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Cabot is consolidating its regional offices in Denver and Charleston into a new "north region" headquarters in Pittsburgh, company officials said Thursday night.
Cabot, West Virginia's fourth-largest natural gas producer, cited a "desire to improve efficiency" for its decision to shutter its eastern region office, which occupies three floors of the Huntington Banks building in downtown Charleston.
"Decisions that disrupt our employees lives are never easy, but we feel these changes will provide Cabot Oil & Gas the best and most efficient structure long-term," said Dan Dinges, Cabot's chief executive officer.
About 25 Cabot employees at the Charleston regional office have been asked to move to Pittsburgh, while 15 will be laid off, the company said.
"This is deeply disturbing," said Kanawha County Commission President Kent Carper. "These are irreplaceable jobs."
The consolidation of the Charleston and Denver regional offices will allow Houston-based Cabot to increase drilling and exploration in what geologists call the Marcellus Shale formation, which extends throughout the Appalachian Basin, Dinges said.
Though the West Virginia regional office is closing, a dozen employees in Cabot's gas control and measurement department will remain in Charleston, the company said.
Cabot's move follows Chesapeake Energy's decision in February to close its regional headquarters in Charleston and cut 215 jobs. Days later, Columbia Natural Gas Transmission Corp. announced it was eliminating 95 workers in Charleston and another 75 employees across the state.
Cabot's eastern regional office primarily oversees operations in West Virginia and Pennsylvania. Cabot also operates West Virginia district offices in Glasgow, Pineville and Danville.
The company has more than 150 workers throughout the state.
Last year, Cabot had 3,382 wells in the eastern region. The wells produced about 69 million cubic feet of natural gas daily.
"They've been targeting northeast Pennsylvania with the Marcellus Shale development," said Corky DeMarco, executive director of the West Virginia Oil and Natural Gas Association. "They drilled a lot of wells here in 2005 through 2007. Now they're targeting Pennsylvania."
DeMarco speculated that most of the Cabot jobs leaving Charleston pay $60,000 on average.
"The impact to the area isn't pretty," he said. "Their production numbers have been fairly high. They've been among the top five [natural gas] producers in West Virginia for years."
Cabot also announced Thursday that Thomas Liberatore, the eastern region's vice president, has resigned.
In 1992, Cabot closed its regional headquarters in Charleston and moved the office to Pittsburgh. Eight years later, the company reversed course and returned the regional headquarters to Charleston.
In 2005, Cabot started running tests in Southern West Virginia for future gas wells in the Marcellus Shale formation.
Last year, Cabot challenged a decision by the Manchin administration to reject the company's plan to drill nearly three dozen new natural gas wells inside Chief Logan State Park. Cabot holds lease agreements for gas under the 3,600-acre park.
Cabot's lawyer's filed a petition in Logan County, asking a judge to overturn the Department of Environmental Protection's decision to deny the company a drilling permit. The lawsuit is still pending.
The company drilled its first gas well in West Virginia -- in Calhoun County -- in 1899.
"Cabot's been here forever," Carper said. "They've been a mainstay. Their history is rich and longstanding."
Cabot, an independent natural gas and oil producer, also has significant operations in Texas, Louisiana, the Rocky Mountain region and western Canada.
Natural gas prices have dropped significantly in recent months, forcing companies to restructure and scale back operations.
Nonetheless, Dinges said Thursday he remains optimistic about the future of natural gas.
"When all the rhetoric ends, the result will be a desire for a clean energy resource readily available in the United States that can meet the energy demands of a growing nation. Natural gas meets all the criteria, and is the most immediate solution to a clean energy source. That is why I am optimistic that reality will rule ultimate energy policy."
@tag:Reach Eric Eyre at ericeyre@wvgazette.com or 304-348-4869.
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