Report: Drilling results poor in northern county
"We won't drill any more wells near the s--- (poor) ones we drilled already, that's one major initiative," Halcon Chairman and CEO Floyd C. Wilson said during a quarterly conference call for investors and media Tuesday morning.
Hinting at low success rates in northern Trumbull County where the company holds mineral rights on hundreds of acres, Wilson said the company has decided instead to shift its focus to southern Trumbull County and northern Mahoning County.
Halcon Resources is operating the successful production well known as the Kibler along Brunstetter Road in Lordstown. The company has in recent days initiated drilling on a second Kibler well and holds permits for three other Kibler wells, including a permit for the fifth leg issued just Friday by the Ohio Department of Natural Resources.
Wilson said the company has secured "lots of room" for drilling in southern Trumbull County and northern Mahoning County, where it will concentrate drilling for the next several quarters.
The company said it expects to operate one rig at a time in the Utica Shale throughout 2014.
He said the company would be "more cautious than we were," in its Utica drilling plans. "We have had a lot of drilling results on these wildcat wells, and our focus will be on the southern end of the play at this time," Wilson said.
"I think that's our main initiative to consolidate our position in the southern end and drill a bunch of wells down there and let the mid-stream business get back on track after the fire in the processing plant."
He was referring to a September gas processing plant fire in Natrium, in West Virginia's northern panhandle. As a result of the fire, products from the first Kibler well headed for the Blue Racer Midstream pipeline heading to the Gulf Coast area instead are being rerouted.
The first Kibler well is producing an average of 358 barrels of condensate per day and 1.6 million cubic feet of gas per day into sales over the first 30 days, which is in line with expectations, company officials said in their quarterly operations report.
Wilson said plans to develop infrastructure pipelines in the northern end of the Utica Shale, which could include portions of northern Trumbull County and nearby areas of western Pennsylvania, are being delayed because of the need to cross wide expanses of "inhospitable surface" including areas like wetlands.
In southern Trumbull County and northern Mahoning County, some infrastructure already in place and rights of way already established for egress will make investment there more likely.
"Infrastructure spend is going to be less in those areas than it would have been in the northern wild cat areas," Wilson said.
Halcon's total revenue for third quarter ended Sept. 30 was reported at $305 million for the company that operates in several shale plays across the country. That's a revenue increase of 316 percent over third quarter last year.
Net production for the period increased 237 percent year-over-year to an average of 37,707 barrels of oil equivalent per day. Third quarter 2013 production was comprised of 83 percent oil, 6 percent natural gas liquids and 11 percent natural gas.
The company reported net income for the quarter of $18.1 million compared to a net loss of $0.9 million in the comparable quarter of 2012.
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Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by 0i7okn54zwbdo on
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Disappointing but ultimately not surprising. Still, good news about the southern portion of Trumbull and northern Mahoning.
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Permalink Reply by Bob Rock on -
Where are halcon's north wells drilled at? Crawford county by pymatuming lake or do they have some north of that?
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Permalink Reply by Trapper on
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What does he consider a s_ _ _ well? Are they just not wet enough or is the dry gas production even piddly? Thus far I have been under the impression that the Utica kicks butt with a higher volume of dry gas than the Marcellus. Is this an accurate evaluation?
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Permalink Reply by Mark McGrail on
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Trapper,
Low liquid content of production.
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Permalink Reply by David Perotto on
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Trapper,
Based upon most results, the higher gas production appears to be present when the Utica is at a deeper burial depth. An example is the Gulfport, Belmont County experience. In that area the Utica is at least 8,000 feet deep. In northern Ohio, the burial depth is 4,000-6,000 feet.
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Permalink Reply by Mark McGrail on
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Based on the figures in the article (1.6 cubic feet of gas and 358 barrels of condensate) doesn't that mean the well is producing about $900,000.00 per month ?
The company must like what they have found, I believe they just permitted the fifth lateral at the site.
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No, the Kibler site is fantastic and they are happy with the results. It sounds like everything north of that (which in Trumbull is Brugler and Avalon which is WOPL) isn't great.
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Permalink Reply by Jason Grecco on
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This could be a front to justify low leasing $. Lets see if there is a rush leasing at $250-$1000 an acre by newly created leasing companies.
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Stock plummeted 10%. I doubt that such a loss is justified by being coy about well results. It's more likely that their position is just not as strong as they once bragged that it was.
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Who knows. It'll take more than two data points to really have a concept of well performance but Halcon is a victim of the knee-jerk reactions of investors, so all bets are off.
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Permalink Reply by Joseph-Ohio on
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All part of "The Great Utica Landowner Beatdown" (IMHO).
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Permalink Reply by Craig Stull on
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Joseph,
I will not argue with you, L.O.L. !! Halcon drilled one well centrally (north to south) located in the county and not far from the P.A. border and they want to down play the whole northern portion of the county.
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