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Shop ’Till You Drop - Is the Consolidation Trend Ending in British Columbia’s Montney Gas Formation?

British Columbia’s portion of the immense unconventional Montney formation has been the epicenter of Western Canada’s rapidly rising natural gas production in recent years. It should come as no surprise then that it has also become fertile ground for numerous acquisitions of companies — or some portion of their assets — by more nimble and financially stronger gas producers. However, as we discuss in today’s RBN blog, the most recent acquisition by Canada’s largest natural gas producer, Tourmaline Oil Corp., leaves the list of potential targets shockingly short.

 

The Montney formation remains at the forefront of upstream natural gas activity in Western Canada. Straddling the provincial boundary that separates British Columbia (BC) from Alberta (yellow-outlined region in Figure 1 below), it is considered one of the lowest cost and most prolific natural gas producing regions in North America. The Montney has consistently surpassed expectations in terms of reserve size per well, initial wellhead production rates and liquids recovery (i.e., a mix of ethane, propane, butane and field condensate). Fortunately for all of those gas producers, gas demand has also been expanding with the startup of the LNG Canada export plant on BC’s coastline and rising gas power and industrial demand in Alberta, with plenty of molecules left over for export to the rest of North America.

 Figure 1. Western Canada Primary Unconventional Gas Formations. Source RBN_1

Figure 1. Western Canada Primary Unconventional Gas Formations. Source: RBN

The Montney has become the dominant natural gas producing basin compared to its close geologic brethren — the Deep Basin (purple-outlined region in Figure 1 above), which is primarily in Alberta and consists of several sandwiched unconventional layers, as well as the liquids-rich Duvernay formation (teal-outlined region above) that is typically considered more of a true shale as opposed to the tight gas of the Montney. So compelling is the Montney that we dedicated a five-part-series to the formation (see Big Gun).

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