Since long, there have been plenty of political and environmental battles going on in regard of the Marcellus Shale natural gas field. And a latest research seems to bring a big twist in this tale of debates.

According to two independent financial firms, the Marcellus apart from being the biggest natural gas field in the country is also the most reasonable place for energy companies to drill. Reason behind this is that Marcellus reserves lie in the underneath parts of Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio and New York. And all these are quite ahead of what the government has estimated recently.

But according to another latest research, it is just the dominant grouping of resource, cost and location that has brought such a major change in the prices of natural gas and has drastically changed the market trends across the entire nation.

A report from Standard & Poor's that was released earlier this week revealed that the Marcellus is so huge that it could contain "almost half of the current proven natural gas reserves in the U. S".

But then at the same time, another report from ITG Investment Research, which is a worldwide financial firm based in New York, discovered this Marcellus well production report produced by federal government to be a grossly discreet one.