Barnett Shale
The Barnett Shale in the Fort Worth Basin was one of the first major shale gas plays developed using horizontal drilling.
Gas Production
Source: U.S. EIA — Barnett shale gas (cached) · Latest source period Jun 2026
U.S. government data, public domain at the source. Well counts are monthly. We do not publish a basin rig count or a historical basin series, because we do not have a current source for either.
Understanding Barnett Shale
The Mississippian Barnett Shale lies within the Fort Worth Basin of north-central Texas. Work in the Barnett helped establish the combination of horizontal drilling and multi-stage hydraulic fracturing later applied across U.S. shale plays. Reservoir depth, thermal maturity and natural fractures vary across the basin, with the Forestburg limestone separating portions of the shale interval.
The mature play now has a different activity profile from newer growth basins, but it remains important for understanding shale development history and legacy well performance. EIA publishes a Barnett-specific shale-gas series through its STEO data route. Oil is not part of that series and is deliberately omitted rather than shown as zero.