Haynesville Shale saw highest rise in natural gas rigs in US as WTI price recovers
The US’s Haynesville Shale saw a 53% year-on-year (YoY) rise in the number of natural gas rigs in 2021, according to GlobalData. The leading data and analytics company notes that, while the play has not quite reached pre-COVID-19 levels, this rig addition was the largest in the US.
GlobalData’s latest report, ‘Haynesville Shale in the United States of America (USA) – Oil and Gas Shale Market Analysis and Outlook to 2025’, reveals that the Haynesville Shale’s rig count increased from 32 in July 2020 to 49 in December 2021.
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Svetlana Doh, Oil & Gas Analyst at GlobalData, comments: “The Haynesville play was hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic’s negative impact on natural gas demand. Haynesville’s rig count dropped by around 30%, from 53 in 2019 to an average of 37 in 2020. However, the recovery of commodity prices in 2021 meant basins across the US could start to re-open and re-build rigs. Haynesville’s 53% recovery to 49 rigs in 2021 is significant when you compare to, say, Marcellus—which is the largest gas-producing play in the country, but only saw a 31% increase.”
Natural gas production in the Haynesville Shale declined by nearly 0.8 billion cubic feet per day of gas (bcfd) during the first wave of COVID-19 in the US*. However, despite this loss, it remained attractive to natural gas drillers due to its quick recovery to pre-pandemic levels by the end of 2020.
Doh adds: “Besides one slight fall in output during the winter storm of February 2021, natural gas production in the US has remained on an upward trend throughout 2021. Haynesville supplied almost 13.1 bcfd of gas in 2021, which accounted for almost 13% of the natural gas production in the US. This marked a swift recovery from August 2020, when the production had dropped to its lowest point of 11.4 bcfd, representing 11.7% of 2020 production.”
The Haynesville Shale play runs across east Texas and west Louisiana states and primarily produces natural gas. Crude oil production in the play accounts for just 0.2% of the total oil production in the country and mostly consists of dropped-out liquid phase from wet gas production. Supply of crude oil dropped by 17.8% in May 2020 but has since kept a relatively stable output at 33,300 barrels per day (bd).”
The statements, opinions and data contained in the content published in Global Gas Perspectives are solely those of the individual authors and contributors and not of the publisher and the editor(s) of Natural Gas World.