Junior company on verge of commercial CBM production

Thunder Energy, a Calgary-based junior, aims to join the emerging ranks of coalbed methane producers in Alberta this year.

Doug Dafoe, Thunder president and chief executive officer, said the company expects to integrate its first commercial CBM project with its conventional business, which is projected to reach 45 million cubic feet per day in 2004.

By year’s end Thunder hopes to have 10 percent of its production coming from CBM, he said.

Thunder has budgeted C$70 million from cash flow to drill an estimated 125 wells this year, up from 110 wells in 2003, including a “significant” expansion of CBM activity.

In the Fenn-Big Valley area of central Alberta, where the company plans 66 shallow conventional gas wells, it is also targeting 50 wells in the Horseshoe Canyon coals.

Thunder said CBM development is contingent on a four-well pilot test north of Edmonton. Two other pilots have been completed with “encouraging” results.