The Utica Shale might prove to be a bigger play than the nearby Marcellus, a senior Shell executive told the North American Gas Forum in Washington, DC this week.

“The Utica has the potential to trump the Marcellus,” Greg Guidry, executive vice president-unconventionals, upstream Americas, told attendees at the conference, adding that initial drilling results on Shell’s acreage in northern Pennsylvania have been “very impressive.”

He pointed out the acreage lies some 300 miles northeast of the Utica’s recognized “sweet spot” in southeastern Ohio that has seen rapid development by several drillers. “The play extension is very substantial,” Guidry added.

Shell has some 275,000 net acres in Tioga County, Pa., with an option on an additional 155,000 net acres. It told analysts at its annual investor day in early September that it has had Utica wells in Pennsylvania with IP rates of 11 million to as high as 26 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d).

Guidry’s comments come less than a week after Magnum Hunter Resources Corp. announced stunning numbers for a well at the opposite end of the play in Tyler County, W. Va., the southeastern extreme of the Utica. Magnum Hunter said its Stewart Winland 1300U well flowed at peak rates of 46.5 MMcf/d on an adjustable choke with 7,810 psi flowing casing pressure and is now flowing to sales on the company’s Eureka Hunter Pipeline. True vertical depth is 10,825 feet with a 5,289-foot horizontal lateral, and successfully fracked in 22 stages.

It added it has three additional wells in the area that have been completed and will flow to sales when state permits have been received. Magnum Hunter holds some 200,000 net acres in West Virginia and Ohio that are prospective for both the Utica and Marcellus.