Ardmore basin Woodford gas plan takes off

May 26, 2008
Operators are pursing gas and liquid hydrocarbons in Mississippian-Devonian Woodford shale in the northwestern Ardmore basin in southern Oklahoma.

Operators are pursing gas and liquid hydrocarbons in Mississippian-Devonian Woodford shale in the northwestern Ardmore basin in southern Oklahoma.

Bankers Petroleum Ltd., which calls the field Tishomingo, is implementing a development plan that entails drilling 30 gross wells in 2008 at a capital cost of $45 million.

The wells produce gas, oil, and natural gas liquids from the Woodford, which averages twice the formation’s thickness in the Arkoma basin (see table).

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Bankers had five wells on production in Tishomingo in mid-May at a combined 3.1 MMcfd of gas equivalent, 64% gas, and was recovering frac fluid from a second commercial discovery in the area.

Bankers is running five rigs drilling wells with horizontal legs on 640-acre spacing. Most of the drilling so far is in the southwestern Johnston and eastern Carter counties, just north of the Marshall County line.

Other operators in the area include Wagner & Brown, Chesapeake Energy Corp., Range Resources Corp., and Walter Oil & Gas Corp.

Drilling costs are lower than for Arkoma basin wells due to much easier drilling through formations that overlie the Woodford, Bankers said.

Bankers’ leasehold in Carter, Murray, and Johnston counties is about half of the 24,000 net acres it acquired in May 2006 from Vintage Petroleum LLC in the Ardmore and Arkoma basins.

The Ardmore basin Woodford drillsites are 50 miles southwest of Woodford gas production in the southwestern Arkoma basin (see map, OGJ, Apr. 7, 2008, p. 40).