Under the terms of the transaction, Reliance will acquire a 40% interest in Atlas’ core Marcellus Shale acreage position. Reliance paid Atlas apprximately $339m in cash at closing and will pay an additional $1.36bn under a carry arrangement by funding 75% of Atlas’ capital costs over the development program.
Reliance and Atlas have agreed to acquire, in a series of transactions, 42,334 prospective Marcellus Shale acres in southwestern Pennsylvania for an average purchase of $4,532 per acre.
Substantially all of the acreage to be acquired is held by production and is either contiguous with the JV’s existing acerage or in concentrated blocks of acerage.
As a result of these transactions, the Atlas/Reliance JV will now control approximately 343,000 Marcellus Shale acres, of which approximately 137,000 acres are net to Reliance.
