Matador Resources Company and its midstream affiliate, San Mateo Midstream (“San Mateo”), announced the completion and successful start-up of the expansion of San Mateo’s Black River cryogenic natural gas processing plant (the “Black River Processing Plant”) in Eddy County, New Mexico.

The expansion of the Black River Processing Plant adds an incremental designed inlet capacity of 200 million cubic feet of natural gas per day to the previously existing designed inlet capacity of 260 million cubic feet of natural gas per day for a total designed inlet capacity of 460 million cubic feet of natural gas per day.

The expanded Black River Processing Plant supports Matador’s exploration and development activities in the Delaware Basin and is expected to gather and process natural gas from Matador’s Stateline asset area and from the Stebbins area and surrounding leaseholds in the southern portion of its Arrowhead asset area (the “Greater Stebbins Area”).

The Black River Processing Plant currently processes natural gas from the Company’s Rustler Breaks asset area and also provides natural gas processing services for a number of other San Mateo customers in the area.

Matador has also secured firm transportation via pipeline and fractionation for all anticipated natural gas liquids (“NGL”) and firm transportation via pipeline for all residue natural gas volumes, including those attributable to the newly increased inlet capacity, delivered at the tailgate of the Black River Processing Plant.

Matador also announced that San Mateo is nearing completion on the construction of approximately 24 miles of large diameter natural gas gathering pipelines between the Black River Processing Plant and the Company’s Stateline asset area, as well as approximately 19 miles of large diameter natural gas gathering pipelines between the Black River Processing Plant and the Greater Stebbins Area.

In addition, San Mateo is nearing completion on the construction of approximately 19 miles of various diameter crude oil pipelines from certain points of origin in Eddy County to the existing San Mateo interconnect with Plains Pipeline, L.P. in Eddy County. These various pipelines are expected to be placed in service at various times from early to mid-September 2020.

Matador recently initiated flowback operations on its five Leatherneck wells in the Greater Stebbins Area, all two-mile laterals, as anticipated. The Company also remains on track to begin turning to sales the 13 Boros wells, all two-mile laterals, drilled and completed in the Stateline asset area in early September 2020.

The Boros wells are expected to be turned to sales in a staggered fashion of three to four wells at a time throughout September and into early October. These projects reflect Matador’s tightly integrated strategy of growing its exploration and production and midstream businesses together, as well as the planning, execution and hard work of the Matador and San Mateo teams to achieve the goals the Company set two years ago in terms of production and reserves growth, midstream expansion and improved capital efficiency. Matador looks forward to providing additional details on the completion of the various pipeline and other midstream projects and the initial test results from the Boros and Leatherneck wells in September and October, as these results become available.

Joseph Wm. Foran, Matador’s Chairman and CEO, commented, “We are pleased to announce the completion of this most recent expansion of the Black River Processing Plant, which was initiated almost two years ago and was completed this summer on time and on budget. Along with the addition of the enhanced processing capacity and firm transportation and fractionation, the Black River Processing Plant and associated residue gas takeaway should provide Matador reliable transportation for the natural gas and NGLs from our Rustler Breaks and Stateline asset areas and the Greater Stebbins Area for years to come. The Board and I congratulate and thank the members of our midstream and asset teams – and especially the teams in the field – for the significant value they have created through their efforts and strong execution. We also greatly appreciate the support from our San Mateo joint venture partner, Five Point Energy LLC.”