Does this unit make sense?

Hi,

I have a question concerning how a unit is formed. There is a well head within about 300' of my property line. I am told that the well bore runs due south. However, the well head in the map is almost in the north-eastern corner of the unit. I understand that the well would be the northern edge of the pooled unit... but I thought the well would be pretty well in the center of the northern edge of the unit. From my reading, I thought the unit spread out so many feet on both sides of the unit. What am I missing? I'm attaching the map they gave me. The well head is the blue dot. My property is the 2 parcels due east of the unit. The south western corner of the one parcel is all they are saying is included in the unit.

Thanks for any info anyone can provide!

Windell

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Permalink Reply by James Foster on April 1, 2014 at 3:55pm

What state are you in? While the wellhead is typically in the middle and the lateral legs go out like tines on a fork! I see no reason why the well head could not be over the first tine instead of the middle. If there is a house, lake, existing well or something at the logical site for well head they may have had to improvise. Or that lease was no drilling.

Permalink Reply by David Cain on April 1, 2014 at 4:12pm

Goffwind,

I believe the J. Anderson well in Guernsey county, OH is layed out like you have described.  There are a total of 5 legs from the one pad.  1 leg starts SW of the well bore, while 3 legs are on the NE side of the well bore.  I would think that this could be due to the lay of the land, proximity of roads, or other factors.  It seems like they like to put these pads on higher ground also.

Good Luck,

Dave

Permalink Reply by Jon on April 1, 2014 at 5:58pm

How many acres is it?

Permalink Reply by Philip Brutz on April 2, 2014 at 6:17am

Here is the plat map for one of the five legs of the J.Anderson that David is referring to.

http://www.dnr.state.oh.us/mineral/oil/MRMImages/17/1/232646.pdf

Permalink Reply by Carl Krebsbach on April 2, 2014 at 1:06am

I've been seeing all sorts of funny arrangements while looking at the plans submitted to the ODNR, including units with well heads on different pads.

The unit itself seems to consist of (relatively) parallel laterals that are drawing gas/oil in from a certain distance out (think of pipe insulation on a pipe).  They try to space the laterals just far enough apart to maximize the amount of gas/oil pulled out without leaving any.  The well heads themselves can be where they need to be for the geography on the surface, within the limits of connecting the lateral with the well head, with the easiest being a vertical shaft, a radius transition, and the lateral, all being in the same vertical plane, but usually they don't quite get that straightforward of a layout.

Are all the well heads on the same pad in your case?  Is there some geographical reason on the surface that the well head could not be where you expect it to be?

Permalink Reply by Kathleen on April 2, 2014 at 3:42am
Hi,

I'm going to take a stab at this but I wish there was a scale to use.
I do want to ask where did this come from? Just curious.
I think you are seeing the whole unit, not just the well bore leg, but due to the lack of a scale its hard to be sure.
So, if this is THE FULL unit you are seeing which is a block of area for the full unit more wells can be added. If that's true, then you see how they would go left and add more well legs into this full unit. The unit would not change size by adding those new legs in time, since the full pooled unit has already been configured.
An idea of the size of this area would be helpful.
If the size of this area is over 200 acres, I'm pretty sure this is a full unit drawing with plenty of room to add more legs.
If you are within 300' and in Ohio, another 200' should be added of your minerals since ohio follows a 500' set back.
Your corner maybe included adding in that 500' since the well head is 500' from you, and that's as far as they need to go.
I would be pretty confident the driller is going by state laws, but you need to see this in scale to make sure.
You would need another full pooled unit catching the rest of your land East of this unit to be made, if this is a full pooled unit.
Permalink Reply by goffwind on April 2, 2014 at 6:00am
This is north of Wheeling, WV. The well pooled unit is about 250 acres if I remember correctly. The corner of my place it it taking is 1.94 acres of the 16 acre tract seen in the map. The guy from Chesapeake said that the state of WV is who decides the pooled units. He said the well bore goes due south on the map. There is only 1 well at this time and another planned sometime in the future according to Chesapeake. The well is on top of a hill. A lot may be my lack of understanding how the laterals are drilled. The map just looked very odd to me.
Thanks for all of the replies! !!
Permalink Reply by James Foster on April 2, 2014 at 10:32am

Our unit is 640 acres with the well head in the middle of the north end.  There is a second 640 acre unit that is directly north of the well head.  This could have been a 1280 acre unit except there our several landowners in these two units that have 640 acre max unit in there lease.  They have drilled two wells one north and one south which will now hold all these acres by production.  Had the landowners not limited the size of the unit this 1280 acres could have been held by only one well.

Also of interest and I believe there is a post somewhere on here regarding this, at least one company if not more than one has gotten permission from ODNR in Ohio to put some of these laterals closer together to see if they indeed are getting maximum product at 500 feet or does putting them closer together produce more.  Technically this violates the set back rules in Ohio for a drilling unit.  But in the larger production unit all the land is leased so it is not really an issue.   I think the outer edges of these units must still be 500 feet from horizontal leg but inside this larger unit they are doing some experimenting with distances so at some point they may put 4-5 legs in a 640 acre unit instead of the three that is now typical.

Permalink Reply by Sam Moore on April 3, 2014 at 10:22am

The well unit next to me is a strange set up.  800 acre unit 6 wells.  all the well heads are 300 to 400 feet from my property line but I am not in the unit.  As I understand it the 500 foot set back is from where the horizontal lateral starts and not the vertical hole.

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