Penn Virginia Corporation
From Wikimarcellus
Radnor, Pennsylvania-based Penn Virginia Corporation (NYSE: PVA) is an independent oil and gas exploration and production compnay. The wholly-owned subsidiary Penn Virginia Oil & Gas Corporation (PVOG) is its exploration arm. PVA owns a leasehold of 40,000 acres prospective for Marcellus shale in northeastern Pennsylvania and has additional holdings in West Virginia.
In an October, 2008 PVA was reported to have been leasing land in Pennsylvania that was prospective for Marcellus shale. It had the intention of drilling there during 2009. To date, it had leased roughly 40,000 net acres mainly in Pennsylvania.
According to an August, 2008 report, PVA'a joint venture (JV) partner was Zone Oil & Gas. The JV project included 3-D seismic mapping and also drilling up to six wells in the Appalachian Basin. It covered PVA's 40,000 acres that were under lease in Fayette, Potter, Somerset, Tioga, and Westmoreland Counties in Pennsylvania.
A February, 2009 update provided by Penn Virginia indicated that the company had conducted 50 miles of 2-D seismic in northern Pennsylvania and planned to drill two Marcellus shale wells there by the end of 2009.
PVA also owned an extensive leasehold position in southcentral West Virginia including 8500 acres in Mason County and 30,000 in Boone County. During 2007 two horizontal wells were drilled in Mason County targeting the Huron shale. One horizontal well targeting the Huron had been drilled in Boone County; a second, vertical well had been completed to both the Marcellus and Huron shales. According to the aforementioned February, 2009 report, the company opted to defer the capital costs of connecting up these West Virginia Huron wells to a gathering system. Instead it deployed the capital elsewhere during 2009.
A November, 2009 press release announced that Penn Virginia planned to move its divisional office in Kingsport, Tennessee to a new office in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. According to the release, the move was to be made for efficiency reasons in anticipation of growth in the company's Eastern Division related to the potential of the Marcellus shale. The move was to be effective March 31, 2010.
According to a February, 2010 company update, PVA was in the process of drilling test wells in its northeastern Pennsylvania leasehold. It had also been acquiring new leases and had budgeted up to $48 million for doing so. In January, 2010 the company had drilled its first vertical Marcellus shale test well in Tioga County, PA. Completion of this well was to be determined based upon analysis of the Marcellus shale portion of the core. PVA planned to drill up to 6 test wells; 4 of these were to be horizontal. It had been successful bidder in a state lease sale acquiring 3,700 net acres in Potter County, PA.
A press release appeared in March, 2010 regarding a planned pipeline gathering system by a company formed by PVA, Penn Virginia Resource Partners LP (NYSE: PVR). The line was to handle Range Resource's production in Bradford, Lycoming, and Tioga counties. It was to have a capacity of 700 Mmcf/d and be built over a period of five years at a cost of %170 to $200 million.
A later March release mentioned that a division of the aforementioned PVR, Penn Virginia Resource Midstream (PVR Midstream), had entered into an agreement with a private company in Wyoming County, PA to build a gas gathering line and compression facility. It was to be a 12-inch gathering line and compression station with capacity of 25 Mmcf/d. The line was to become operational during the second quarter of 2010. It was to cost $6 to $7 million during 2010 with future extensions costing up to $10 million.
- A. James Dearlove is Penn Virginia's President and CEO.
- Frank A. Pici is PVA Executive Vice President and CFO.
- H. Baird Whitehead is Executive Vice President and COO.
- William H. Shea, Jr.is CEO of Penn Virginia Resource Partners LP (PVR).
