This month's cover story highlights the basins that will deliver the next growth spurt in U.S. coalbed-methane (CBM) production-the Powder River, Raton, Appalachian, Cherokee, Arkoma and Washakie basins. Beyond these, two basins that look particularly promising for future commercial production are the Forest City and the Green River. Forest City Basin Denver-based Evergreen Resources, which is under bid by Pioneer Natural Resources, holds a 100% working interest in more than 700,000 gross acres in and around the Forest City Basin in northeastern Kansas. It drilled 18 wells on this property last year; prior to the announcement of its impending sale, it had planned to drill 60 additional wells this year. To date, Evergreen's wells have encountered aggregate coal thicknesses of between five and 40 feet per well. Average wells are likely to produce fairly small volumes of between 70,000 to 100,000 cubic feet of gas per day. Typical reserves might be 200- to 400 million cubic feet per well and all-in costs are in the range of $175,000 to $200,000 per well. "The secret to success in a play like this is process- and cost-control," Mark Sexton, Evergreen president, said at a recent investment conference. The assets will fall to another operator's hands, as Evergreen has announced that it will sell its Kansas position prior to the company's purchase by Pioneer. Heartland Oil & Gas, based in Vancouver, also owns 240,000 acres of leases in the Forest City Basin. It has drilled a five-well pilot, which is currently dewatering, in its Engelke area in Nemaha County. This year, it plans three more five-well pilots, along with three saltwater disposal wells. The new drilling will be spaced across its acreage block. Green River Basin Another strong area of interest is southwestern Wyoming's Green River Basin. Two firms are particularly active in trying to establish and enhance CBM production there. For several years, Denver- and Chanute, Kansas-based Infinity Inc. has been working on its LaBarge Field, a prospect comprising approximately 30,000 acres including options, located near Big Piney in Sublette County. "We know the gas is there; now we are going through the learning curve to try to crack that code and get the gas out of the ground," says Stanton Ross, president and chief executive officer. "We have a good amount of coal and a good amount of gas content in those coals." Infinity has drilled 10 CBM wells and two water-disposal wells at LaBarge. Currently, it has four producing Mesaverde coal wells, which have an average of 60 to 70 feet of net coal in up to a dozen seams in each wellbore. Last year, it produced 29 million cubic feet of gas and 300 barrels of oil from its Labarge area, a volume that was uneconomic. At the close of 2003, the company struck an agreement with Schlumberger Technology Corp. to help it develop the properties. Currently, the partners are completing and recompleting existing wellbores. This year, Infinity expects to drill up to six additional wells, mainly near its Thompson pilot. It has another pilot to the west, Riley Ridge, which is in a federal unit and is undergoing an Environmental Impact Study. "Successes in other basins didn't come overnight," says Jim Dean, Infinity vice president. "We did have production here; we lost it and now we're getting it back. To us, this is an engineering challenge." Rocky Mountain Gas Inc., a subsidiary of Riverton, Wyoming-based U.S. Energy Corp., is interested in an area on the western flank of the basin. The company holds 87,000 gross acres in its Oyster Ridge project, located in the Hams Fork coal field in Uinta and Lincoln counties. It plans to drill 14 wells there this summer to depths of around 1,500 feet. "We've drilled seven wells to date, and identified two coals," says Keith Larsen, Rocky Mountain Gas chief executive officer. The Adaville coal is up to 45 feet thick in the area, and the Frontier is 15 feet thick. There is no nearby CBM production, notes Larsen, but the coal is very gassy. Indeed, back in the late 1800s, there were a series of devastating explosions in area coal mines. Other operators that have drilled CBM wells in the Green River Basin are Anadarko Petroleum, Patina Oil & Gas, ChevronTexaco and Wind River Services. McMurry Oil Co. has been the most active recently, spudding a well and permitting another in the Jonah area in Sublette County.