Wanna learn more about Barnett Shale natural gas operations?
There’s a fresh opportunity, with the new Chesapeake Learning Center opening at a 2.5-acre site in Grapevine that has seven producing gas wells.
The grand opening for the Chesapeake Energy facility will be from 9:30 a.m. to 11 a.m. Thursday. It’s located at 3015 Grapevine Mills Circle, near the entrance to Grapevine Mills mall.
The event will include a 9:30 a.m. reception and brief comments by speakers at 9:50 a.m. The public may participate in a question-and-answer session with technical experts from 9:30 to 10:30, with a brief interruption for the speakers.
The center will be open to the public 24 hours a day, seven days a week. There is no charge and free parking will be provided.
Over the next couple of years or so, the site also is expected to offer visitors an opportunity to witness drilling and hydraulic fracturing of new wells. Approximately 10 additional wells are planned for the site, Chesapeake spokesman Brian Murnahan said.
The center will include a covered pavilion offering educational materials and an observation area allowing visitors a “ring-side seat” to see inside the well padsite, Chesapeake said today in announcing the new facility.
The seven wells at the site produce gas from beneath more than 600 acres in Grapevine, said the Oklahoma-City based company, the No. 2 producer in the Barnett Shale. The Barnett is a geological formation, generally more than a mile below the surface, that underlies more than 20 North Texas counties and is one of the largest natural gas-producing areas in the U.S..
Thursday’s grand opening will feature a 106-foot-high workover rig, used to perform maintenance on gas wells; a seismic truck, used in mapping potential gas deposits in the Barnett Shale and other geological formations; and a “confetti cannon” to open the event with a bang.
The center is designed to educate the public and help it understand “that there’s really nothing to be afraid of” in regard to natural gas operations, Murnahan said. “This really will be, for those who are interested in the oil and gas industry, a site to come and see.”
--Jack Z. Smith
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