Cunningham Energy LLC has announced plans for two new shallow horizontal oil wells to be drilled in Kanawha County, West Virginia.

The newly planned horizontal program will be drilled from the "Matterhorn" pad, consisting of two initial wells surveyed with a specified measured depth ("MD") ranging from 6100′ to 6800′ plus feet and vertical depths ("TVD") of 2150′ plus feet.

Both "Matterhorn" horizontal wells are targeting oil in the Weir Sand formation. Cunningham Energy also plans to utilize one of the company’s three Speedstar 185 top drive drilling rigs in conjunction with these new wells. Each well bore on the Matterhorn pad has been planned to be completed with multiple frac stages with varying spacing dependent on future wireline data.

"Cunningham Energy is looking forward to developing this promising new shallow horizontal oil & gas play in West Virginia," said Ryan Cunningham, of Cunningham Energy. "Prior in house drilling data has shown strong oil production potential and experts feel that the potential of these shallow horizons is in the infancy of the game.

"The Weir Sand has shown exciting vertical logs in this area and it holds tremendous potential horizontally. Economic conditions in our industry point to lower cost production being the new normal and the Weir Sand horizontal can possibly fit into that slot. The company sees possible lifting costs of this new play to be advantageously low during the first years of production." Cunningham Energy is currently completing the Lions Paw 4-Well Horizontal Program in Clay County, West Virginia. The company anticipates spudding the first Matterhorn well by Spring of 2016.