Shaun Polczer, CALGARY: Despite a bearish outlook for natural gas prices, the flow of foreign dollars into North American shale-gas plays continues unabated. France’s Total and China’s Sinopec have each secured multi-billion dollar joint ventures with two of North America’s largest shale gas producers.
Total will pay $2.32 billion to farm in for 25% of Chesapeake Energy’s Utica shales in Ohio, while Sinopec struck a $2.2-billion partnership with Devon Energy covering emerging plays in Mississippi, Michigan, Louisiana and Colorado.
The terms are particularly attractive to the US companies, which will continue to operate the assets and control the pace of development – including the acquisition of more land.
The transactions show continuing high levels of interest in North America’s unconventional basins, even as natural gas prices fall to decade lows. According to the US government’s Energy Information Administration (EIA), Lower 48 inventories finished the week...