Privately

With its strategy more trained on oil than natural gas, Denbury Resources Inc. has agreed to sell more than half of its Barnett Shale natural gas assets to privately held Talon Oil & Gas LLC for $270 million.

Onshore natural gas explorer Edge Petroleum Corp. and privately held Chaparral Energy Inc. Wednesday scuttled a merger plan citing “no reasonable expectation” that financing could be completed by the Dec. 31 deadline. The majority owner of Chaparral is co-founder Mark Fischer; Chesapeake Energy Corp. purchased a 32% stake in the company in 2006.

Thomas Myers “Tom” Hunt, who went to work for his uncle, the legendary wildcatter H.L. Hunt, before World War II and eventually chaired privately held Hunt Petroleum, died Tuesday in Dallas at the age of 85. Tom Hunt was working in the oilfields in the 1930s and was said to have impressed his uncle, who hired him as an adviser. The younger Hunt eventually rose to manage all of the family’s operations, and he negotiated some of the oil company’s most important transactions. Earlier this year he negotiated the company’s acquisition by XTO Energy Corp. for nearly $4.2 billion (see Daily GPI, June 11). A life-long bachelor, Hunt was said to avoid publicity, and he preferred answering his own phone, associates said.

The financial market turmoil forced the hand of privately held producer Antero Resources last week, which agreed to accept less drilling acreage in the Marcellus Shale from Dominion but pay more money per acre.

The financial market turmoil has forced the hand of privately held producer Antero Resources, which agreed to accept less drilling acreage in the Marcellus Shale from Dominion but pay more money per acre.

Swift Energy Co. has closed the previously announced acquisition of property interests from privately held Crimson Energy Partners LP with an effective date of May 1, 2008. The interests in Crimson’s Briscoe “A” lease and wells are in Dimmit County, TX, on 5,140 acres adjacent to existing Swift Energy production in its Cotulla area. Production is approximately 90% natural gas and natural gas liquids and averaged approximately 3.7 MMcfe/d net to the purchased working interests for the first seven months of 2008. The final purchase price of the property interests closed was $46.4 million, including the initial deposit, and is subject to post-closing adjustments. This acquisition was funded with bank borrowings under the company’s credit facility.

Houston-based Eagle Rock Energy Partners LP agreed to pay $236 million to acquire privately held Millennium Midstream Partners LP (MMP), a natural gas gathering and processing business whose operations are based in Texas.

To diversify its geographic operational area, DCP Midstream Partners LP has agreed to purchase Michigan Pipeline & Processing LLC (MPP), a privately held company engaged in natural gas gathering and treating services for gas produced from the Antrim Shale of northern Michigan and gas transportation within Michigan, for $145 million.

To diversify its geographic operational area, DCP Midstream Partners LP has agreed to purchase Michigan Pipeline & Processing LLC (MPP), a privately held company engaged in natural gas gathering and treating services for gas produced from the Antrim Shale of northern Michigan and gas transportation within Michigan, for $145 million.