From better efficiency to emerging markets, DUG Eagle Ford was full of insights about the venerable play. Here’s a look at the top four things attendees learned in San Antonio.
1. Substantial technical progress continues to be made in the Eagle Ford. The Permian may be generating all of the headlines nowadays, but operators in the Eagle Ford are very quietly reducing both costs and cycle time and improving recoveries. Operators are drilling longer laterals more quickly or doing the work of six rigs previously, only at lower costs.
2. There’s good news and bad news for Eagle Ford fracks. The good news is that there are far better recoveries than the industry really understands. The bad news is there hasn’t really been recovery from as big a radius as thought, and a significant part of the energy being pumped downhole is wasted by the highly layered nature of the Eagle Ford. As operators begin to understand that phenomenon, they will learn about better placement of laterals and stages and be able to get more goodie out of the play.
3. It’s time to start thinking about North America—U.S., Canada and Mexico—as one potentially integrated energy province with substantial opportunity for natural gas demand and newly opened energy markets. Now that demand may be even greater than the 7 Bcf to 9 Bcf, a day that most had previously assumed, there is enormous potential in Mexico. U.S. and international companies have been doing business south of the border for more than four decades and that opportunity is only expanding.
4. $60 oil and $3 gas will keep Eagle Ford production flat as opposed to rolling over, and wet gas in particular offers some very near-term possibilities as the gas market looks at potential rebalancing this winter. There are 10 Bbbl of technically recoverable oil at current pricing through 93,000 potential wells with less than 20% of that recovered to date, meaning a lot of potential remains in the Eagle Ford.
Richard Mason can be reached at rmason@hartenergy.com.
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