CNX Drilled 14 & Delayed 11 Wells in 1Q; Rev. Down 39%; Prod. Up 3%
Last week, CNX Resources issued its first quarter 2024 update. The company’s earnings totaled a paltry $6.8 million, or just $0.04 per share in 1Q24. That compares with $710 million, or $4.22 per share, in last year’s first quarter (down 99%). CNX’s revenue for 1Q24 fell 39% to $384.6 million from $1.28 billion last year. Production was 140.4 Bcfe (billion cubic feet equivalent) in 1Q24 — which works out to 1.54 Bcfe/d — up from 135.9 Bcfe last year (up 3%). The company announced it had delayed completion activities on three Marcellus Shale pads consisting of 11 wells “due to the challenging near term gas market conditions.” By delaying, the company will produce roughly 30 Bcfe less this year for a new target of 540 to 560 Bcfe.
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Antero Resources, which is 100% focused on the Marcellus/Utica with over 500,000 net acres under lease (and the largest M-U driller in West Virginia), issued its first quarter 2024 update last week. The company reports net production averaged 3.4 billion cubic feet equivalent per day (Bcfe/d) during 1Q24, an increase of 5% year-over-year. Of the company’s 2024 production, liquids (NGLs) averaged 202 thousand barrels per day (MBbl/d), an increase of 8% from 1Q23. Natural gas production averaged 2.2 Bcf/d, up 4% from 1Q23. The company made $36 million in 1Q24 versus a profit of $213 million in 1Q23 — down a big 83% year over year.
The Bidenistas at the EPA attacked coal and gas-fired power plants last week, threatening to destabilize the existing electric power grid (see 
In addition to opposition from the editors of the Wall Street Journal to the Biden EPA plan to ration electricity by prohibiting existing coal and any new gas-fired power plants (see today’s companion story), prominent Republican legislators in Pennsylvania issued statements challenging the new regulations. The Pennsylvania Senate President Pro Tempore, Senate Majority Leader, Senate Appropriations Committee Chair, and Chairman of the Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee all issued statements describing how the EPA regs will kill gas-fired power in the Keystone State.
Last week, the Baker Hughes U.S. rig count lost six rigs, down to 613, the lowest the count has been since February of 2022. Since last October, the national count had gone as low as 616 and as high as 629, and that was it. No higher and no lower. That is, until last week when we crashed through the floor and went lower, down to 613. The Marcellus/Utica lost one rig last week and now runs 40 rigs. Pennsylvania lost one rig and now runs 21 rigs; Ohio (which lost one rig two weeks ago) remained static with 11 active rigs; and West Virginia remained the same with 8 rigs.
According to a Bloomberg article, Venture Global LNG Inc. expects to begin production at its second liquefied natural gas export facility in Louisiana in mid-2024. The new facility is called Plaquemines LNG, located in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, approximately 20 miles south of New Orleans. Venture Global has asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) for permission to import up to three LNG cargoes to test the facility before it’s ready to go. But then, will Venture Global claim it’s not ready for another 2+ years as they have with its first facility, the Calcasieu Pass LNG export facility in Cameron Parish, Louisiana?
OTHER U.S. REGIONS: Biden’s new EPA rules put NH power grid in jeopardy; NATIONAL: Prison sentence for climate activist who targeted National Gallery of Art; U.S. natgas-fired electricity generation increased in 2022 and 2023; The EV meltdown in 10 charts; INTERNATIONAL: Is Western energy policy causing economic self-harm?