Hess Corporation (HES) held an earnings conference call on January 25, 2012, in connection with the company’s fourth quarter of 2011 and full year earnings releases. The company discussed its operations in the Utica Shale in 2011 and plans for 2012.
“Regarding the Utica Shale, our appraisal drilling program will be designed to delineate the oil-, liquids- and gas-rich areas on both our 100%-owned acreage and that owned by our 50-50 joint venture with CONSOL Energy.”
“On our 100%-owned acreage, we plan to acquire 200 square miles of seismic and drill approximately 7 wells. The joint venture will also acquire approximately 200 square miles of seismic and plans to drill 22 wells. We will also continue to pursue and delineate unconventional opportunities globally.”
“Regarding the Marquette well, we recently completed that well in December that was drilled by Marquette prior to the acquisition. The well was drilled in a dry gas location, we knew that. But it was ready to complete, so we went ahead and completed it. And while we're still testing the well, we can report that the initial rate from the well was 11 million cubic feet per day on a 24/64 choke. So that's a very good result. We're very pleased with that result. It's very encouraging, but, obviously, there's a lot more appraisal drilling necessary to delineate our acreage position and, in particular, figure out where the oil condensate and dry gas windows are.”
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