Oklahoma’s Expand Energy is among the nation’s top gas producers who are benefitting from a data center construction boom in the Appalachia basin.
As more and more data centers are being constructed in such states as Virginia and Pennsylvania, it’s also driving the need for more natural gas—just what Expand Energy and other firms such as Range Resources and EQT do.
Those firms are responsible for supplying the natural gas from the gassy Marcellus Shale in Pennsylvania. Some describe the feeding frenzy from data centers a “natural gas boom.” As Fortune magazine reported, Appalachian footprints and market cap values have spiked 25% to 7% over the past year.
Expand, the nation’s largest domestic natural gas producer, had 8 rigs running in the Appalachia in the past year and in its recent second quarter earnings report indicated, it had record quarterly production in the Northeast Appalachia, drilled 4 of the top 10 best FPD or Field Production Data wells in the first quarter and drilled 9 of the top 10 best FPD wells since the start of 2024.
Southwest Appalachia also had a record in FPD in the second quarter and set a u.S. land lateral length record of 27,657 feet. It all added up to a second quarter where Expand had $1.3 billion in net cash provided by operating activities and $968 millionor $4.02 per share in net income.
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