frac spread

Over the past nine months, the frac spread —a rough-cut measure of the value of extracting NGLs from raw gas at gas processing plants — has taken a terrifying plunge, from $9.82/MMBtu in early March to only $2.16/MMBtu on Monday. Given that the frac spread is the differential between the price of natural gas and the weighted average price of a typical barrel of NGLs on a dollars-per-MMBtu basis, a 78% nosedive like that suggests that something is seriously out of whack, and that at least some market players are taking a real hit financially. In today’s RBN blog, we discuss the frac spread, the drivers behind its recent freefall, and what it would take for gas processing margins to rebound.

There is no such thing as a typical NGL barrel. For example, the composition of y-grade production out of the Marcellus is significantly different from y-grade out of most of the Permian. And it is not just gas processing engineers who care. The make-up of an NGL barrel is inextricably linked to the value of that barrel. The reason is pretty simple: there’s a big difference in the value of each of the five NGL products. These days, natural gasoline is worth nearly eight times as much per gallon as ethane. Normal butane is worth 1.6X as much as propane. Consequently, the more natural gasoline and normal butane in your barrel versus the amounts of ethane and propane, the more the barrel is worth. So it’s important to anyone trying to follow the value added by gas processing and related infrastructure to understand where these numbers come from and how much the composition of a barrel can vary from basin to basin, or for that matter, from well to well. In Part 2 of our series on gas processing, we turn our attention to the variability in the mix of NGL production and its implication for processing uplift.

OK, we admit it. Our title may be a bit of an overstatement in early 2020, but it was absolutely true back in 2012, when the frac spread was $13/MMBtu. These days, the frac spread — the differential between the price of natural gas and the weighted average price of a typical barrel of NGLs on a dollars-per-Btu basis — is only $2.48/MMBtu as of yesterday. But with Henry Hub natural gas prices in the doghouse — they closed on February 11 at $1.79/MMBtu — getting $4.27/MMBtu for the NGLs extracted from that gas, or an uplift of 2.4x, is still a pretty darned good deal. And that’s Henry Hub. Natural gas prices are lower in all of the producing basins, and are likely headed back below zero in the Permian this summer. So even with NGL prices averaging 30% lower than last year, the value of NGLs relative to gas can be a big contributor to a producer’s bottom line — assuming, of course, that the producer has the contractual right to keep that uplift. Today, we begin a blog series to examine the value created by extracting NGLs from wellhead gas, including processing costs, transportation, fractionation, ethane rejection, margins, netbacks and the myriad of factors that make NGL markets tick. We will start with the frac spread — what it tells us in its simplest form, how we can improve the calculations so it can tell us more, and, just as important, the economic factors that the frac spread excludes.

With ethane prices remaining below 30 c/gal, making it only slightly more valuable than natural gas at Henry Hub on a Btu equivalence, most natural gas processors/producers can earn a greater profit when ethane is sold with natural gas (rejected) than when it is extracted and sold with the NGLs. How much more money you may be wondering? The answer is — it depends. Are there downstream pipeline contracts and sunk costs impacting the decision making? Are the contracted volumes on an ethane-only pipeline or a raw mix pipeline? How far away is the producing basin from the Gulf Coast market? How do all these factors come together to determine whether ethane is produced or rejected and the value created? Today, we continue our discussion of the MQQV gas processing model — this time focusing on the Value principle. This is our final blog focusing on the MQQV model and, with it, we are making it available to all Backstage Pass holders should you want to run scenarios of your own.

Prices for heavy NGLs (propane, butanes, natural gasoline) have been rising fast since the middle of 2017, but the same cannot be said for the price of ethane. For most natural gas processors/producers, low ethane prices mean that ethane continues to be worth more when sold with natural gas (rejected) than when it is extracted and sold with the other liquids. But as NGL production continues to grow, hitting a record-high 3,968 Mb/d in October 2017, and new steam crackers are just starting to come online, there is a limit to how much ethane can be left in the residue gas stream without violating dry gas pipeline Btu specifications. How do processing plant designs, gas pipeline specs and economics play into a gas processor’s decision regarding whether to extract or reject ethane? Today, we continue our discussion of RBN’s MQQV gas processing model — this time focusing on the Quantity and Quality principles.

NGL prices have been rising fast since the middle of this year, but the same cannot be said for the price of natural gas. So how does this market scenario play out for gas processors who make their money extracting NGLs from gas? It plays out pretty darn good. In Part 1 of this series, we looked at how the relationship between the price of NGLs versus natural gas can be assessed by the Frac Spread, and concluded that things are definitely looking up for gas processing economics. But we also concluded that the Frac Spread misses the impact of a few key factors, including the BTU value and composition of the inlet gas stream. So today we’ll see what it takes to incorporate those factors into our assessment and, in the process, do a deep dive into the math of gas processing to examine the relationship between volumetric capacity, gallons of NGLs per 1,000 cubic feet of natural gas (GPMs) and moles. Today, we continue our latest expedition into the wilds of gas processing.

Not long after crude oil prices crashed in 2014, natural gas processing economics hit the skids. From late 2014 through the first half of 2017, times were tough for natural gas processors and the producers processing natural gas to extract NGLs in their plants. That’s because the per-MMBtu price difference between natural gas prices and NGL prices was low. Very low. In fact, during 2015-16, it was the lowest it’s been over the past decade except for a brief period during the 2009 financial meltdown. But things are looking up. Thanks to a big boost in from propane and butane prices — and, to a lesser extent, rising ethane and natural gasoline prices — natural gas processing economics look healthier today than they have in years. It is going to get even better as more new ethane-only steam crackers come online. Given these developments, it is clearly time for another deep dive into what makes gas processing economics work, and how the numbers are about to change. Today, we begin our latest expedition into the wilds of gas processing. 

The frac spread—the difference between the value of a typical basket of NGLs and the price of natural gas, in $/MMBtu—has averaged a paltry $2.28 for the past two years, by far the longest period of depressed NGL values since the start of the Shale Revolution. That’s bad news for natural gas processing economics, which are most favorable when NGL prices are strong and natural gas prices are weak. But things are about to get a lot better. Today we consider the currently low frac spread, what it means for natural gas producers and processors, and why a big turnaround may be in the offing.