Ascent Resources LLC hopes to be “showing the way” with its environmental, health and safety practices in the Appalachian Basin, Jeff Fisher, CEO of the shale producer, said during an interview at Hart Energy’s recent DUG East conference and exhibition in Pittsburgh.

“It’s a big deal for us,” Fisher told HartEnergy.com. “We were early pioneers in the Marcellus and, of course, the Utica play. And this is the area that I think the new generation of operations really came about.”

Ascent Resources holds 350,000 net acres in the overpressured southern part of Ohio’s Utica play, primarily in Belmont, Jefferson, Guernsey, Harrison and Noble counties. Bolstered by $1.5 billion worth of acquisitions last year, the Oklahoma City-based company now produces from some monster wells.

“We had to improve things,” he continued. “To operate at the scale and coming into new environments, we had to change the way we operated and practiced. There was some valid pushback. I think the industry has done a great job of taking that on and inventing new ways of doing our business.”

Fisher also has hopes he’ll see the Appalachian Basin become more unblocked in the near future, noting that several new pipelines have recently come in.

“The basin is exporting more gas throughout the nation and ultimately across the water and that’s been exciting for us to be a part of that,” he said. “It does appear that for now, at least for the foreseeable, there is sufficient capacity for operators to continue to grow at least at a reasonable pace.”

Ascent Resources has partnered with The Energy and Minerals Group (EMG) and First Reserve Corp. as the leading financial backers of its Appalachian operations.

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RELATED:

DUG East: Key Players Eye Increased Production In Utica

“Ascent In The Utica” featured in the August 2018 issue of Oil and Gas Investor

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Onshore