Lateral Completions a Boon for Haynesville Extension

Abstract

There is an old adage in the oil patch: The best place to find oil … is in an oil field. The same holds for natural gas. The Deep Bossier gas play of east Texas spawned some impressive field discoveries in the early to mid-2000s, such as the Amoruso and Savell fields in Robertson County, Texas. Another big find, Hilltop, lies just to the east in Leon County. Wells tap into the Deep Bossier at depths between 15,000 and 20,000 ft. They intersect overpressured shale and sandstone formations a few thousand feet thick. These conventional, vertical wells were challenging to drill, but often the payoff merited the difficulty and the associated cost as many would come online producing 20 MMcf/D or more of natural gas once completed. A few even bested 50 MMcf/D. The Haynesville Shale of east Texas and western Louisiana has been a gas tank for operators like Shell, BP, Chevron, Chesapeake, and others since it came into prominence around 2008. Even though some of these players have exited, it reached new highs in March 2023, averaging 14.5 Bcf/D, 10% more than the 2022 annual average of 13.1 Bcf/D, according to data from Enverus. Haynesville natural gas production currently accounts for about 14% of all US dry natural gas production. It is the third-largest shale gas-producing play in the US, behind the Marcellus play in the Appalachian Basin and the Permian play in west Texas and New Mexico. The linchpin of both plays is their robust natural gas potential. In 2017, the US Geological Survey (USGS) estimated the Bossier Formation contained 2.9 billion bbl of oil, 108.6 Tcf of natural gas, and 1 billion bbl of natural gas liquids (NGLs), while the Haynesville Formation was estimated to contain a mean of 1.1 billion bbl of oil, 195.8 Tcf of natural gas, and 0.9 billion bbl of NGLs. In a report from 2010, the USGS predicted the Bossier held a mean of just 9.0 Tcf of natural gas, while the Haynesville was estimated to contain 61.4 Tcf of natural gas. There has been some confusion regarding the Haynesville and Bossier shales over the years due to the different geological naming conventions in Louisiana and Texas. According to the Texas Railroad Commission, it is generally recognized that the shale interval in east Texas is the Lower Bossier that correlates with the Haynesville of Louisiana. The Upper Bossier Formation is distinguished from the Lower Bossier Formation by its location, to the southwest, and the fact that it is more sand-rich.