Haynesville Shale

Penn Virginia - Haynesville Shale Operational Update

Penn Virginia Corporation (PVA) released an operational update and discussed its operations in the Haynesville Shale. The company drilled one horizontal well in the Haynesville Shale in the fourth quarter of 2009, and is currently waiting on completion results.

Penn Virginia Corporation is currently operating three rigs in the Haynesville Shale, which it refers to as the Lower Bossier Shale. In 2010, Penn Virginia Corporation plans on drilling 7 horizontal Haynesville Shale wells.

Comstock Resources - Haynesville Shale Conference Call Comments - Part III

Comstock Resources (CRK) reported its earnings for the fourth quarter of 2009, and held a conference call on February 9, 2010 to discuss the results. The company has 73,000 acres that are prospective for the Haynesville Shale, and 46,000 net acres that are prospective for the Upper Haynesville (Bossier) Shale.

Haynesville Shale Acreage

“We currently have 86,000 gross acres and 73,000 net acres that we believe our perspective for Haynesville development. 70% of our acreage is in North Louisiana, the better part of the play. Given expected well spacing of 80 acres, and an expected per well recovery of 5 Bcfe per well, our acreage could add 3.4 Tcfe of reserve potential.”

Upper Haynesville (Bossier) Shale Acreage

“We currently have 52,000 gross acres and 46,000 net acres that we believe are perspective for upper Haynesville development. Given the same well spacing of 80 acres and expected per well recovery of 5 Bcfe per well, this acreage could have an additional 2.2 Tcfe of reserve potential.”

“We plan to drill probably around 15 or so upper Haynesville or Bossier tests (in 2010).”

Source: Seeking Alpha

Comstock Resources - Haynesville Shale Conference Call Comments - Part II

Comstock Resources (CRK) reported its earnings for the fourth quarter of 2009, and held a conference call on February 9, 2010 to discuss the results. The company has shown improved operational efficiency as it has developed its Haynesville Shale acreage, and has reduced its time to drill from 49 to 37 days. Comstock Resources also reported increased costs to drill in the Haynesville Shale due to improved pricing leverage by oil service companies due to the rebound in the rig count.

Haynesville Shale Time to Drill

“The number of days that has taken us to drill the 33 horizontal Haynesville wells on the prior slide. Our average drill time for all 33 wells drilled to date is 49 days. You will see that the average drill time for our first five wells that we drilled was 51 days, compared to an average drill time of 37 days for our last five wells.”

Haynesville Shale Finding and Development Costs

“The Haynesville Shale program delivered excellent finding cost in 2009. We spent $345 million in 2009 on acquisitions, exploration and development activities, which added 210 Bcfe to our proved reserve base resulting in finding cost of $1.64 per Mcfe. If you exclude the $26 million we spent on unevaluated leases in 2008, the finding cost improves to $1.52.”

“The Haynesville is unique among the shale plays since it is an abnormally pressured shale, and requires specialized equipment to drill and complete them. But again, we do feel we can offset some of that cost increase by the improved efficiencies although not all, we are pretty far along in improvements on our drilling side.”

“We are estimating between $7.5 million to $8 million. That is with the increased number of fracs that we are planning upon (18 stages). ”

Source: Seeking Alpha