text: **10**| LETTER TO SHAREHOLDERS 
  
  with these new play efforts, the most notable of which are described 
  in the sections below. 
  
  Pearsall Shale — This shale underlies most of our Eagle Ford acreage 
  and is the second “sleeper” of our natural gas shale plays. We have two 
  rigs dedicated to testing this formation, and our first few wells have 
  significantly exceeded our expectations. This formation is found about 
  3,000–4,000 feet deeper than the Eagle Ford and so for the play to 
  become competitive with our other natural gas shale plays, we will need 
  natural gas prices to strengthen from where they are today. We believe 
  this will likely occur in 2013 at the latest. We believe our 350,000 net 
  acre Pearsall leasehold position could support the drilling of up to 3,000 
  additional net wells. 
  
  Eagle Ford Shale — This South Texas shale is distinctive from the other 
  shale plays described above because it has three components: an oil 
  play, a wet natural gas play and a dry natural gas play. During 2009–10, 
  Chesapeake acquired approximately 600,000 Eagle Ford net leasehold 
  acres, all of which were in the liquids-rich portions of the play. Our initial 
  wells were very successful, and in late 2010 we sold 33.3% of our assets 
  in the play to Beijing-based Chinese National Offshore Oil Company 
  (CNOOC) for $2.2 billion in cash and drilling carries. This was CNOOC’s 
  first investment in the U.S. onshore E&P industry, and we are proud that 
  it chose Chesapeake as its first U.S. onshore partner. We are currently 
  drilling with 16 rigs in this play and expect to accelerate our drilling to 
  40 rigs by year-end 2013. We believe our 470,000 net leasehold acre 
  position could support the drilling of up to 5,500 additional net wells 
  in the years ahead. 