Rice Energy 1Q16: Prod. Up 53%; Drilled 19 New Wells; Lost $21M
Rice Energy, one of the newest and brightest drillers in the Marcellus/Utica, released their first quarter 2016 update yesterday. The company reports production averaged 675 million cubic feet equivalent per day (Mmcfe/d) during 1Q16, a 53% increase over 1Q15 (and up 8% from 4Q15). On the financial side the company lost $21 million during 1Q16, versus making $152,000 in 1Q15. Pretty mild compared to most. During 1Q16 Rice drilled 11 new Marcellus wells and 8 new Utica wells. Good to see someone is still drilling! Here’s the update, along with a great PowerPoint slide deck…
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Eclipse Resources released their first quarter 2016 update yesterday. Although Eclipse, a Marcellus/Utica pure play driller headquartered in State College, PA (but drilling mostly in Ohio), has curtailed or shut-in some of it’s production given low prices for gas, they still posted an impressive 26% increase in production in 1Q16 over 1Q15. While we’ve heard of Prince and his “Purple Rain,” we hadn’t heard of Eclipse’s “Purple Hayes”–which is a Utica well with an underground lateral reaching out 18,500 feet–3.5 miles! During 1Q16 Eclipse drilled their Purple Hayes well in under 18 days. Amazing! Even more amazing–the well was completed with 124 frac stages. It is believed to be the longest onshore later well ever drilled. Kudos to Eclipse! On the downside, the company lost $41 million in 1Q16…
The “best of the rest” – stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading. In today’s lineup: The well runs dry for the little guy; BLM finds “no significant impact” in WNF from o&g leasing; Vallourec posts big loss; Hilcorp pad still shut down for earthquake investigation; Baker Hughes evolving; future of U.S. shale is…Mexico?; how is natgas stored?; Trump to keynote Bakken event; and more!
Something noteworthy has happened in western Pennsylvania and (so far) local media has chosen not to cover it. So MDN is happy to break the following story about South Fayette Township in Allegheny County (near Pittsburgh). South Fayette is one of seven PA towns that sued the state after the Act 13 law was enacted in 2012 (see 
Yesterday MDN brought you the news that EQT has cut a deal to buy all of Norwegian Statoil’s operated Marcellus assets in West Virginia for $407 million (see 
EXCO Resources, once a sizable player in the Marcellus–with 145,000 net acres in the Marcellus and having drilled and operating 124 horizontal Marcellus wells–has pretty much abandoned the Marcellus at this point (see 
TransCanada Corporation is Canada’s largest midstream (i.e. pipelines and storage) company. TransCanada is the company that wanted to build out the Keystone XL oil pipeline into the United States, but the Obamadroids squashed it (it would flow nasty, icky oil through it). TransCanada is also making a major play to move into the Marcellus/Utica region by buying out/merging in Columbia Pipeline (see 
In March MDN brought you the news that Primus Green Energy, a gas-to-liquids (GTL) technology company announced they would build a 160 metric tons per day (MT/day) methanol plant using the company’s proprietary technology at “a manufacturing site in the Marcellus shale region” in 2017 (see 
Everybody knows, anecdotally, that the shale revolution has been great for U.S. manufacturers. Empty plants have roared back to life and new plants have been built, bringing back millions of jobs, due to the huge quantities of natural gas being extracted from shale in the U.S. Now we have a research study to prove what we already knew anecdotally. Yesterday the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) released a new research report from IHS titled “Energizing Manufacturing: Natural Gas and Economic Growth” (full copy below). The research finds that shale gas has put an extra $1,337 back in the pockets of the average hard-working American family. Wow! Shale gas has also contributed to the creation of 1.9 million jobs throughout the economy. Double wow! Just building natural gas transmission lines has meant more than 347,000 jobs with 60,000 of those jobs in manufacturing. Here’s the best part: All of it is without a government program or taxpayer expense. Read on for more good news about how the shale revolution and the miracle of fracking has benefited every single American…
It seems that anarchy is all the rage these days. In vogue. Popular. At least among the non-thinking radical left. Witness Crazy Bernie Sanders and his mind-numbed robot followers. Also witness the radical environmental movement, which whips up emotions among the enviro faithful like a Pentecostal preacher from the back hills. Many of these environmental Nazis are young and haven’t grown a brain yet. But there’s a fair number who are old hippies, burned out from drug use in the 60s and 70s. A group of these dangerous fanatics have begun what they call 12 days of “breaking free” from fossil fuels–a campaign to force law-abiding companies to abandon certain pipeline and drilling projects. The radicals are calling it “peaceful” and “civil disobedience.” However, going by previous such protests, we expect there will be violence associated with this movement–far from the peaceful veneer they hope to project. A number of the most radical, law-breaking groups are behind the effort: 350.org, Greenpeace, Climate Action Network and others. Here’s some of the lawbreaking they have planned for 12 days beginning yesterday…
EQT, a major Marcellus (and Utica) driller based in Pittsburgh, announced yesterday it has cut a deal to purchase all of Norwegian Statoil’s Marcellus assets in West Virginia. The deal will give EQT another 62,500 net acres and 50 million cubic feet per day (50 Mcf/d) of natgas production for $407 million. The acreage is located in Wetzel, Tyler and Harrison counties in WV. The deal includes 31 Marcellus wells and ~500 drilling locations. It bumps up EQT’s available drilling locations by a big 29% and shows the company’s continued commitment to the mighty Marcellus Shale. How will they finance it? EQT released another announcement yesterday that says they are floating 10.5 million shares of new stock, hoping to get $67 per share for a total of $700 million for this deal and for “other potential acquisitions and for general corporate purposes.” Statoil is retaining ownership of its shale assets in Ohio and (for now) it’s non-operated Marcellus assets–i.e. joint venture deals where Statoil owns a portion of the lease but doesn’t do the drilling…