Targa Resources’ plan to acquire sour-gas specialist Stakeholder Midstream will give the midstream giant an even stronger foothold in the Northern Delaware Basin, where much of the associated gas has high levels of H2S and CO2.
Bragging rights are a big deal in Texas, and we’re not just talking pride about the Astros’ annual rampage through baseball’s post-season. Getting to the top is also a source of immense pride for oil and gas midstreamers, and right now Targa Resources claims the bragging rights as the largest gatherer and processor of associated natural gas in the Permian Basin. Targa’s bold decision to build an integrated gas and NGL business, its timely infrastructure expansions through and after the pandemic, and a recent, accretive acquisition have resulted in a massive footprint where a stunning 25% of forecast Permian gas production growth is expected to take place. But strong competitors such as Enterprise Product Partners, DCP Midstream and Energy Transfer are nipping at Targa’s heels. In today’s RBN blog, we discuss highlights from our Spotlight Report on the company.
Bragging rights are a big deal in Texas, and we’re not just talking pride about the Astros’ annual rampage through baseball’s post-season. Getting to the top is also a source of immense pride for oil and gas midstreamers, and right now Targa Resources claims the bragging rights as the largest gatherer and processor of associated natural gas in the Permian Basin. Targa’s bold decision to build an integrated gas and NGL business, its timely infrastructure expansions through and after the pandemic, and a recent, accretive acquisition have resulted in a massive footprint where a stunning 25% of forecast Permian gas production growth is expected to take place. But strong competitors such as Enterprise Product Partners, DCP Midstream and Energy Transfer are nipping at Targa’s heels. In today’s RBN blog, we discuss highlights from our new Spotlight Report on the company.
Increasing scale. Improving efficiency. Expanding into a fast-growing production area. These are only a few of the many reasons that midstream consolidation has remained an ongoing phenomenon in U.S. oil and gas basins — nowhere more so than in the Permian. The slew of acquisitions, mergers and joint ventures announced in the past couple of years is resulting not only in more concentrated ownership of midstream assets in West Texas and southeastern New Mexico, but in large, smooth-running systems for gathering, treating and processing hydrocarbons and transporting them to market. In other words, in magnificent molecule-moving machines. With today’s RBN blog, we begin a short series on the latest round of midstream M&A activity in the U.S.’s hottest production area.
Though crude oil prices have been rebounding lately, this spring’s price crash sent shockwaves through the U.S. midstream industry, which not too long ago had emerged from a decade of massive infrastructure investment in response to unprecedented upstream production growth. Just as midstreamers were looking forward to steady earnings growth, waves of huge capex cuts and well shut-ins by producers shattered forecasts and shifted strategic instincts toward survival instead of growth. Every company is different, of course, but a lot can be learned by examining a single firm in detail to see how it will fare in the current market environment, given its particular set of assets and arrangements. Take Targa Resources. An analysis of its performance provides insights into the outlook for integrated natural gas and NGL assets, especially in the Permian Basin, as well as the value of forming joint ventures. Today, we preview our Spotlight report on Targa.
Though crude oil prices have been rebounding lately, this spring’s price crash sent shockwaves through the U.S. midstream industry, which had just emerged from a decade of massive infrastructure investment in response to unprecedented upstream production growth. Just as midstreamers were looking forward to steady earnings growth, waves of huge capex cuts and well shut-ins by producers shattered forecasts and shifted strategic instincts toward survival instead of growth. Every company is different, of course, but a lot can be learned by examining a single firm in detail to see how it will fare in the current market environment, given its particular set of assets and arrangements. Take Targa Resources. An analysis of its performance provides insights into the outlook for integrated natural gas and NGL assets, especially in the Permian Basin, as well as the value of forming joint ventures. Today, we preview our new Spotlight report on Targa.
The recent collapse in oil prices has thrown into question the future levels of crude, natural gas and NGL production in, among other places, the Permian Basin and the Eagle Ford. That will lead midstream companies to take a fresh look at the two regions’ existing and planned infrastructure to make sure they still are in line with pipeline, processing and other needs. Today, we conclude our series on the two regions’ natural gas processing plants, NGL pipelines and fractionators with a look at where we stand, and what’s ahead.
As we said in Part One of this series, the production of NGLs has risen sharply in the past five years, and the pace of growth is only increasing. In response, the four leading fractionators in Mont Belvieu have been adding new capacity and planning more. They also have been adding pipeline capacity to move NGLs in and out of Mont Belvieu’s massive storage capacity and building and expanding export terminals nearby to facilitate the export of LPG, ethane and other NGL-based products to consumers overseas. We also discussed how geography and geology have helped to make Mont Belvieu (30 miles east of Houston) the center of US fractionation activity. As we said, it is located near several oil and gas production regions; it is in the heart of petrochemical production; it is along the coast (a must for importing and exporting); and it sits atop one of the world’s largest salt dome formations). Finally, we talked about how fractionators in Mont Belvieu compete with each other for business primarily on price (fractionation fees) and logistics (the ability to provide the pipelines and storage needed to smoothly move product through the process), and how fractionators in other regions are always looking to take some of Mont Belvieu’s market share.
