Production Scenarios for the Haynesville Shale Play

The Haynesville shale gas play has significant potential, with an estimated original gas in place larger than that of the Barnett with roughly 63% of the Barnett's acreage. However, the drilling and completion costs of Haynesville are approximately three times as much compared with the Barnett. We present a production scenario for the Haynesville on the basis of wells existing by the end of 2012 and wells to be drilled over the next 3 decades and quantify uncertainties around it. The scenario is underpinned by geologic, engineering, and well-economics analyses, which reveal the important differences between the Haynesville and two other plays we analyzed previously, Barnett and Fayetteville. The production profiles are developed by use of data from 2,131 wells drilled between 2008 and 2011 in both Louisiana and Texas, and a transient-linear-flow model. We run sensitivity analyses on reasonable ranges for natural- gas price, remaining-developable acreage, improvements in technology and well-cost performance, and economic limit for shutting in a well. Our analysis indicates a cumulative production of roughly 46 Tcf in the base case, subject to many uncertainties.