additional 30 Mmcf per day in gas processing capability,
bringing processing capacity to a total of 60 Mmcf per day. Two additional expansions of processing capacity
are planned for southwestern Pennsylvania that would bring processing capacity to 200 Mmcf per day by late 2009 or early 2010. As
a result of the new rigs being delivered on schedule and the infrastructure proceeding as planned, Range reiterated its year-end
target exit rate of 80 – 100 Mmcfe net per day from the Marcellus Shale play.More on RRC
St Mary Land and Exploration SM - St. Mary plans to start testing activities in the Marcellus shale in the third quarter of this year.
Two horizontal wells are planned to be completed in 2009. In this play, we have the potential to earn up to 43,000
net acres. First two wells will be in McKinney County.
Talisman Energy TLM - Talisman’s Marcellus Shale play, located in New York and Pennsylvania,
is an area of focus for 2009. The Company holds 800,000 net acres of undeveloped land in this play. The majority of the land
is in New York, where the State continues to review its environmental assessment procedures and regulations for operations.
This is effectively preventing horizontal drilling activities. As a result, the focus for the time-being will be Pennsylvania
where Talisman holds 140,000 net acres of highly prospective land, including recently acquired State lands. In 2008, the Company
drilled a total of six gross (5.0 net) wells. Talisman plans to drill up to 36 gross (34.8 net) wells and possibly acquire
new lands. The 2009 drilling program includes both pilot and development wells with the development focus beginning mid-year..
Ultra Petroleum UPL - UPL is very active in the Marcellus Formation - During the first quarter, Ultra increased its position in Pennsylvania
to 321,798 gross (171,613 net) acres from 287,745 gross (152,227 net) acres at year-end 2008. With the expanded acreage position,
the company plans on drilling 21 wells during the year, an increase from the previously planned 19 wells. The company is analyzing
the 3-D seismic that was completed earlier this year. As part of the evaluation of the Marcellus, the company is currently
drilling its third horizontal well and is in the process of completing the first of two recently drilled horizontal wells.
- Equitable Resources EQT - Equitable controls more than 400,000 acres in the high pressure Marcellus
Shale Play throughout northern West Virginia and western Pennsylvania. To date, the company has drilled 13 high pressure
Marcellus wells; nine vertical and four horizontal. Results of these wells are encouraging. Two Horizontal Marcellus
Shale wells were drilled, one in Greene County and one in Doddridge County, WV. Five vertical wells were
drilled in Wetzel, Doddridge, Richie, Gilmer and Lewis County in West Virginia. The horizontal Marcellus Shale
well flowed 1.9 million cubic feet per day and cost 6 million to drill. EQT expects future Marcellus Shale wells
to only cost 3-4 million. Two of the most recent
horizontal Marcellus wells were drilled with air, a technique the company pioneered in the low pressure Lower Huron - Devonian shale drilling program. Equitable believes that the application of horizontal air drilling to the Marcellus Shale Formation
offers the potential of reducing drilling costs by as much as 25% compared to conventional drilling methods. More on EQT
- Cabot Oil & Gas COG - Cabot COG has land in the Marcellus Shale development field particularly in West Virginia &
Pennsylvania. Cabot's most recent horizontal completion, the Heitzman #1H, was completed with a four-stage frac
and flowed to sales in a 24-hour test at an initial rate of 9.0 Mmcf per day. Presently the well has been online five days,
and production has averaged 8.8 Mmcf per day during that period.
"This is our best initial rate to date and provides
us further confirmation of the prolific nature of this area for the Marcellus," said Dan O. Dinges, Chairman, President
and Chief Executive Officer. "Additionally, production from our first three reported horizontals continues to hold up
well."
The first horizontal well, the Ely 6H (came on at 6.4 Mmcf per day) and is producing 4.3 Mmcf per day after
105 days on line. The Black 1H (initial 24-hour sales rate of 8.8 Mmcf per day) had a 30-day average rate of 8.3 Mmcf per
day and is producing 8.0 Mmcf per day after 60 days on line. The Black #2H, after only a four-stage frac, flowed to sales
at an initial rate of 8.3 Mmcf per day, with a 30-day rate of 5.6 Mmcf per day and is producing 4.1 Mmcf per day after 60
days.
"Presently, these four horizontals together are producing over 25 Mmcf per day with our field producing at
our current sales capacity of approximately 34 Mmcf per day from these four horizontals and 13 vertical wells," stated
Dinges. "We continue to make progress on increasing our sales capacity with the installation of additional compression
and dehydration. Capacity should increase to approximately 50 to 55 Mmcf per day by mid-May and up to 85 to 90 Mmcf per day
by the end of June, 2009." Cabot has also successfully negotiated a second compressor site for additional capacity and
will be building this site over the summer. Plans call for first gas sales from this site in early 2010. To date, Cabot
has drilled 28 wells in Pennsylvania, eight are horizontals with laterals stretching up to 4000'. There are six rigs operating
in Pennsylvania, drilling three horizontal and three vertical wells at the present time. Three horizontal and three vertical
wells are waiting on completion, with one horizontal well currently flowing back. More on COG
- Atlas Energy Resources ATN - Atlas Energy ATN has drilled 98 Marcellus Shale
wells, of which 90 wells currently have normalized production approaching 25 million cubic feet ("Mmcf") per day
into a pipeline (8 wells are waiting on completion); As of September 30, 2008, Atlas Energy controlled approximately
555,000 Marcellus acres in Pennsylvania, New York and West Virginia, of which approximately 271,000 of these acres are located
in the Company's current focus area of southwestern Pennsylvania; ATN continues to realize average peak production
rates (24 hours into a pipeline) of approximately 1 Mmcf per day, with its best wells having initial peak rates of approximately
3.6 Mmcf per day The Company's last 13 vertical Marcellus wells have averaged initial rates of production of 1.3 Mmcf
per day, which is 30% higher than Atlas's prior average vertical Marcellus well.
- EXCO Resources XCO - XCO is drilling at Marcellus Shale - we now control approximately 361,000
net acres in the Marcellus shale fairway, with in excess of 215,000 net acres located in the core area of the overpressured
Marcellus. A significant percentage of this fairway acreage is held by production (HBP) by our shallow producing assets.
In 2008, we drilled 6 vertical and 4 horizontal wells. During the first quarter 2009 much of our technical Marcellus activity
was focused on integrating our 2008 Marcellus well results and seismic data to high grade for a 2009 and 2010 development
program and to continue delineating our remaining acreage blocks using our updated geological model. We have made substantial
progress on our permitting efforts. The remainder of 2009 will be focused on further planning and executing our drilling program
in the Marcellus. We believe our present leasehold position in the Marcellus and Huron shale fairways contains 7–12 Tcf of potential reserves.
- Carrizo Oil & Gas CRZO - CRZO In the Marcellus,
we have gone over 200,000 acres net to our JV with Avista Capital Partners and have wound down our leasing activity. We plan
to spud the first Carrizo-operated vertical Marcellus
well in the next two weeks in the Sea County area, with another well in that same area, another vertical well in April. Permitting
is progressing in West Virginia and New York also. Our budget plan is to drill ten verticals and one horizontal well in 2009
- Dominion Resources D - Dominion Resources D has many Marcellus Shale acres. Dominion still holds
between 485,000 to 685,000 acres after selling some to Antero for $3037 per acre. They are continuing to pursue other
transaction.
-
Continental Resources CLR - Continental Resources ( CLR ) now has exposure to the Marcellus Shale. We now own 88,000 net acres in the Lower Huron, Rhinestreet Marcellus plays and continue to build on our position. The bulk for this acreage is
located West Virginia, Ohio, and New York where the shales have at found debts of 1000 to 5400 feet. We're currently drilling
our first-four wells targeting Rhinestreet, then Lower Huron shales in Southeast, Ohio.
.
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Marathon Oil MRO - Marathon Oil ( MRO ) is building a position in the Marcellus Shale ( Seeking Alpha ) - Marathon
is also building a position in the Marcellus
Appalachia play with 30,000 acres in hand of a targeted 100,000 total by year end. Drilling on our acreage is expected within
six to nine months.
- CNX Gas CXG - CNX Gas is active in the Marcellus Shale, particularly in Southwest, PA. In the Marcellus Shale during the third
quarter, CNX Gas drilled its first and second horizontal wells in southwestern Pennsylvania. The first horizontal well cost
$6 million and was stimulated with a five-stage slickwater frac. An open flow test was not conducted on this well. It came
online October 2, and is producing 1.2 MMcf per day with 4,000 pounds of backpressure. The daily flow rate is expected to
increase dramatically over the next few weeks as the backpressure is gradually eased. The nearby coalbed methane gathering
system has the capacity to handle up to 2.5 MMcf per day from this horizontal well and is being expanded within the next two
weeks to handle additional volumes. The second horizontal well has been drilled and is currently awaiting fracing. Its
cost, before fracing, has been $2.8 million. It will be fraced when the drilling of a third horizontal well is completed.
The second and third wells will then be fraced concurrently. CNX
Gas will keep one horizontal rig and one vertical rig running in the Marcellus Shale for the remainder of the year.
More on CXG......
- Petroleum Development Corp PETD - The
Appalachian Basin includes our West Virginia, Pennsylvania, New York and Tennessee operations, in which we own an interest
in approximately 2,090 gross, 1,566.4 net oil and natural gas wells. Our leasehold position encompasses approximately 140,300
gross acres with approximately 19,400 net undeveloped acres remaining for development as of December 31, 2008. We drilled
63 gross/net wells in the area in 2008 and produced approximately 3.9 Bcfe net to our interests. The majority of our Appalachian
leasehold is Devonian and Mississippian aged tight sandstone reservoirs. We are currently evaluating the potential of the
Marcellus Formation in West Virginia and Pennsylvania and have drilled three tests to date in West Virginia.
- Trans Energy TENG - Trans Energy is very active in the Marcellus Shale and has announced in Jan 2009 a Marion County, WV well. TENG announced
that its Blackshere #101 well in Marion County, West Virginia was successfully fraced on December 29th and is currently
awaiting connection to a sales line. The Blackshere #101 is completed in the Marcellus shale, a prolific new “resource
play” in Appalachia, similar to the Barnett, Fayetteville and Haynesville shales which have grown to become a significant base of hydrocarbon reserves in the United States. James K. Abcouwer,
President and CEO of Trans Energy, said “This fourth Marcellus well is located in Marion County which is the county
to the east of our existing Marcellus wells and is a step out of what we consider our proven area. We are delighted
with its initial indications. We are optimistic that the positive results from our three vertical wells in Wetzel
County and now with our most recent completion in Marion County can be replicated throughout our acreage position in northern
West Virginia. We’re now beginning a horizontal well program in yet another significant step forward for Trans
Energy to properly develop its acreage position. We’re pleased to have achieved this sizeable acreage position
centered on the Wetzel-Marion-Doddridge Counties area, which looks to be one of the most – if not the most
– prolific part of the Marcellus resource in Appalachia.”
Stone Energy SGY - Appalachian Basin (Marcellus Shale Play). Stone holds a 50% working interest in three non-operated producing
wells in the Marcellus Shale play in West Virginia. Two of the wells have been on production approximately ten months and
one well was recently completed and is still unloading frac water. A fourth well was drilled and evaluated in the first quarter
2009 and is awaiting completion. A fifth well is currently drilling and an additional well is planned for the second quarter.
All of these wells are vertical wellbores. Stone has permitted a number of locations in other parts of the Marcellus Shale
Play and expects to drill three more wells in 2009 to test its existing leasehold, which is approximately 30,000 net acres.
