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Shale gas discoveries have transformed North America’s natural-gas industry. The massive fields have created a surplus of the fuel that has driven prices down to 10-year lows and sparked the creation of a nascent liquefied natural gas industry as producers look to tap high-paying markets in Asia and elsewhere.

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Apache owns 430,000 acres of exploration lands surrounding its new find and its wells have already been connected to pipelines in the region.

However the field could also supply an LNG export facility the company and partners Encana Corp and EOG Resources Inc are planning to build at Kitimat on British Columbia’s northern coast.

Bedingfield said the company will not rush to develop the field while gas prices remain low but called the field “a huge resource for the future.”

The find was one of several the company detailed for investors on Thursday. Along with its Liard field, the company said its 580,000 acres of land in the Mississipian Lime field in Kansas and Nebraska could contain as much as 2 billion barrels of oil while its holding in Montana’s Williston Basin may hold another 1 billion barrels.

As well, it’s targeting as much as 1.3 billion barrels of oil in Alaska’s Cook Inlet and 1.4 billion barrels from its holding off the shore of Kenya. It will drill in both regions later this year.

Apache said its holdings in western Oklahoma and the Texas panhandle could also hold another 5.4 billion barrels of oil equivalent while the Permian Basin in west Texas and New Mexico hold 3.4 billion barrels of oil equivalent.

Analysts said Apache, a company that has often focused on growing by acquisition, will now focus on building production by drilling its existing properties worldwide.

“Apache has typically … been viewed as an M&A driven company,” said Rob Cordray, an analyst at Guggenheim Securities. “But this shows a tremendous amount of organic growth potential. There’s a huge drilling inventory for these guys.”

Apache shares were up US$1.09, 1.3%, at US$87.10 by early afternoon in New York.

© Thomson Reuters 2012