While the company did not confirm where the 43,736 enriched acres were located, it did confirm the rights were in addition to a gas lease signed with Consol Energy gas arm CNX Gas.

The transaction, including the mineral rights and associated gas lease – which will be managed through newly-formed subsidiary Blaze Minerals – is valued at more than $51 million.

Additionally, a 2010 underlying engineering report on the mineral rights estimated the value at $130 million. Blaze is updating that report to include current market conditions.

CNX leases the entire acreage of the deal for CSG production, and is presently in the first year of a five-year renewal.

“Having previously explored the underlying mineral rights for production as far back as 2006, the company has had a long-standing connection to these properties," chief executive officer A Leon Blaser said.

“With more than 500,000 million tons of in-place, clean coal reserves, in additional to the gas, the company was committed to acquiring the minerals rights as its core asset, since the sale of its natural gas interests to Petrohawk.”

No further specifics on the deal were available at press time.