E&P

In what it said is an effort to improve regional business performance, Chevron Corp. is restructuring its Appalachian business unit, which oversees the company’s Marcellus and Utica shale assets.

Texas’s tax rate reduction program for “high-cost” natural gas wells may not be as generous as those provided by other states, and the shift in exploration from natural gas in the Barnett Shale to oil in the Eagle Ford Shale could also be making the incentive less relevant, according to areport by the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts.

Total U.S. crude oil production averaged an estimated 8.9 million b/d in October, and monthly average production is forecast to surpass 9.0 million b/d in December and 9.4 million b/d in 2015, which would be the highest annual average crude oil production since 1972, according to the Energy Information Administration (EIA).

Based on samplings of hydraulic fracturing (fracking) fluids used in five states, a first-of-its-kind analysis by Colorado researchers at two universities found the chemicals used at wellsites are no more harmful than what’s found in common household products.

Onshore independent Halcon Resources Corp. is slashing its capital budget and will drop almost half of its rigs in 2015, but production year/year still will jump by 15-20%, CEO Floyd Wilson said Tuesday.

The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) has received approval from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) to add state-level data from 10 states, including some of the most shale-rich names in its current “Other States” category, to its monthly natural gas production survey.

Encana Corp.’s strategic decision last year to balance its weighty natural gas portfolio with more liquids-rich assets propelled profits in the third quarter and enabled the independent to hit targets two years ahead of schedule, CEO Doug Suttles said Wednesday.

Rex Energy Corp. has notified a group of its lessors in western Pennsylvania that it has been forced to suspend operations at a five-well pad while it awaits the outcome of a zoning appeal filed by two environmental groups and residents in Butler County that want drilling halted near a school.

An affiliate of American Energy Partners LP (AELP) has completed a series of transactions that has built a portfolio in southern and central Oklahoma, better known as the South Central Oklahoma Oil Province, or SCOOP.