EnCana has reported several months of production from the first of their long lateral hz. wells in San Augustine County.  I thought I'd share some comps. (with shorter laterals) so you can see the improvements...  and judge for yourselves.  Keep in mind that there have probably been other (than lateral length) changes such as # of perfs, # of stages, frac design (I started to say “recipe” but decided that would be really too “girl-ie”… ish) etc… .

ECA drilled their first well in the county back in 2010.  It was the Black Stone Minerals A43 Unit #1H (405-30307) which came on @ a reported 32.000 MMcfd on a 28/64 choke with a 5659# flowing pressure (13 frac stages).  By December it was producing an average of 2.131 MMcfd from a ~4400’ lateral.  Here are the 2010 monthly numbers:

                May – 397,411 mcf

                Jun –  474,540 mcf

                Jul –   293,300 mcf

                Aug – 232,185 mcf

                Sep – 168,306 mcf

                Oct – 134,040 mcf

                Nov – 103,238 mcf

                Dec -   66,072 mcf   Total (8 months) : 1,869,092 mcf  

                                                 Cum. to date (51 months) 2,912,745 mcf

Black Stone A-398 Unit #1H (405-30335) was the next to come on, in August 2010, @ 23.424 MMcfd from a ~4,000’ lateral (18 frac stages) … a very strong well with a 9097# flowing pressure on a 27/64 choke.  This has been a better producer than the first well which had a larger IP, a longer lateral and a steeper decline.  Here are the numbers from 2010/2011:

                Aug – 456,444 mcf

                Sep –  463,548 mcf

                Oct –  398,242 mcf

                Nov – 350,209 mcf

                Dec – 274,467 mcf

                Jan -  215,532 mcf

                Feb – 154,138 mcf

                Mar – 136,338 mcf   Total (8 months): 2,448,918 mcf

                                                  Cum. to date (48 months) 3,669,194 mcf

I am not going to include the A43 #2H (405-30369) because I think it was (most likely) a Bossier completion.  I am also not going to use what I am calling the “Norwood, East” wells because I think (by my amateur analysis) they are finding different and/or thinner rock over there… so the well results are different.  I will stick to just the “Norwood, West” wells for this exercise.

That brings us to the BSI Unit A47 wells.  #1H (405-30414) and #2H (405-30445) both had a lateral length of ~7,500’ (both wells had 30 frac stages on completion reports).  A47 #1H came on in Nov. 2011 (partial month).

                Nov – 139,179 mcf

                Dec – 415,211 mcf

                Jan -  499,980 mcf

                Feb – 452,522 mcf

                Mar – 474,811 mcf  

                Apr -   238,836 mcf  

                May-   137,437 mcf

                Jun-    169,052 mcf   Total (8 months): 2,527,028 mcf

                                                  Cum. to date (33 months)  6,714,9896 mcf

A47 #2H came on in Dec. 2011 (partial month).

                Dec – 428,947 mcf

                Jan –  503,917 mcf

                Feb – 481,450 mcf

                Mar – 493,196 mcf

                Apr -   235,660 mcf  

                May-  207,470 mcf

                Jun-   163,640 mcf  

                July-   207,445 mcf   Total (8 months): 2,721,725 mcf

                                                  Cum. to date (32 months)  6,925,986

This is not enough time to really compare these two new wells (to the others) but they are looking good, so far, and I will come back and add the production until we have eight months from all of the wells.  The decline appears to be fairly flat (I’d do charts but I’m not an accomplished “chartist”… sorry) on both and they look set to eclipse (by far) the shorter wells at eight months in.  This will give us something to while away our summer with… while we wait for the NG price to improve.

Update 9-27-14:

With over thirty months of production from the A47 wells it is now apparent that the longer laterals (~7500' vs.~4000')  are far out-producing the shorter wells. What is not apparent are the differences in the later wells compared to earlier ones regarding number of stages, number of perforations per stage and frac design.

To give you another exemplar of a still later well in the area, to show that these are all evolving aspects of a horizontal well, the XTO - Banana Slugs DU #1H has an effective lateral length of 6,538' & was frac'd with 8,612,980# of sand. (Sorry, no data available on number of stages... but I will make a WAG that it is upwards of 28-30).

Banana Slugs DU #1H came on in May of 2013 (partial month) @ 15.332 MMcfd on a 17/64 choke with 8342# flowing pressure. It has exhibited gentle decline in fifteen (15) months of production and turned in 401,014 mcf in July, 2014:

             May-  243,593 mcf

             Jun-   463,670 mcf

             Jul-    448,927 mcf

             Aug-   461,712 mcf

             Sep-   391,040 mcf

             Oct-    431,454 mcf

             Nov-    440,797 mcf

             Dec-   472,418 mcf     Total (8 months): 3,353,611 mcf      

                                                 Cum. to date (15 months): 6,198,746 mcf

Banana Slugs DU #1H is on track to eclipse the A47 wells in just a few months as the A47 wells continue to decline.