Shale Daily

The Eagle Ford Shale now rivals the nearby Haynesville Shale in natural gas output and could be decisive in shaping U.S. gas production trends into the future, according to Barclays Capital.

The U.S. oil and gas rig forecast should be 2.5% higher than it was in 2013, with the horizontal drillers up by 11%, analysts with Raymond James & Associates Inc. said Tuesday.

Pure-play Appalachian operator Rice Energy Inc. has agreed to acquire gathering assets in southwest Pennsylvania from a subsidiary of M3 Midstream LLC for $110 million in cash.

Consol Energy Inc. said Thursday it has struck a deal to send ethane produced in the Marcellus Shale of western Pennsylvania on Sunoco Logistics Partners LP’s Mariner East pipeline for export to European cracker complexes.

Eagle Ford Shale crude oil producers now have a new option for transportation as NuStar Energy LP has completed construction of its private marine loading dock at its North Beach Terminal in Corpus Christi, TX, and has its first ship at the dock to be loaded with crude oil.

Occidental Petroleum Corp., headquartered in Los Angeles since 1920, is relocating to Houston and spinning off its California exploration and production (E&P) unit to create a new independent.

As the mayor of Dallas predicted might happen, Fort Worth-based Trinity East Energy LLC is suing the city for millions of dollars after the city council voted last year to deny the company the permits it needed to drill on leases for which it had paid the city more than $19 million.

After more than a month of delays caused by cold weather, Magnum Hunter Resources Corp. reported what analysts called “monster” results at its Stalder 3UH Utica well in Monroe County, OH, which tested at a peak rate of 32.5 MMcf/d.

A bill making its way through the West Virginia House of Delegates would better protect public water supplies from industrial chemicals, including those in above-ground storage tanks like the one that leaked into the Elk River recently, affecting the water supplies of 300,000 West Virginians in nine counties for several weeks.