Year

The Northeast has replaced weather as the wildcard in the U.S. natural gas markets because deferred and constrained wells could unleash as much as 10 Bcf/d if prices were to cooperate, a Genscape Inc. expert said Wednesday.

Balance sheet stress is intensifying in the U.S. natural gas and oil sector, which means more takeovers and asset sales are likely by the end of this year, researchers said Thursday.

Amid low commodity prices that may stick around for a year or two, North Dakota’s robust oil and natural production may see higher peaks and longer productivity for its wells than previously forecast, the state’s chief oil/gas official told state and local officials at a meeting of the oil/gas producing counties on Thursday.

While showing a delayed response to the commodity price nosedive, Colorado oil and natural gas production will experience sizable declines this year before stabilizing in 2016, according to a report released by the Leeds School of Business at the University of Colorado (UC). Based on the Moody’s Analytics forecast for WTI crude prices, the report assumes a price “rebound” next year.

Oil and natural gas drilling rights sales in British Columbia (BC) have fallen sharply this year compared to 2014, according to statistics from the provincial government’s Ministry of Natural Gas Development.

The North American natural gas trade fell off the same cliff as global oil markets last winter, according to a continental market scorecard kept by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).

An abundance of natural gas and consequent low prices have helped turn the tide for long-haul pipelines. Where once there was worry, now there is opportunity, according to an analysis by U.S. Capital Advisors.

Preparing for a longer period of low crude prices, perhaps two or three more years, Los Angeles-based California Resources Corp. (CRC) after its second full quarter separated from Occidental Petroleum Corp.(Oxy), is focused on whittling down up to $1.6 billion in debt and concentrating on workover rigs in the vast steam flood operations it has in the San Joaquin Basin in the central valley.

Bismarck, ND-based MDU Resources Group said it expects to sell its exploration and production (E&P) business by the end of this year. CEO David Goodin previously had said that Fidelity E&P Co. was going to be sold, but the sharp crude oil price drop late last year caused him to postpone putting it on the market at the time (see Shale Daily,Feb. 5).