Oil and Gas Investor magazine announced the names of its 2006 Excellence Award winners on February 1, the opening day of the North American Prospect Expo (NAPE) at the George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston.

Oil and Gas Investor’s March 2007 issue includes a special section with details on all the award winners and lessons from them.

This year’s winners are as follows:

* Executive of the Year: Harold Korell, chairman, president and chief
executive of Southwestern Energy Co. The Houston-based company has
made a name for itself on Wall Street with its promising Fayetteville
Shale play in Arkansas where Southwestern quietly put together some
800,000 acres before other producers jumped in. Under Korell, since
1997, the company has gone from less than $100 million in market cap at
one time to $6.4 billion, and it projects year-end 2007 production from
its Fayetteville assets alone of 300 million cubic feet per day.

* Best Discovery: operator BP Plc and partners Oklahoma City-based Devon
Energy Corp. and Anadarko Petroleum Corp. for their huge Lower Tertiary
discovery in the Gulf of Mexico. The Kaskida prospect was drilled in
5,860 feet of water to a total depth of 32,500 feet in Keathley Canyon
Block 292. The well encountered 800 net feet of hydrocarbon-bearing
sands. The find appears to be the largest yet made in the world-class
Lower Tertiary play in the Gulf of Mexico.

* M&A Deal of the Year: Anadarko Petroleum Corp.’s simultaneous, profile-
changing acquisitions of gas players Kerr-McGee Corp. and Western Gas
Resources Inc. The total $23.3-billion deals were funded with short-
term debt, which The Woodlands, Texas-based Anadarko has been paying
back with asset divestments, such as in the Gulf of Mexico and Canada.
With the acquisitions, Anadarko received some 4.3 trillion cubic feet
equivalent of proved gas reserves and 711 million barrels of proved oil
reserves.

* Financing of the Year: Denver-based Forest Oil Corporation and Houston-
based Mariner Energy Inc. (NYSE:ME)
have received Financing of the
Year for Forest’s spin-off and merger of Gulf of Mexico assets with
Mariner. The deal involved a multiple-step transaction, featuring a
Reverse Morris Trust component, a share distribution to Forest
investors generally tax-free and Mariner’s listing on the New York
Stock Exchange.

* Best Field Rejuvenation: Tulsa-based Williams Cos. for its nuts-and-
bolts engineering work on its mature San Juan Basin properties, which
are making 163 million cubic feet of gas per day, up from 135 million
in June 2005. The company’s production-optimization and -enhancement
team gained volumes by lowering field operating pressures, optimizing
flow rates, and drawing down bottomhole pressures.

* Best Investor Relations Program: Houston-based Newfield Exploration
Co., which had a challenging 2006 while trying to explain its emerging
Woodford Shale program to the marketplace while also needing to hit
production targets in other plays, which it missed three times in the
year due to continued post-hurricane and other problems. A tour of its
Woodford program for more than 80 analysts and investors shed light on
the goals and possibilities there, and Newfield’s stock performance
improved.

* Best Corporate Citizen: Denver-based Questar Exploration & Production
Co., for its work in the Pinedale Anticline area of Wyoming. In
discussions with community members, regulatory agencies and
environmental groups, Questar will reduce surface disturbance 67% via
directional drilling up to 30 wells per pad, resulting in 60% fewer
wellpads, and it has other innovations under way that reduce emissions
and tanker-truck trips. The plan has won it year-round drilling access
to its leases, while addressing wildlife and air-quality concerns.

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Source: Hart Energy Publishing