Empire Petroleum Corp. on Monday reported revenue of $52.9 million for 2022, up 95 percent from 2021 on higher sales volumes and prices.
The New York-listed company saw sales rise 46 percent last year to 2,163 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boed). Oil accounted for the largest share of sales at 61 percent, natural gas liquids (NGLs) accounted for 20 percent and natural gas 19 percent, Empire said in a news release.
It said it had started four new Bakken wells in the fourth quarter. The Bakken rock formation is located in the Williston Basin of the states of Montana and North Dakota. The Bakken and Three Forks formations in the same basin are estimated to hold 4.3 billion barrels of unconventional oil and 4.9 trillion cubic feet of unconventional natural gas, according to a U.S. Geological Survey assessment released Dec. 15 of 2021.
At Empire’s Starbuck Field Pilot Project in North Dakota, production has accelerated to 7,000 barrels of oil per month from 3,000 barrels of oil per month last year, according to the announcement.
However, Empire’s fourth-quarter revenue fell to $10.7 million from $14 million in the previous quarter, as sales fell to 2,149 boed from 2,232 boed.
“Contributing to the sequential decline from the third quarter of 2022 was temporary downtime due to the impact of severe winter storms on the Company’s operations and production shutdowns at Empire’s assets in the Rockies region, primarily associated with the temporary retirement of certain wells as in The company completed the execution of the Starbuck program,” the statement explained.
Despite a net loss of $2.29 billion in the fourth quarter, Empire ended 2022 “in a strong financial position” with net income of $7.1 billion for the year, $12.2 billion in liquidity, including $11.9 million in cash and $5.1 million in working capital. It has also reduced its debt by 16 percent to $7.2 billion at the end of 2022 from $8.6 billion at the end of 2021. Debt now represents less than three percent of the capitalization of Empire’s current market, he said.
Empire’s proven reserves rose to 13.2 million barrels of oil equivalent (MMboe) at the end of last year, up 27% year-on-year. It reported “positive revisions to previous quantity estimates of 2.2 MMBoe due primarily to the inclusion of LGN in New Mexico, expansions and discoveries of 0.7 MMBoe and acquisitions of 0.7 MMBoe.”
The acquisitions ate up about $3 million of Empire’s $14 million in capital investments last year. “Non-acquisition expense of about $11 million was primarily related to well improvement projects in North Dakota and non-operated drilling,” he said.
“We intend to focus our initial capital investments primarily on our asset base in North Dakota through a mix of activities, including drilling and completions, capital workovers, recoveries and related infrastructure,” said the Empire President and CEO Mike Morrisett.
The company traded up 7.2 percent at the close on the New York Stock Exchange on Tuesday after announcing its 2022 results.
To contact the author, please send an email jov.onsat@gmail.com
