WildHorse Resource Development Corp. (NYSE: WRD) said on Jan. 18 it has been selected for a Department of Energy (DOE) study, alongside the Texas A&M Engineering Experiment Station (TEES), to develop a new field laboratory in the Eagle Ford Formation.

The team, which has been awarded an $8 million grant from the DOE for research and development of unconventional oil and natural gas recovery, will test next-generation monitoring solutions for hydraulic fracturing and EOR.

WildHorse will contribute three wells for testing, one existing well for refracturing and two new wells during the life of the study.

Dr. Dan Hill, director of TEES’ Crisman Institute for Petroleum Research and professor in the Harold Vance Department of Petroleum Engineering at Texas A&M University, is the principal investigator for the project. He will be working with co-principal investigators Dr. Jens Birkholzer, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory; Dr. Mark Zoback, Stanford University; Dr. Matthew Averill, WildHorse Resource Development Corp.; and their research teams.

“We are very excited to be working with Texas A&M and the Department of Energy to help add to the public knowledge of the Eagle Ford trend and how our natural resources can be best utilized over the life of a reservoir,” Jay Graham, WildHorse’s chairman and CEO, said.

“We look forward to lending WildHorse’s expertise to the leading petroleum engineering program in the country.”