American Energy Production Inc(fka AENP)

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The Barnett Shale is considered a source bed rock that is actually actively producing natural gas through bacteria breakdown. At three different times spread out by 100 million years, Texas was actually a shallow ocean that stretched up through most of the central plains and even carried up into and through Canada. The first 100 feet of ocean is considered the photo Eukaric zone since light can penetrate the first 100 feet. With light and heat being a factor in this shallow body of water we can assume these oceans had a huge phytoplankton and zooplankton population and with that massive coral reef beds were created by filtering the massive plankton population. This was the environment in most of Texas some 300 to 600 million years ago as the ocean came in and out at least three different times in the Fort Worth Basin. As the rocky mountains formed several separate ocean beds formed in the state of Texas and are identified as our Basins such as The Delaware Basin, The Permian Basin and The Fort Worth Basin. The Barnett Shale is in the Fort Worth Basin and because of its maturity and age we are able to frac and produce from this blanket formation. The Permian basin sets an example from its exploration and research being from coral reef beds itself. However, the fields are completely different in many aspects. This shallow ocean existed at least three times that we know of in the area of the Fort Worth Basin called the Barnett Shale. The Barnett Shale exists in what most believe to be two zones; the upper and lower Barnett Shale. However, there are three based on the three flooding events and also a close look at our logs of the lower zone we can see a very minor separation in lower zone. Most likely the first two ocean occurrences were closer together which today is noticed and defined as the "lower zone" and the third one spanned at least 100 million years later. The split in the lower zone is called the "Sanders Zone" which I originally had identified and named after myself. It is only noticed in the core area of the Barnett Shale. Time zones are geologically missing from this area stumbling others in what happened to this time frame in geology as we explore the Barnett Shale. My only assumption is that the oceans continually existed in this time and either eroded or absorbed the span of these missing formations. We have three faults and three times that the ocean came in and out of the Fort Worth Basin spread out over 300-500 million years we also have three faults in the shale. Add plate tectonic action and 200 million more years for maturity and we have our current situation today. At the core area of the Barnett Shale we find a thicker a deeper lower level looking like a third zone in this shale perhaps this is the existence of the first ocean sediment itself. Also in this lower level there is more maturity and higher levels of gas and condensate with a higher BTU rating. Obsidian is found underneath this third layer proving some volcanic activity before the creation of these oceans. The northern and older part of the Barnett Shale between Denton and Decatur produces a higher 1278-BTU rating as we follow the Shale south to Fort Worth the BTU drops to 966-BTU. I have noticed that some operators are only successful in certain areas and most of this has to do with their frac techniques in conjunction with either the low BTU or High BTU areas. CO2 stimulation is what I would scientifically recommend to induce breathing in an anaerobic organic environment. Major oil companies have decided to concentrate in different areas of this shale and even other new shale discoveries because of their different fracturing techniques, beliefs, discoveries, and abilities.



The reason for failure in the Barnett Shale Play is simple. Spacing and depth are the essentials in producing from this zone. A fine layer of obsidian covers the ELLENBERGER Zone which must be watched and avoided. 60 acre spacing seems to be a common norm for safety in vertical wells. If a well hits the ELLENBERGER it will produce water and we consider the well "Killed". Horizontal wells require at least 4 times the normal spacing. Problems: If one of the fractures goes into the ELLENBERGER Zone which is below the Barnett Shale then all of the gas will follow the path of least resistance and flow into the ELLENBERGER zone which is mainly water here in this area. Certain new companies have learned how to find this gas now trapped in the ELLENBERGER and are working on a purification process which extracts all of the gases and precious metals from the water. Some of the water will be used to maintain the water level of Lake Bridgeport.



What is creating all of this gas and why is it considered a source bed rock? The Shale is basically compacted organic composition and living at a high temperature. Inside this compacted shale we find that it has life and that there is anaerobic bacteria feeding on a decomposed coral reef bed producing gas. The bacteria I believe lives in an anaerobic environment and can be stimulated with CO2, the bacteria in turn is stimulated and literally excretes methane. However the rock is so dense that a lot of the gas stays trapped uniformly perfect and even in the rock. What happens with this other gas that leaves through the surface of the shale? It rises and is trapped in other structures and feeds other zones such as the conglomerate. Most of these zones were discovered before we discovered the shale because we did not go deeper. The Barnet Shale is about at 8900 to 8400 feet deep along highway 380 in between Denton and Decatur Texas. We know that the ocean / Ellenbuger is at around 9000' here. The inorganic theory in gas has been attempted many times but never successfully completed. In other words drilling into the core of the earth passed the ocean even at its faults has never produced gas.

Questions and concerns? Extremely high gas pressures leak into shallow to deep fresh ground water fields. The problem. The annulus in between the production casing and the earth / dirt or ground itself creates a passageway for gas to escape into different horizons. Gas can work its way up the crack and poison large fresh water reserves. Is there a solution? Yes! In Artesia New Mexico they noticed a great natural resource early on with their artesian fresh water springs - they did not want to contaminate their naturally carbonated water. So, they cement around the pipe the whole way down destroying the annulus. Yes its more expensive, but water is really more of a precious resource than gas.



The Interstate I-35 E was the edge of this ocean and as a result it is the edge of the Barnett Shale Zone. A history of the drilling activity teaches us that the "primary zone" of this Barnett Shale is in between Denton and Decatur Texas stretching down to Fort Worth Texas. We know that the zone is thicker and richer in natural gas the further north in the Barnett shale and has a higher BTU rating @1200 and the further south towards Fort Worth we find a BTU rating @ 996. Unlike other source beds we have learned to avoid the fault lines that exist because they do not produce gas and are accurately mapped by geo map on active production in the area.

The most interesting thing about this Barnett Shale is how solid it is. Typically when we measure for permeability or porosity we calculate in darceys as a form of measurement. However, in the Barnett Shale we calculate our porosity and permeability in anchstroms or shall I say, atomic measure. This means that the shale is so tight that gas has a hard time escaping it. Drilling through the shale is like drilling through a Brunswick pool table or bowling ball. Yet we find several interesting factors in the shale itself such as micro fractures that travel from the north east to the southwest. We use these micro fractures when we horizontally drill to utilize the structure in combination with the multi stage frac job. Halliburton has several multi frac techniques that will literally amaze you. Using micro radio transmission devices and special fluids the company is literally able to follow each fracture in amazing detail. You get what you pay for and horizontal frac jobs can go easily between 4$ and 12$ million. Devon itself claims that the work itself is very costly and still an educational process. James Hall of Devon is leading the industry in horizontal production discoveries and results.

Many smaller operators are experiencing the same dramatic results using standard old vertical techniques and open hole completions. Open hole completions? Yes, you heard me right. The shale is so very solid that it is more stable than what we could put down there and it allows us to cover more area. The trick in developing this field is spacing. 60 acre's seems to be a safe space for wells in the Barnett Shale. Many of the majors have killed off some of their nearby wells by drilling to close or having a huge horizontal with a bad frac job lose the area. The trick in this field is not finding the zone - its not getting greedy. If you pass the Barnett Shale you have entered the ocean you hit the ocean you ruined your project. Engineers be ready to spot obsidian which covers the Ellen burger Zone the zone you must avoid. If a nearby well hits the ocean and has fraced into your zone that well has just ruined your well. That gas will shoot out into the ocean instead of up your hole.

Mitchell pioneered the lower Barnett Shale and Devon has seen its capital gain merely by perforating the upper zones in their existing wells. However, I believe a majority of their wells were slim hole completed making a rework really not an option. Nevertheless, this company holds about 75% of the Barnett Shale and its Oil and Gas Leases by production.

Recently, I produced a success in the Permian Basin with my Working Interest partners Clayton Williams and Devon. Currently - we are exploring four other shale discoveries in two other areas of Texas and in Colorado and Oklahoma.



Chris Sanders
Producer / Operator
LNG / SANCO
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(if you are using Internet Explorer and happen to hear the music on this page
it is my Piano music - I hope you enjoy it - Sanders Piano Volume 2 - "Tribute to Mancini")

If you need a great geologist in the Barnett Shale I would recommend PhD Billy Coldwell who has actively been on the cutting edge of discovering and educating others about the Barnett Shale. [e-mail]

If you have Minerals or are able to execute an Oil & Gas lease in the Barnett Shale please contact me at [e-mail] as there are many oil and gas companies ready to drill in this highly active and successful area.



The Paleo Landscape and the Birth of the Barnett Shale began with the defining of the Fort Worth Basin and also the Conglomerate Zone discovered by early Wildcatters such as Coke Gage, P. Ellenberger, T.B. Pickens, George Mitchell, Norman Stovall, and C.W. Sanders. But George Mitchell discovered how to stimulate this zone and with that and the established conglomerate zone above it a blanket coverage was quickly defined to be the "Barnett Shale". It was soon later known through science that this layer was in fact responsible for feeding the above zones with natural gas and that this was in fact the source bed rock.





Mitchell Energy / George Mitchell was acquired by Devon in January 2002, and began developing the Barnett Shale in the Fort Worth Basin in the northeast sector of central Texas in 1981. The Mississippian-age Barnett Shale is one of the most uniform stratigraphic units in the basin, outcropping along the flanks of the Llano uplift in central Texas, where it is about 30 to 50 feet thick. The Barnett Shale dips gently and thickens to the north, reaching a maximum depth of around 8,900 feet and a maximum thickness of almost 1,000 feet near the Texas-Oklahoma border.

Large fractures in the Barnett Shale are created by tectonic stresses created after deposition about 300 million years ago. Huge grids of small sized fractures extend northeast southwest across the area, but could not be produced until onset of newer fracturing techniques. Barnett Shale production was first established in the Newark East Field in Wise and Denton counties, where it grew from less than one billion cubic feet of gas from 25 wells in 1985 to 19.2 billion cubic feet from 306 wells in 1995. During the past five years, production has more than doubled to 40.6 billion cubic feet from over 500 wells. The Barnett is found at 6,500 to 8,900 feet in the Wise and Denton counties area, the pay layers at 400-500 ft. are almost 10 times thicker than in similar fields and divided into lower and upper intervals by the Forestburg Limestone.

Father and son team Sanford and Jason Dvoran and AFE Oil and Gas Consultants expanded the Barnett Shale play area in 1997 with a discovery in Dallas County, approximately 12 miles southeast of the Newark East Field. In fact they are the only ones to produce Dallas county at all. The firm continued to expand its play area with three wells in northeastern Tarrant County. At first, AFE completed wells only in the lower Barnett interval, using massive hydraulic fracturing treatments that pushed the cost of completion per well to almost $1 million. In 1998 the firm experimented with a new stimulation technique that employed water as the fracturing fluid, required significantly less proppant and was about 60 percent less expensive than the conventional stimulation treatments. The technique proved successful and has since been implemented field wide. In September of 2005 the team completed its 74 successful well in the barnett shale using this process.




Devon with James Hall demonstrated a technique for economically completing the upper Barnett Shale interval, increasing reserves in their core area by 25 percent, or 250 million cubic feet per well, and expanding the play to previously marginal areas. This new completion technique in combination with a 50-acre spacing infill well drilling program is expected to allow Devon Energy to increase its Barnett Shale gas production and open up new areas for exploitation. (Devon perforated the upper zone which George Mitchell did not stimulate)



Regional Geology
The subject prospect occurs in the Fort Worth Basin, which is one of most intensively drilled areas in the United States. There are several prominent pay zones as listed below, shallowest first: STRAWN SANDS Usually above 5000 ; occurs as channel sands, extremely productive locally.
CADDO LIME Occurs below the last Strawn Sand and may be thick and prolific as at Breckenridge.
CADDO CONGLOMERATES A series of coarse-grained sands particularly prolific in Montague County just to the northwest.
CONGLOMERATES The major pay in this area producing over 3 trillion cubic feet of gas in Wise County.
CONGLOMERATES ATOKA-BEND The major pay in this area producing over 3 trillion cubic feet of gas in Wise County.
MARBLE FALLS LIME A zone above the Barnett at about 7000'. This may produce in the Fletcher well.
BARNETT SHALE "SOURCE BED ROCK" Thick hydrocarbon rich shale between 100' -1000' thick occurring at depths below 7000' to as deep as 9000'.
OBSIDIAN Evidence of a massive explosion or super volcano. - perhaps Yellowstone
MISSISSIPPIAN REEF Thick and prolific but rare, reefs produce mostly to the west or in the Bend Arch.
VIOLA LIME Locally productive on structures in the northern portion of the Fort Worth Basin needs a structural trap.
ELLENBERGER The deepest pay at nearly 10,000 deep in the deeper portion of the Fort worth Basin needs a structural trap. two major epics the Devonian is missing Silurian is missing 100 of millions of years.

Key Advantages of Drilling and Producing in the Barnett Shale

The three key advantages of shale gas plays are moderate development costs, high success rates and slow production decline rates. The rapid growth in the late 1980s and early 1990s in the Antrim Shale, which is being repeated today in the Fort Worth and San Juan basins, is driven by the powerful economic incentives of low risks and low reserve finding costs. Recent technological advances in hydraulic fracturing, coupled with the application of multiple fracture stimulations over the life of a well to recover additional reserves create an attractive opportunity to produce in the Barnett Shale.

Over 700 hundred wells have been drilled in the Barnett without a dry hole. Many of these will produce over 1 BCF with the best at 2 BCF; some areas produce less with an average of about .5 BCF. The Barnett Shale gas has a BTU from 950 in the south to about 1250 in the Fletcher area, garnering a premium from $0.30 to $0.50/MCF. Barnett Shale wells have been producing for over 14 years, thus some wells may produce for 20 years or more.



For many large producers, their high overhead costs prohibit aggressively pursuing small, yet highly productive areas like the Barnett Shale. However, for smaller operators like Sanco, R.L. Adkins, Oxley, Sanders, EOG, Devon (DVN), Dvorin, LLANO, TEMA, NESS, The Natural Gas Group (NGG), 7777, Crown and Lonestar Natural Gas (LNG) with operating and overhead cost structures streamlined, the Barnett Shale play truly becomes a success simply because of reserve potential and blanket coverage.

Expert companies producing the Barnett shale include:

www.devon.com | www.naturalgasgroup.com | www.oilandgascompany.com | www.texaslandandenergy.com | www.sanco.us

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