Devon Energy completed a major expansion of its Bridgeport Gas Processing Plant northwest of Fort Worth, TX, adding 200 MMcf/d of inlet gas processing capacity to process rapidly growing production from the Barnett Shale formation in the Fort Worth Basin, which Devon inherited from Mitchell Energy following its purchase of the company last summer (see Daily GPI, Aug. 15).

The Barnett Shale is Devon’s largest and fastest growing gas development project. The expanded Bridgeport Plant now has a total inlet capacity of 650 MMcf/d. The plant is capable of producing 57,000 b/d of natural gas liquids. It is currently processing 460 MMcf/d and extracting 37,000 b/d of ethane, propane and butane.

“The continuing success of Devon’s north Texas gas development program has required us to increase the capacity of the Bridgeport Plant three times in the past two years,” said Darryl Smette, Devon’s senior vice president of marketing. “These three expansions have more than doubled the capacity of the plant.”

The massive shale formation covers 10 Texas counties and is estimated to contain recoverable reserves of up to 10 Tcf, but technology has limited development so that only 8% of the gas has been extracted.

Devon has over 1,000 producing wells in the Barnett Shale. The company also has 14 rigs at work drilling new Barnett Shale wells. A 1,700-mile integrated gas transmission system, owned and operated by Devon, supplies gas to the Bridgeport Plant.

As gas production increases in 2003, the Bridgeport Plant is expected to become the largest-volume natural gas liquids producing plant in Texas and one of the five largest in the United States.

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