Posted on 10/27/2006 5:10:59 AM PDT by Ready4Freddy
A natural gas drilling boom in Fort Worth is bringing with it hopes of wealth, and fears of pitfalls.
FORT WORTH, Oct. 20 — Boston had the Big Dig. Now Fort Worth has the big drill.
Three years ago, Lawrence B. Dale, president of a small drilling company, began leasing about 90 sites around Fort Worth for natural gas wells.
Under golf courses, schools, parks, libraries, airports and dozens of neighborhoods, some of the nation’s leading independent energy companies are scouring the city in search of the best locations to recover one of the largest concentrations of natural gas in the United States.
Everyone seems to be lining up for a share in the bonanza. The American Cancer Society recently made $5 million just by selling its mineral rights to land that had been donated years ago. The Girl Scouts leased their mineral rights for drilling under a summer camp for an undisclosed amount.
It may not be a rerun of “The Beverly Hillbillies.” And energy executives say it will not tear up the heart of the city, as Boston’s trouble-plagued highway construction project did.
But it is a replay of sorts of the oil drilling booms that roused and remade Los Angeles and Oklahoma City in the 1920’s and 1930’s. And with rigs lighted up like Christmas trees on the city’s periphery at night, it is the biggest urban drilling boom in the nation today.
The surging interest in tapping gas trapped in the so-called Barnett Shale that veins through Fort Worth is only the beginning of a new far-flung search by wildcatters now exploring Alabama, Illinois, Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Texas for a big new source of shale natural gas.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
I have an uncle who is running about 8-10 rigs around Fort Worth. He's in his late seventies and refused to retire. He says this is the biggest boom he's seen in his 50 years in the business. He is quite excited about the "Barnett-Shale play" that's going on and says he can't wait to get to work every day.
Sounds like he's a rich Uncle now! ;^)
The Austin Chalk play a number of years ago gathered as much hype, possibly, but probably not as much hydrocarbons.
With restricitons down to and below every 50 acres alot of people without mineral rights are losing the beauty of their surface rights to the oil companies. When the water trucks start tearing up the roads cities are going to rethink the decision. JMO
I noticed a lot of new drill rigs last spring when I went through Colorado, too. I know Union 76 drilled a slew of test wells here on the Cumberland Plateau back in the '70's, found gas, and capped them off. It's about time for them to start tapping the field here. Thermal needs his royalty check......
I live in Fort Worth. They are buying 3-year driling rights in my neighborhood to put in a well 4 blocks from my house.
Doesn't reach as far east as Plano. The Barnett Shale in the Fort Worth basin is limited by geological formations on its edges. Original "sweet spot" back in the late 90s was in Denton/Wise counties.
This is still mostly a Tarrant, Johnson, Wise, Denton county play, although drillers are testing the periphery. Fort Worth sits solidly atop it, but Dallas can only drool. DFW airport between the cities has made a killing.
The link at #8 gives a pretty good history and outlook for the play around Fort Worth.
Shine sounds like a very interesting fellow. Thanks for the article!
They call him Shine because when he takes that hardhat off the reflection will nearly blind you. ;O)
I wonder if the France family and Bruton Smith are in on this?
Dunno, but I wish we were. Now only would we end FReepathons, but we'd be well on our way to creating our own racing league.
which means.....oil is a renewable resource.
The property owner is paid for access to those minerals through a land lease. The oil companies provide a contract stating that any damage done will be repaired. The property owner has plenty of rights.
I know this as fact, as I own, and lease out 337+ acres in Wise County.
As one who does not own the mineral rights I'm
not eager to test the surface repair clause.
My neighbors who have operations on their properties
tell horror stories about brine infusion wells poisoning
their stock ponds and placement of spite wells in front
of their house if they complain.
They have legal recourse, unless they signed a contract saying otherwise. It sounds like an independent company or a subcontractor of some sort. Your neighbors need to retain a lawyer and not be intimidated by these types.
This is on the assumption that they own the property these wells are on. They may be able to use the environmental angle.
Surely, this is not in Texas?
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