"We were charged with finding something that looked like the Haynesville and we ended up in Eagle Ford. Good thing we went looking," Dick Stoneburner, president and chief operating officer of Petrohawk Energy Corp., told more than 2,200 attendees during the opening remarks of the DUG Eagle Ford conference and expo in San Antonio.

Petrohawk, already holding 368,000 net acres in the east Texas and west Louisiana play, has accumulated approximately 357, 000 net Eagle Ford acres and began producing in the fourth quarter of 2008. By the end of 2009, the company had 345,000 net undeveloped acres, and 288 billion cubic feet equivalent of proved reserves. The company's Hawkville Field acreage was acquired without competition during the second and third quarters of 2008. The average cost per acre is about $400 with an 80% geologic risk.

After mapping Eagle Ford acreage in the first part of 2008, Petrohawk spud its initial test well, #1H STS 241 in July, 2008 (completed in October 2008) and that discovery produced 8.9 million cubic feet equivalent (128 barrels of 61.2° condensate and 8.16 million cubic feet of gas per day). In 2010, the company reported that #4H Caroline Pielop, also in Lasalle County, produced 8.9 million cubic feet equivalent (128 barrels of. 61.2° condensate and 8.16 million cubic feet of gas per day).

Petrohawk is focused on three fields in Eagle Ford ? Red Hawk in Zavala County, Hawkville, its primary and most productive gas acreage in Lasalle and McMullen counties, and the higher gross-oil Black Hawk that spans Karnes, DeWitt, Gonzales, and Lavaca counties. The company estimates that there is 51 trillion cubic feet of recoverable gas in its Hawkville acreage alone.

"We started with trying some of our successful slickwater frac techniques that worked so well in the Haynesville. After some testing, we found that a hybrid design using gel, larger proppant size and concentration used less water and pump time, which results in much better performance." Stoneburner also told participants that "we still need pumping horsepower in the play."

Approximately 50% of their Hawkville acreage yields condensate. Natural gas liquids account for 2-3% of total production and approximately 50% of their Hawkville acreage yields condensate, which generates twice the revenue stream of a volumetric dry gas well. For example, Stoneburner showed that #2H Dora Martin (7 million cubic feet per day initial production, 88 barrels of oil and 6.3 million cubic feet dry gas) made $30,000 per day and when compared to #1H Donnell Minerals 457 (3.4 million cubic feet per day initial production, 600 barrels of condensate, 204 barrels of liquids, and 2.9 million cubic feet of dry gas) made $67,000 per day.

The company currently has 41 Hawkville and eight Black Hawk wells completed with three rigs operating in Hawkville and five in Black Hawk. Through 2013, the company plans to have 280 Hawkville wells and 238 Black Hawk wells while reducing the number of rigs in its Haynesville acreage from 16 to seven.