Rush to liquids backfires for natural gas producers - Globe and Mail

By Carrie Tait
Calgary
September 26, 2012

It was the natural gas industry’s big new thing.

Major producers, long suffering from an industry oversupply of natural gas and ultra-low prices, in the past year or two spent bundles to boost production of obscure energy products such as butane and condensate – also known as natural gas liquids – which had been enjoying solid demand and strong prices.

But the party didn’t last long. As companies rushed to ramp up output from fields rich in natural gas liquids, prices tumbled as supplies jumped – dragging down the performance of gas companies using the diversification strategy.

Two major gas producers, Talisman Energy Inc. and Encana Corp., began their shift toward natural gas liquids in late 2010, when prices were buoyant.
The benchmark blended price for a gallon of NGLs was $1.0567 (U.S.) in early January, 2011; it rallied to $1.2983 in May, 2011, and stayed in the triple digits until last February, according to data collected by BMO Nesbitt Burns Inc.

But recently the market has been plunging. On Tuesday, the benchmark price for a gallon of NGLs sold for 68 cents – a 44-per-cent drop from a year earlier.

The natural gas liquids business “is not all it is cracked up to be in some cases,” said Luc Mageau, an oil and gas analyst at Raymond James in Calgary.

And the tumble in gas-liquids prices came just as natural gas prices rallied, though they remain at historically low levels.

“Today, you’ve had almost a 50– or 40-per-cent increase in [natural] gas prices, but the offsetting decline in NGL pricing has effectively made average pricing for a gas-focused producer the same,” Mr. Mageau said. “You’re realizing the same price today as you were in April.”

NGLs – condensate, butane, propane, and ethane – are extracted as producers pump natural gas. Energy companies are paid based on the volume and value of each separate commodity in the mix; the blended price reflects the varying prices and the fact that some NGLs make up a greater percentage of production.
In Canada, condensate and butane are the most valuable liquids, while ethane and propane are weak. Condensate, for example, typically trades at a premium to West Texas Intermediate crude.

Condensate, which is similar to a light oil and can be used to transport bitumen, is a key part of the liquids game. Dean Foreman, Talisman’s chief economist, said that in his company’s Eagle Ford play, about two-thirds of the production value is wellhead condensate, and the rest is gas and less valuable liquids.

“That’s the prize. That’s what people are searching for,” he said. While ethane and propane supplies are outstripping demand, that will not “fundamentally undermine” liquids-rich plays, he said, given the price that condensate commands.

Talisman, whose shares have lagged other energy companies amid criticism about its strategy, installed Hal Kvisle as its chief executive two weeks ago after abruptly removing John Manzoni from the top spot.

Ethane, which is expensive to extract from the natural gas mix but can be abundant, is a particularly weak slice of the liquids market. It trades in lock-step with natural gas in Canada, Mr. Mageau said, noting that two buyers, Dow Chemical Co. and Nova Chemicals Corp., dominate the market and their plants are running at 70-per-cent capacity. “Ethane doesn’t do anything for you,” he said.

Encana Corp. believes its long-term contracts to sell ethane to Dow and Nova at a premium to Alberta’s gas benchmark will help buffer problems in that market, said Encana spokesman Jay Avrill. He argued that Encana can ride out any bumps in the NGL market. “This is a long-term strategy. It is not to say: ‘Hey, let’s cash in and get by for the next couple of years until natural gas comes back,’” he said. “We’re not going to switch and jump based on short-term volatility and price volatility.”

Encana added $600-million to its 2012 spending budget in June, a move aimed at increasing liquids production. It is also searching for oil as it tries to distance itself from dry natural gas. The shift came after Encana spent years married to its strategy to increase natural gas production despite languishing prices. Shares dropped and investors howled, and they remain nervous as Encana chases new plays.

“You’ve seen a significant increase, particularly in the United States, in natural gas production that is rich in liquids. Probably a 25– to 30-per-cent increase in supply over the last four years or so,” said David Smith, chief executive at Keyera Corp., which processes natural gas streams. “So that has created additional volumes of all the NGLs – ethane, propane, butane, and condensate.”

Hedging NGL Production

Recent report by Platts:

"Some producers are having difficulty hedging their rapidly expanding natural gas liquids production, as currently available financial products lack sufficient liquidity or product correlation. In essence, producers are still learning how best to hedge their liquids output, according to Michael Zenker, director at Barclays Capital. Some producers will lock in an NGL hedge as a percent of oil production, which results in a proxy hedge that may leave them vulnerable to situations when the prices of oil and liquids do not correlate." Also reported by Gas Business Briefing

My point of view:

The financial products priced at Mt. Belvieu, Texas (MTB) and Conway, Kansas (CWY), both do provide sufficient liquidity. MTB is better since there are more traders and more contracts exchanged daily (estimates placed at between 150 - 300 contracts per day).  CNW is less liquid (50 - 75 contracts per day). Depending on your company's thresholds, typically established by internal risk and credit groups, these volumes may not be liquid enough based on the standards used for buying/selling natural gas.  LESSON: Using financial instruments for NGL is not the same as natural gas... you need to recalibrate the liquidity thresholds based on the NGL marketplace and match back to your own NGL production profile.  This will require educating your risk and credit groups... good luck, some of them may still think NGL is text-shorthand for "not gonna lie".

In 2005, our team developed several regression models comparing historical pricing between Edmonton, Alberta, Canada (EDM), CWY and MTB.  EDM was the most illiquid.  In fact price discovery was outright non-existent, if it wasn't for our actual production that was being produced and sold out of Taylor, British Columbia, Canada (Younger Extraction Plant) and central Alberta. CWY was better, but still had issues. Some of them well published through the press and legal courts since there are fewer major players that act as traders out of this hub.  MTB remains the best NGL trading hub, based on the aggregation of supply and the large petrochemical industrial demand

That being said, simply executing hedges priced at MTB and CWY will still leave you open to other forms of risk, since your sales point may not be close to MTB or CWY.  Many producers contract to sell their natural gas and NGL at delivery points thousands of miles/kilometers upstream of MTB and CWY. As a result, producers are subject to basis risk, or the pricing differential between their sales point and the end market consumers of NGL. LESSON: To reduce basis risk, enter into NGL sales contracts that are priced off of MTB or CWY with a firm deduction that would approximate transportation, marketing and ancillary fees.  This will allow you to receive MTB- or CWY-based pricing for your production, and will enable you to hedge by using financial instruments priced at these locations... thereby reducing basis risk.

On another note, I am not necessarily a big proponent of hedging NGL.  The market for NGL has disconnected from natural gas prices (other than ethane, which is still highly correlated to natural gas).  The historical frac spread for NGL gapped out in 2006 and has not returned to long-term averages (1995 to 2004) since then, except for brief couple weeks in late 2008. However, if your company needs price certainty to support the quarterly earnings, met dividend commitments or show stability for bankers or credit rating agencies, using NGL hegdes to lock in frac spread or NGL margin, the above strategies will help... but be prepared... these instruments typically settle out of the money, since price certainty comes at a price.  Just like insurance.

Other sources:

Understanding Frac Spread or NGL Margin

BP: NGL - Risk Management - FAQs

Understanding Natural Gas Liquids and Frac Spread 101

Where do Natural Gas Liquids Come From? What is frac spread?

RECENT PUBLICATIONS
4 Apr 2013: NGL hedging takes off amid shale gas boom (Energy Risk) [subscription required; author Alex Osipovich interviewed me]

10 Jan 2010: Energy Hedging 101: The Frac Spread by "CaR"

INTRO

After doing a wikipedia search and broad internet search, I thought it would be good manners to explain Natural Gas Liquids (NGL) and Frac Spread, to the best of my ability... plus, every time I am asked, I can simply reference colleagues to this site.  My perspectives on NGL and Frac Spread is based on more than 15 years following NGL or frac spread margins, development of financial derivative models to hedge NGL commodity risk, which were built with representatives from Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan and BP North America.

I have included within this blog a definition of frac spread or NGL margin, components of NGL, description of extraction and fractionation process, key terms/definitions and conversion/volumetric terms.

Below are some other good sites on the topic of NGL and Frac Spread:

Another Fracing Problem? NGL Prices and the Natural Gas Processing Frac Spread by Rusty Braziel of RBN Energy LLC
NGL Primer by The Energy Harbinger
A Propane Molecule’s Journey to Mont Belvieu by Callie Mitchell of RBN Energy LLC
Making Sense of Natural Gas Liquids by Aimee Duffy
Just What are Natural Gas Liquids Anyway? by Jim Willis
Carbon Rich Value High - Trading and Pricing Natural Gas Liquids by Callie Mitchell of RBN Energy LLC
Natural Gas 101 by Perpetual Energy
Natural Gas Liquids Play a Greater Role in Oil and Gas Activity by U.S. EIA
What are natural gas liquids and how are they used? by U.S. EIA

For an excellent video on gas processing and natural gas liquids extraction, see Keyera's segment on "Midstream 101" [make sure your browser allows pop-up windows]. Simple Midstream & NGL Frac screenshots below:

Republished in part with permission from FirstEnergy is Deep Cut Gas Plants that was originally published in February 2012.

MIDSTREAM SERVICES
The area enclosed in RED is the core component of understanding the source and generation of Natural Gas Liquids. Graphic courtesy of Enterprise Products Partners L.P.

FRAC SPREAD and NATURAL GAS LIQUIDS

Terms in Italics have been defined later.

Frac Spread is simply the value received on the sale of propane, butane and condensate (collectively, natural gas liquids or NGL or C3-plus or C3+) LESS the cost of the natural gas used to extract the natural gas liquids.

NGL is typically considered to be more valuable than natural gas given the other multitude of uses for NGL and its price relationship to oil, rather than gas. 

A blended Alberta- and British Columbia based barrel of C3+ contains 68% propane, 23% field butane and 9% condensate [based on pre-2012 data].  Based on the heat value equivalent of propane, field butane and condensate, one cubic metre (m3) of C3+ contains 26.47 GJ of natural gas equivalent or 4.2 GJ per barrel of C3+ (more below in the "Measures and Conversion Factors" section).

Between 2000 and 2007, the average frac spread, for a typical Alberta-based barrel of C3+ was approximately $10 per barrel (CAD).  From 2008 to 2010, frac spread averaged $26.75/bbl.  First quarter 2011, Alberta-based plant gate frac spread averaged $41/bbl.  In Mt. Belvieu, Texas, the most liquid market for buying and selling ethane and NGL, spot average frac spread has been between $55-$60/bbl.  The premium for NGL compared to its feedstock natural gas has reached all-time highs based on my records that go back to 1996.

However, frac spread can also be negative, which has occurred several times in the past 12 years and has lasted for several weeks in duration (ie. Katrina caused natural gas prices to spike above $12/GJ, while the value of the NGL did not increase as much).  Physically, frac spread cannot remain negative for long periods of time. Companies that extract and fractionate NGL within the midstream sector would reinject NGL or bypass the NGL completely, and therefore the NGL would end up in the natural gas transmission system. This would result in immediate supply reduction of NGL all together.  These operating decisions can happen very quickly at the plant level.

Frac Spread is also known as NGL Margin.  However, it is important to note that NGL margin when referencing Frac Spread does NOT contain ethane within its mix--products are limited C3+; 

Some extraction plant companies report frac spread after deducting the extraction premium paid to producers or shippers of natural gas to obtain the rights to remove NGL from the natural gas stream. In this case, frac spread would be equal to sale of C3+ LESS the cost of replacement natural gas LESS premium paid to obtain the right to extract NGL from the natural gas stream used.

Details covering the above short explanation have been included below for those that want to dig deeper. 

  

EXTRACTION and FRACTIONATION PROCESS

Extraction plants recover and process NGL in four main steps (see Figure A below):

1. Cooling the inlet processed natural gas to condense the NGL
2. Recompressing the residue natural gas for redelivery to a gas transmission systems
3. Fractionating the NGL into pure components and treating the components to meet commercial specifications
4. Terminalling of the NGL products.

Figure A: Extraction and Fractionation Process

An extraction plant typically routes natural gas off of high pressure gas transmission systems and is cooled in a series of heat exchangers. The cold inlet stream then flows through gas/liquid separators where condensed NGL are recovered. The cold vapour stream flows to an expander where the gas pressure is decreased, resulting in additional cooling and liquid condensation. The process temperature is such that the bulk of the NGL condense to a liquid and are recovered.

The methane and the unrecovered ethane form a residue gas stream. The residue gas flows first to the expander-compressor, which increases the pressure of the residue gas by recovering energy from the expander operation that was used to cool the natural gas. The residue gas is then further compressed, using electric drive gas compressors, so that it meets the receipt pressure of the specified gas transmission system.

The recovered NGL mixture flows to fractionation towers where the components, ethane, propane, butane and condensate, are separated and treated to meet commercial specifications.

The ethane is shipped by pipeline to petrochemical markets. Propane is shipped to market by rail, truck or pipeline. The butane is also shipped by rail or pipeline. The condensate is shipped by truck or pipeline. The NGL that are not fractionated into their constituents are shipped as part of a mix.

For an excellent overivew of the midstream business, which includes gas processing, NGL extraction and fractionation, and storage see Keyera's website for "Midstream 101".

WESTERN CANADA DEMAND FOR NGL: Oil Sands Blending and Petrochemical Facilities

See "Midstream 101 Special Edition: Oilfield and Oilsands Glossary"

TERMS

Natural Gas - A naturally occurring mixture of hydrocarbon and non-hydrocarbon gases found in porous geological formations beneath the earth’s surface, often in association with petroleum. The principal constituent is methane.

Raw Natural Gas - Natural gas directly from the well head that has not been processed.  Raw natural gas contains methane, other hydrocarbons called natural gas liquids, nitrogen and impurities such as sand, water, carbon dioxide (CO2), hydrogen sulphide.

Processed Natural Gas - Raw natural gas that has been dehydrated (water removed) and filtered to remove other impurities.  Processed natural gas may contain to various degrees other gaseous hydrocarbons called natural gas liquids.  The composition of the natural gas is dependent on the type, depth and location of where the underground deposit was drilled and produced up through the well head.

Sales or Residue Gas - Processed natural gas that is nearly all methane and has had nearly all natural gas liquids removed.  Sales gas is delivered through transmission systems and some minor facilities so that the gas can be used for heating residential and commercial homes.  If the natural gas liquids were NOT removed, there would be black smoke coming from our homes' chimneys, due to the extra carbon molecules that were released through burning.  Also, our furnaces would need to be replaced more often, due to the buildup of "oils" and carbon layers.

Natural Gas Liquids - most natural gas contains, to varying degrees, other hydrocarbons, which under pressure or at underground pressures, exist in a liquid state.  However, these molecules will become gaseous at normal atospheric pressures.  Collectively, these liquid/gases are called "natural gas liquids" or NGL.  The liquids are comprised of ethane, propane, butane and heavier hydrocarbons known as condensate.  These components typically can be sold at values higher than the residue natural gas or methane.  Based on data gathered in 2007, a typical million standard cubic foot (mmscf) of processed natural gas that was transported within Alberta on the Transcanada system (TCT) had a composition as follows:

Ethane  44.8 barrels (bbls)
Propane  8.6 bbls
Field Butane   1.8 bbls
Condensate  0.5 bbls

Northeast British Columbia 2007 averages were as follows:

Ethane  29.0 bbls
Propane  13.3 bbls
Field Butane  5.1 bbls
Condensate  1.6 bbls

Dry Natural Gas - Raw natural gas that is produced from a zone in which there are few NGL within the stream.  The composition of natural gas is deemed to be "dry".

Wet or Liquids-rich Natural gas - Raw natural gas that is produced from a zone in which the composition is high in NGL.

Sweet Gas - natural gas that is not considered to be sour gas.

Sour Gas - natural gas that contains a significant amount of hydrogen sulfide (H2S). Natural gas is usually considered sour if there are more than 5.7 milligrams of H2S per cubic meter of natural gas, which is equivalent to approximately 4 ppm by volume.

Acid Gas - the combination of hydrogen sulfide (H2S) and carbon dioxide (CO2) that has been removed from the raw natural gas stream.

Extraction - the method by which natural gas liquids is removed from raw or processed natural gas and produces an NGL mix.

Extraction Plant - Facilities that can remove natural gas liquids from raw or processed natural gas.  An absorption tower or "demethanizer" is used to remove the NGL mix from the natural gas (see Figure A above, which show full NGL extraction and fractionation). The processed natural gas is fed into the tower at the bottom of the tower, while an oil/chemical is fed from the top.  As the gas rises/bubbles up through the tower through a series of trays, the oil/chemical spills down on those same trays.  The oil/chemical attracts the NGL and methane (or combination of methane/ethane) continues up the tower into another pipe. The NGL and absorption oil is taken to another vessel where through a combination of pressure and temperature, the oil/chemical is removed from the mix to be used again in the absorption tower.  The NGL mix is then set to other fractionation tower or by pipeline to fractionation facilities in other markets.  Deep-cut extraction plants can remove the greatest amount of NGL from natural gas.  Deep Cut Extraction Plants can also remove ethane, which is the lightest NGL, by cooling the gas to a temperature (at least -110 degrees celsius) where the ethane changes from gas to liquid.  A deep cut extraction plant can produce an "ethane-plus" NGL mix or C2+.  Extraction plants can remove an NGL mix, but cannot split the NGL into its separate components which requires fractionation towers and separate component storage facilities.

Extraction Premium - the price paid above the local market price for natural gas by the extraction plant operator to the producer or shipper of natural gas in order to obtain the rights to extract the NGL from the natural gas stream.

Fractionation - the method of separating an NGL mix into its different components of ethane, propane, butane and condensate, or different mixes thereof.

Fractionation  Plant - facilities that can separate an NGL mix into its different components.  A deethanizer tower along with a turbo expander can chill natural gas to less than -110C to isolate ethane from the other NGL (see Figure A above, which show full NGL extraction and fractionation).  The process to split the other products (propane, butane and condensate) is chained together by using a depropanizer and debutanizer.  The figure also shows the process to split butane by using a C4 splitter which takes field butance and separates into normal and iso butane.  Most Canadian based factionation plants do not split butane.  This process is left to refineries or the petrochemical facilities.

Methane - The primary hydrocarbon within natural gas which has the chemical symbol/formula CH4 (Water has the chemical formula H20).  Methane is the shortest and lightest hydrocarbon molecule and looks like:

Figure 1: Methane

Ethane or C2 - is a hydrocarbon component of NGL used by petrochemical facilities.  Ethane is transported in gas form through pipelines.  Within Alberta, the Alberta Ethane Gas System or AEGS, is the primary method of transmission.  Ethane from Alberta and British Columbia is used primarily by NOVA Chemicals and Dow Chemicals to make ethylene, which is in turn used to make other ethylene structures, such as polyethylene which is the base substance for plastics. The chemical symbol/formula for ethane is C2H6 and looks like:

Figure 2: Ethane

Propane or C3 - is a hydrocarbon component of NGL used for heating, commercial drying applications (such as corn dried to make feed) and of course BBQ.  Propane burns clean and can be transported by truck, rail or pipeline, making it a versatile fuel. The more hydrogen atoms a molecule has the hotter the hydrocarbon will burn.  However, the more carbon atoms a molecule has, the more carbon released (smoke) and more carbon dioxide will be formed.  The chemical symbol/formula for propane is C3H8 and looks like:

Figure 3: Propane

Butane or Field Butane - is a hydrocarbon component mix of NGL and is used in numerous applications with the petrochemical industry, gasoline or oil additive. Butane from most fractionation facilities is a mix of normal butane (nC4) and iso butane (iC4), called field butane. In Alberta a typical field butane volume split is 70% normal or 30% iso.  Both butane molecules have four carbon atoms, but the hydrogen atoms are configured differently:

Figure 4: Normal Butane *

* Western Canadian normal butane has four primary markets: refiners who use it as a component of motor gasoline; crude oil blenders, who use it as a diluent; Keyera Corp.’s Alberta EnviroFuels (AEF) plant, which converts butane to iso-octane; and the export market. The crude-blending market absorbs more than 50% of daily production, with gasoline blending, the export market and AEF accounting for the remainder (see "Butane Extract" below).


Figure 5: Iso Butane **

** Isobutane, in turn, is used in the manufacture of premium gasoline. It occurs naturally and can also be made by running normal butane through an isomerization (a.k.a. butamer) unit.

Condensate or Light Crude Oil or Pentanes or Natural Gasoline - is a combination of hydrocarbon components of NGL that have five or more carbon molecules, such as pentane (C5H12) and hexane (C6H14). Condensate is used to assist oil and oilsands as a diluent to allow the oil or bitumen to be transported by pipeline.

Figure 6: Normal Pentane

Figure 7: Hexane

C3-plus or C3+ or NGL Mix - natural gas liquids, excluding ethane.  Propane has three carbon atoms hence the chemical formula notation C3. The "plus" refers to those natural gas liquids that have 4 or more carbon atoms, such as butane (iC4 or nC4), pentane (iC4 or nC5) and condensate (hexanes, etc.).

Butane Extract
Extracted from an article written by Clifton Linton for RBN Energy "(Can't) Give It Away - Too Much Butane In Edmonton Pushed Prices To Near Zero"

Butane is a four-carbon-atom natural gas liquid — a heavier NGL purity product than ethane and propane. It comes in various flavors with three most prevalent: normal butane, isobutane, and field-grade butane, which is a mix of the former two. Normal butane and isobutane have slightly different molecular structures, with normal butane having a straight-chain carbon string; the “iso” version’s carbon string is T-shaped. Western Canadian normal butane has four primary markets: refiners who use it as a component of motor gasoline; crude oil blenders, who use it as a diluent; Keyera Corp.’s Alberta EnviroFuels (AEF) plant, which converts butane to iso-octane (more on this in a moment); and the export market. The crude-blending market absorbs more than 50% of daily production, with gasoline blending, the export market and AEF accounting for the remainder. Isobutane, in turn, is used in the manufacture of premium gasoline. It occurs naturally and can also be made by running normal butane through an isomerization (a.k.a. butamer) unit.

There are two main ways to move butanes out of the Western Canadian Sedimentary Basin (WCSB). One is by leaving it within the rich gas that emerges from wells and exporting it to the U.S. via Pembina’s rich-gas Alliance Pipeline, which originates in northeastern British Columbia and runs through Alberta and Saskatchewan on its way to the Chicago area. (There it is extracted at the Aux Sable gas processing plant for use mostly in Midwest refining markets.) The other way is by rail; the problem is that rail is expensive, and volumes can be constrained if the railroads are congested. The result: more butane can become stranded in Alberta and is increasingly dependent on local consumption. See market price impact that occurred late 2018 and historically back in Jun to Sep 2015.

MEASURES and CONVERSION FACTORS

**NEW Apr 1 2013 - found an excellent resource put out by the National Energy Board of Canada for energy conversion factors (some repeated below).


1 barrel (bbl) (petroleum US) = 42 US gallons = 0.158987 cubic metres (m3)
1 cubic metre (m3) = 6.2898 barrels

1 standard cubic foot (scf)
1,000 scf = 1 mscf
1,000,000 scf = 1 mmscf

35.30 scf natural gas @ 14.73 psia and 60F = 1 m3 (101.325 kilopascals and 15C)

1 mmBTU = 1.054615 GJ
1 GJ on Westcoast-NW system = 1.055056 mmBTU

1 MMBtu = 0.9649 Mcf (sales quality natural gas)

NGL Physical properties:

Physical properties
C3 liquid GJ/m3	25.56
nC4 liquid GJ/m3	28.93
iC4 liquid GJ/m3	27.80
fC4 liquid GJ/m3	28.61
C5+ liquid GJ/m3	31.32
Synthetic Weighted Avg C3+ Heat Value GJ/m3	26.47
Gallons/bbl	42
bbl/m3	6.2898
GJ/mmBTU	1.0551

PHYSICAL PROPERTIES
		Ft*3/gal	BTU/gal	BTU/ft*3	liq GJ/m3	Gas HV Gj/e3
	Helium
	Nitrogen	91.41
	Carbon Dioxide	58.81
	Methane	58.90	59,846	1,010	16.6725	37.708
	Ethane	37.48	65,869	1,770	18.5965	66.065
	Propane	36.38	90,830	2,516	25.5703	93.936
	I butane	30.64	98,917	3,252	27.8089	121.410
	N butane	31.79	102,913	3,262	28.9418	121.790
	I pentane	27.38	108,754	4,001	30.5706	149.360
	N pentane	27.67	110,084	4,009	30.9498	149.660
	Hexanes	24.38	115,061	4,756	32.3421	177.550

Another key proxy, especially in western Canada is that there is 4.25 GJ of natural gas per barrel of typical C3+ (propane = 70%; field butane = 21%, comprised of 70% n-butane and 30% iso-butane; condensate 9%).