MarkWest

According to the Energy Information Administration (EIA), liquids production from the Utica shale in Ohio (identified as crude oil but more likely all lease condensate) has more than trebled since January 2014 from 19 Mb/d to a projected 64 Mb/d in May 2015. Regional production of plant condensate from natural gas processing has also increased with the build out of gas processing capacity in the Utica and nearby Marcellus plays and could reach 50 Mb/d by the end of 2015. Midstream companies have been busy developing infrastructure to get this condensate to market. Today we look at developing infrastructure and markets for Utica condensate.

In the five years since natural gas production began to take off in Appalachia, volumes in the Marcellus and Utica basins have increased by a factor of 9X.  Much of that natural gas production growth is “wet” gas containing significant volumes of NGLs. Consequently NGL production volumes have skyrocketed and midstream development has been booming.  But building all this midstream infrastructure in Appalachia does not work the way it does in other high-growth shale plays.  Making sense out of Marcellus/Utica midstream infrastructure is the subject of RBN Energy’s latest Drill Down report, “Join Together With Demand--The Who and How of Marcellus/Utica Midstream”. In today’s blog, we provide highlights of the report and discuss what’s in store for the Marcellus/Utica over the next couple of years using our new Pipeline GIS mapping system to help tie all of the assets together.

<p>MarkWest Energy Partners is clearly the big dog in the Marcellus/Utica, with by far the largest gas processing and fractionation capacity there.</p>

The fast-growing need for natural gas processing and fractionation capacity in the Marcellus/Utica is creating tremendous opportunities for midstream companies. But determining which assets to develop and when to develop them is complicated by the volatility of hydrocarbon markets, and by the fact that the region has only minimal NGL storage capacity. In today’s blog, we continue our in-depth review of NGL-related infrastructure in the Upper Ohio River Valley with a look at Blue Racer’s existing and planned assets there.