Drilling horizontals in the Marcellus Shale: Unconventional shale development is a boon for Appalachian operators

摘要

A surprisingly large group of natural gas players attended the DUG East (Developing Unconventional Gas) conference in Pittsburgh, Penn., last month to discuss Marcellus shale activities. This emerging Appalachian play is an impressive resource and companies are expanding upstream and midstream infrastructure and moving into 24-hr operations to drill and complete hundreds of new wells. Operators agreed that the Marcellus has low finding and development costs compared with other shale gas plays. Well costs are dropping as companies hone drilling parameters and progressively improve hydraulic fracture stimulation performance.