Pennsylvania – update through September 2021

These interactive presentations contain the latest gas (and a little oil) production data, from all 10,292 horizontal wells in Pennsylvania that started producing from 2010 onward, through September.

Total production

Natural gas production in Pennsylvania came in at 20.4 Bcf/d in September (Hz. wells only), slightly below where it started this year (20.7), but 1.8 Bcf/d higher than 12 months earlier.

Supply Projection

Since our previous update one month ago, 2 additional rigs have moved to this state. With 19 rigs drilling horizontal wells, we project a small positive growth rate in natural gas output at current conditions:

This image was taken from our Supply Projection dashboard.

Permit Activity

After many years of declining permitting activity, the number of approved permits has stabilized since the beginning of last year:

In the 3rd quarter this year, permits for 153 new horizontal wells were approved.

Coterra Energy (formerly known as Cabot), and EQT are in the lead with the most approved permits so far this year (69 & 61 respectively).

Well productivity

Well performance has increased materially over the years, and last year again a big improvement was visible:

The 481 horizontal wells that came online last year (shown in light blue) are on track to recover 4 Bcf of natural gas in the first year on production, on average. In comparison, it took the wells that began production in 2013 5 years to reach that level. Note that the performance of the wells completed this year are following a similar trajectory as the ones from last year.

Top operators

In the final tab (“Top operators”), the output and well locations of the top 10 natural gas producers in Pennsylvania are displayed.

Finally

Our next post will be on the Haynesville.

Production data is subject to revisions.

Sources

For this presentation, I used data gathered from the following sources:

• Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection
• FracFocus.org

Brief manual

The above presentations have many interactive features:

• You can click through the blocks on the top to see the slides.
• Each slide has filters that can be set, e.g. to select individual or groups of operators. You can first click “all” to deselect all items.
• You have to click the “apply” button at the bottom to enforce the changes. After that, click anywhere on the presentation.
• Tooltips are shown by just hovering the mouse over parts of the presentation.
• You can move the map around, and zoom in/out.
• By clicking on the legend you can highlight selected items.
• Note that filters have to be set for each tab separately.
• The operator who currently owns the well is designated by “operator (current)”. The operator who operated a well in a past month is designated by “operator (actual)”. This distinction is useful when the ownership of a well changed over time.
• If you have any questions on how to use the interactivity, or how to analyze specific questions, please don’t hesitate to ask.

Enno Peters

Enno Peters is General Manager at Novi, where he has build an AI-driven data & analytics platform tailored for oil & gas operators and energy investors. Prior to Novi, Enno founded ShaleProfile which was acquired by Novi late 2021.