Aethon Western Haynesville Wildcat Hits 3 Bcf/1K ft in 33 Months
An Aethon Energy Haynesville well’s output has hit more than 3 Bcf per 1,000 lateral ft in less than three years, and its production isn’t declining either, according to new Texas Railroad Commission data.
An Aethon Energy wildcat in the far western Haynesville play north of Houston has surfaced more than 3 Bcf per 1,000 lateral ft in less than three years, according to a Hart Energy analysis.
It’s also producing as much gas in its 33rd month online as during its first full month, Texas Railroad Commission (RRC) data show.
The well, Currie #2HB in Robertson County, with a 6,561-ft lateral, made 19.92 Bcf through May, averaging 3.036 Bcf per 1,000 ft, the most current RRC data show.
Production is holding up too. Output during the well’s first full month was 22.7 MMcf/d; in May, it was 22.1 MMcf/d.
The Dallas-based, privately held E&P also holds the second highest performing wildcat in the new play, which was started in early 2022 by publicly held, Dallas-based Comstock Resources.
Aethon’s River Ranch #1H made 2.534 Bcf per 1,000 ft of its 6,421-ft lateral, also in Robertson County.
In 29 full months online, its output totaled 16.3 Bcf through May.
Production has declined more normally though, from 28.8 MMcf/d in its first full month to 15.3 MMcf/d in May.
Meanwhile, Comstock’s Circle M #1H—the oldest well in the stepout, which is some 150 miles from the original Haynesville play’s northwestern Louisiana start in 2007—has averaged 2.45 Bcf per 1,000 lateral ft in 38 months online through May.
Production from the 7,861-ft lateral was 19.3 Bcf through May.
First-full-month production was 29.7 MMcf/d; in May, it was 5.4 MMcf/d.
Among the 27 wells to date with at least one month of reported production, output is 244 Bcf, averaging 18.8 MMcf/d among the wells, which range from one month to 38 months old, Hart Energy found.
The average lateral length is 9,600 ft, totaling 259,000 ft.
The average Bcf per 1,000 feet is 1.05 with a month-old well making 0.51 Bcf per 1,000 ft in May to the 38-month-old well surfacing 2.45 Bcf per 1,000 ft.
$10,000/acre
Aethon had six wells in the play online through May.
Among Comstock’s 21 wells to date, two are new since its last investor call May 1.
Jennings Loehr #1H made 25.8 MMcf/d from a 12,106-ft lateral in May, its first month online. A twin, Jennings FSRA #1H, made 19.7 MMcf/d from a 12,045-ft lateral.
The two-well pad is in Leon County.
A delineation well in a third county, Freestone, taking the play 45 miles wide along U.S. Highway 79, made 0.131 Bcf per 1,000 ft of its 10,306 lateral ft its first two months online through May.
The well, Olajuwon Pickens #1H, made 26.6 MMcf/d in its first full month online.
Nitin Kumar, energy analyst for Mizuho Securities USA, said the western Haynesville “offers a unique combination of below-average break-evens and higher undrilled acreage that could make it attractive for potential consolidation.”
Kumar found the type-curve and adjusted break-evens in the play are between $3.40 and $3.80 gas.
He estimates leasehold in the play is worth $9,589 an acre.
Comstock holds 520,000 net acres there.
Other operators with leasehold in the area, in addition to Aethon, include publicly held Diversified Energy and privately held Hilcorp Energy along with Mitsui Group unit Mitsui E&P USA, according to a Hart Energy analysis.
Hilcorp bought its position—full of turn-of-the-century Cotton Valley and Bossier verticals—in January 2024 from Exxon Mobil unit XTO Energy.
This spring, it recompleted two vintage horizontal tests that had been made in the early 2010s before the super-deep, super-hot play’s economics were overwhelmed by the tsunami of new Marcellus and Louisiana Haynesville gas.
The tests are in Leon County. Completion results were not yet available in RRC files at press time.
Meanwhile, Mitsui has four permits and had a rig drilling for it in June—two in Leon; two in Freestone. Mitsui joined the play in mid-2024 with 47,000 acres from Vanna LLC and Sabana LLC.
In an analysis of shale metrics across the Lower 48, Kumar found “the western Haynesville stands out in terms of absolute well productivity with an average of 20.1 boe/ft over the first six months.”
Other Lower 48 shale plays with similarly high productivity are the northern Delaware Basin, the Louisiana Haynesville and the east-central Texas Haynesville, he added.
Mizuho Securities USA estimates far western Haynesville leasehold is worth more than $10,000 an acre. (Source: Mizuho Securities USA)
Higher cost, higher EUR
Arun Jayaram, energy analyst for J.P. Morgan Securities, noted in a recent Haynesville review that the far western deposition sits at about 16,000 ft, while the legacy Haynesville is at about 12,000 ft.
“The greater depth and higher pressure of the western Haynesville typically comes with significantly higher initial production rates—as well as substantially higher D&C costs,” he reported.
Comstock reported its initial well cost was nearly $4,000 per lateral ft and most recent cost was $2,700 per ft.
Meanwhile, D&C in the legacy Haynesville is roughly $1,500 per ft, Jayaram noted.
Because of the play’s higher EURs, though, “break-evens could be competitive to Tier 1 rock in the legacy Haynesville,” Jayaram wrote.
He is modeling an EUR of about 3.6 Bcf per 1,000 ft and D&C of $2,650 per ft.
Based on that, $4.02 gas would result in a 35% IRR.
“If D&C costs were to fall by 10% and 20% in the western Haynesville, we estimate that the break-even would fall to $3.75 and $3.48,” Jayaram wrote.
Meanwhile, he found that average first-six-month production from the western wells is 0.459 Bcf per 1,000 ft, while the original Haynesville play had six-month averages of 0.266 Bcf per 1,000 ft in 2024, down from 0.313 Bcf per 1,000 ft in 2023.
“We have observed some mammoth well results from the region,” Jayaram wrote.
But, he added, “the jury is still out on what longer-dated declines may look like, though we believe the significant production volumes from early wells show the potential of the play.”
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