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Ohio’s well reports topics of interest

Monster. Bigfoot. Blue Thunder.

With nicknames and terms like that being tossed around about the region’s gas wells, it becomes obvious that the reality of Eastern Ohio being the new energy center has only just begun.

The first Ohio Department of Natural Resources quarterly report on Ohio well output, now required in place of annual reports from the energy producers, shows big output in the region.

In the third quarter of 2013, Ohio’s wells produced more than twice as much oil and gas than was produced through all of 2012.

And officials of the Ohio Oil and Gas Association say it’s only the beginning of the shale energy move that has been predicted as a potential boom for the region.

It’s not just gas but gas and oil, with a Belmont County well reporting 1.25 billion cubic feet of gas during the report period, and a Harrison County well producing 41,617 barrels of oil for a 70 day period from July through September.

Keep in mind that all those resources mean revenue and the money is paid in part to the landowners, as well as to the workers who spend money throughout the region.

Based on the Bureau of Land Management statistic that shows an average home would use about 88,272 cubic feet of gas annually, the Harrison County well is able to supply more than 56,000 homes in a year if its output is looked at on an annual basis.

The question remains just what the boom will bring, both to the region and the nation. Energy experts and industry representatives are worried the U.S. is moving too quickly to export the gas from the shale regions, including ours. The gas is bringing a higher price overseas, but exports would mean the U.S. could face higher prices in the future instead of the lower energy prices – and a resurgent industrial sector – that the abundance of a domestic gas and oil supply should bring.

The quarterly reports will continue to come in Ohio, and it will be with great interest that area residents should quantify the region’s future. And to use as leverage when the federal government’s policies could cause the abundance to be of greater value to other nations.

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