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UGI NatGas Supplies Largest UPS CNG Station – Near Harrisburg

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Shipping giant UPS recently opened its fourth-largest U.S. distribution hub (a “superhub”) outside of Middletown, PA, in Lower Swatara Township (Dauphin County, near Harrisburg). It is UPS’s largest natural gas fueling station in the country, and it is fed by a pipeline built by UGI for that purpose. While the press announcement says the gas is “renewable natural gas” (RNG), there is no doubt the actual molecules feeding the plant come from the Marcellus.
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Wackos Gather in Harrisburg to Push for 100% Solar/Wind in PA

This past Tuesday, hundreds of Pennsylvanians gathered in Harrisburg to “rally for a new vision for the Commonwealth powered by 100 percent renewable energy.” Among those attending including representatives from businesses, various religious leaders, local mayors, and nurses and doctors to advocate for “bipartisan” legislation to force PA to dump fossil fuels and adopt 100% renewable energy. There is no polite way to say this, but say it we must: This so-called “bipartisan” gathering to push House and Senate bills demanding the state dump the use of fossil fuels (like natural gas) and instead stick solar panels on every rooftop and windmills on every hilltop to power the Keystone state’s electricity (and other) power needs is stark….raving….mad. It’s lunatic. Forcing the state to adopt 100% renewables is not “nice” or a “gentle, blessed future that will arrive someday.” Adopting 100% renewables is a deluded fantasy. To pretend otherwise is unkind. We must call this nuttery out for what it is: irrational hatred of fossil fuels. We have nothing against any form of energy. They all have their pluses and minuses. You like a solar panel on your house–good for you! An ugly windmill with it’s whump whump whump sound nearby? Whatever floats your boat. But ending the use of fossil fuels to generate electricity any time within the next 75-100 years is the end of human life as we know it. What was presented at the rally as some benign gathering of average citizens was nothing of the sort. Big Green (radical) groups, including PennFuture, were behind this flummery…
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Harrisburg NatGas Pipeline Manufacturer Laying Off 180

Dura-Bond Industries operates a pipeline and coating manufacturing plant in Dauphin County, PA–near Harrisburg. The plant, acquired from Bethlehem Steel in 2003, “manufactures and coats steel pipe in diameters from 24 to 42 inches, mostly for the natural gas industry.” You would think with all of these new pipeline projects in the works that business at the plant would be in overdrive. Unfortunately, that’s not the case. Because of a glut of steel imports from places like India and Canada, business at the plant is down. Dura-Bond recently filed a notice that within 60 days they will layoff 180 workers–about 40% of the workforce at the plant. Which is a shame in our book. While the company is mouthing platitudes about trying to rehire them at some point, the local union says don’t count on it. Those jobs are gone gone…
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Harrisburg Job Fair Oct 6-7 Looks to Fill 400 Pipeline Jobs

Listen up job seekers in eastern Pennsylvania: The International Brotherhood of Teamsters is looking for 400 people to work on building Williams’ Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline–a $3 billion, 198-mile natural gas pipeline project running through 10 Pennsylvania counties to connect Marcellus Shale natural gas from northeastern PA with the Williams’ Transco pipeline in southern Lancaster County. The job fair is happening TODAY (Friday) and TOMORROW (Saturday) ath the Harrisburg-Hershey Crown Plaza located at 23 South 2nd Street in Harrisburg (8am-4pm both days). According to the Teamsters, there are “hundreds of jobs to fill” and they are “looking to expand our workforce quickly.” Qualifications? You need to be 21 years old or older, have a driver’s licence, and be willing to travel. Construction experience is a plus, but not required. Here’s the deets…
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Big Green Group Makes Big Deal Out of Tiny ME2 Mud Spill

Will anti-fossil fuel Big Green groups succeed in turning a molehill into a mountain? That’s what they are attempting to do with the latest tiny spill (50 gallons) of drilling mud by Sunoco Logistics Partners in underground drilling work for the Mariner East 2 pipeline project in Dauphin County, PA. Over the past several months, Sunoco has experienced some “inadvertent returns” (i.e. leaks) of drilling mud at various locations. One of those was in Chester County, where a serious leak temporarily fouled a water aquifer and clouded drinking water for 15 local households (see Sunoco Stops ME2 Drilling in Chester County Following Water Issue). Sunoco took extraordinary steps to make it right, going so far as to pay to run municipal water to affected homeowners. Earlier this month Sunoco struck a deal with several Big Green groups to provide stricter regulation for ME2’s underground drilling (see Sunoco Strikes Deal with Devil, “Settles” with Anti Groups re ME2). Part of the deal says if Sunoco experiences two leaks of drilling mud at the same location, they must shut down drilling in that location and wait for the state Dept. of Environmental Protection to further review drilling plans before they can restart. On August 24th there was a 50-gallon drilling mud spill into the Susquehanna River in Dauphin County related to ME2. (A quick reminder: drilling mud, or “bentonite,” is non-toxic–the same stuff found in toothpaste and kitty litter). Thing is, there was another spill of 495 gallons at the same location a week earlier. Antis say Sunoco must now shut down drilling in that spot until further notice. Sunoco is saying that particular location was not part of the signed agreement…
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Group Forms to Shill for High Electric Prices from PA Nuke Plant

Exelon Corporation, the company that operates the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant near Harrisburg (yes, THAT infamous TMI), is accomplishing what it set out to do. Nuclear power simply can’t compete against low-cost, abundant, clean-burning natural gas. And it’s losing. Just like coal did. But nuke plants produce a lot of electricity. And until the past few years, they’ve been quite profitable for the companies that own them. Not any more. So what do those companies, like Exelon, do? Ask the government to stack the deck, of course! Exelon recently announced they will close TMI in the next year or two–unless Pennsylvania behaves like socialist New York and Illinois to prop up the money-losing plant with subsidies. We wrote about this issue recently (see Nuke the Nukes: Harrisburg Battle to Prop Up Failing Nuke Energy). TMI is now the poster child. “Give us money, or we’ll shut ‘er down.” And with the threat of a shutdown, Exelon has enlisted local and state politicians to “sound the alarm” (i.e. shill) in order to “save jobs” and “save our communities” by injecting taxpayer and ratepayer money into these failing power plants…Continue reading

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Radicals Protest Outside PA Senate Hearing on NatGas Benefits

On Wednesday, the Pennsylvania Senate Majority Policy Committee and Environmental Resources and Energy Committee held a joint hearing to examine the economic benefits natural gas production has brought the Keystone State. MDN friend David Spigelmyer, president of the Marcellus Shale Coalition, was present and let legislators know that PA has become the #2 natural gas producer in the country, and that remarkable feat has brought PA billions of dollars in investment. The investment in new or converted natural gas electric plants alone has reached $10 billion! Thad Hill of Calpine Corporation (nation’s largest generator of electricity from natural gas) also spoke. While the adults were inside talking about serious issues, children in adult bodies were outside misbehaving, as they typically do. Radicals (paid protesters) from Earthworks held a protest rally on the steps of the Capitol where they held up big, black balloons. Yeah, we have no idea what makes them tick either…Continue reading

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PA Landowners Rally in Harrisburg to Support Royalty Bill

Pennsylvania State CapitolLandowners from Bradford, Susquehanna, Wyoming and Lycoming counties (Pennsylvania) attended a rally in Harrisburg, at the Capitol, on Tuesday. They were there to lobby for and support passage of House Bill (HB) 1391, a bill that would guarantee landowners a minimum 12.5% royalty payment regardless of post-production costs. We have extensively covered this issue, which is causing a schism between landowners and drillers (see our most recent article: Guest Post: A Possible Solution for the PA Royalty Issue). Affected landowners are extremely mad, and want their legislators in Harrisburg to pass HB 1391. They were there to make the case. Although they had hoped the measure might come up for a vote on Wednesday, the bill’s sponsor, Garth Everett, said it won’t be considered until October when the House is back in session…
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Radical Democrats Invoke God + Sham Science to Bash PA NatGas

Just about nothing makes us more angry than when self-righteous “religious” leaders prance in front of cameras to denounce extracting and burning fossil fuels, like natural gas, as immoral or unethical. They are the height of hypocrisy–because they left them homes and churches heated with natural gas, wearing clothes made from fibers that come from petrochemicals (oil and natural gas), driving vehicles powered by fossil fuels, speaking into microphones with plastics in them and standing at a podium made from a material derived from petrochemicals–to denounce it all. Yet they use it every single day themselves. They claim to have God on their side. Repugnant. The Rev. Dr. Leah Schade (United in Christ Lutheran Church in Lewisburg, PA) and a group of 50 or so other hypocrites recently held an interfaith rally in Harrisburg to call on Gov. Tom Wolf to stop all drilling for gas and oil in the state–because it’s “immoral.” Too bad Rev. Shade lost her way and quit worshiping God and instead now worships nature. Her twisted philosophy is what happens when you quit worshiping the Creator and instead worship the creation…
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7 Antis Arrested at Final PA Pipeline Task Force Meeting

Yesterday we reported on the very last Pennsylvania Pipeline Infrastructure Task Force meeting, held in Harrisburg on Wednesday (see PA Pipeline Task Force Wraps Up – Did We Worry for Nothing?). Once again anti-fossil fuelers disrupted the meeting, which is nothing new. Last October a group of 20 or so antis showed up and behaved badly (see PA DEP Sec. Quigley Calls Pipeline Protesters “Badly Misinformed”). At Wednesday’s final Task Force meeting, seven protesters behaved badly enough that they got themselves arrested. To their credit, the Democrat-run PBS StateImpact Pennsylvania is the only “media” outlet that covered the news of the arrests…
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PA DEP Sec. Quigley Defends DEP, Criticizes Patriot-News Series

backstabberWow. We didn’t think it possible. The PennFuture Secretary of the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP), John Quigley himself, is sticking up for the honor and reputation of his agency. Last week the Democrat-run Harrisburg Patriot-News ran an attack series against shale energy. We told you about it by reprinting Tom Shepstone’s excellent critique (see Harrisburg Newspaper’s Attack Series on Marcellus Exposed). Tom followed it up with another excellent article with a clip of the vapid lead author’s Twitter feed showing her outright bias against not only shale in general, but against the DEP in particular (see Natural Gas Now, PennLive Shale Series: “Erin” Go Bragh?). Quigley had fully cooperated with the Patriot-News and lead series author Candy Woodall, and now feels betrayed and stabbed in the back (welcome to the club John). So Quigley wrote a response to the profoundly biased attack series–and wonder of wonders, the Democrat Patriot-News actually published his response! Here it is…
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Harrisburg Newspaper’s Attack Series on Marcellus Exposed

media biasOne of the Pennsylvania Democrat in-house publishing operations is the Harrisburg Patriot-News. Owned by Dems, run by Dems, slavishly supportive of Dems. That about sums up the Patriot-News. They don’t even pretend to be unbiased in their “reporting” on issues like the Marcellus Shale. This past Monday the Patriot-News began running a series of lying hit pieces against the Marcellus industry–in a transparent attempt to help their boy Gov. Tom Wolf in his bid to hike taxes on the drilling industry. We’ve read some of the articles. Lie after lie after lie. We haven’t commented on it here in MDN because it’s just more of the same. Why bother? The paper is obviously agenda-driven and cares nothing whatever about reporting real, actual news. However, MDN friend Tom Shepstone has put together a brilliant expose of their lies, so we’re bringing you a copy (from his always-excellent Natural Gas Now website) below. Tom points out this “series” by the Patriot-News is a perfect example of why no one trusts the media any more…
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PA DEP Holds its First CPP “Listening Session”

Frazier Crane I'm ListeningOn Tuesday the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection held it’s first “listening session” to consider which creative ways they will cut the economic throat of the state by attempting to comply with nonsensical carbon standards set by our Dear Leader, Barack H. Obama, via his so-called Clean Power Plan (see PA Anti-Fossil Fuel Groups Praise Wolf/Quigley for Supporting CPP). The master of ceremonies for the three-hour event was none other than the PennFuture Secretary of the DEP himself, John Quigley, who said Obama’s nutty standards are “ambitious, but achievable.” Most of the 27 speakers were a stacked deck–there to support the CPP standards. There were, however, a few voices of common sense and reason among the blithering idiots…
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Dueling Rallies in Harrisburg, PA Over Severance Tax Turn Nasty

An interesting contrast in rallies yesterday in Harrisburg, PA. As the July 1 deadline quickly approaches for Pennsylvania to approve a budget, there were two rallies at the state Capitol. The first was held by life’s producers–the people who actually create wealth in this country. It was populated by business leaders and those who work for businesses that support the Marcellus Shale industry. They were there to protest against PA Gov. Wolf’s 17.3% severance tax (often mischaracterized by Wolf and a sycophantic press as a “5% tax” on Marcellus gas). Businesses know that such a tax will effectively kill the industry and the jobs and economic impact that go with it, in the Keystone State. Then there was a second rally that followed the business/anti-tax rally. The second rally was held by the life’s takers–those who suck money from the producers. That is, teachers’ unions and their flacks who bleat and blat that stealing money from businesses “is for the children”–to justify their voracious appetite for other people’s money. The second group was there to protest in favor of a money-sucking, Marcellus-killing severance tax. Guess which crowd behaved like adults, and which crowd behaved like ill-tempered and undisciplined children, shouting down the other rally? No, you don’t really have to guess, do you?…
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UPS Adds 64 New LNG Tractor Trailers to Fleet in Harrisburg, PA

Two years ago we tipped our hat to UPS, the worldwide package delivery service, for their commitment to growing their natural gas fleet with a plan to add 700 new LNG (liquefied natural gas) tractor trailers to the fleet (see UPS to Grow NG Fleet with Additional 700 LNG Tractor Trailers). Good news: UPS has done it again. The company announced last week they are adding another 64 new LNG tractor trailers to the fleet–this batch based in Harrisburg, PA. No doubt cheap, abundant Marcellus Shale gas had something to do with that decision…
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Charges Against 2 PA Anti-Drillers Dismissed on Technicality

Yesterday MDN told you about two Pennsylvania anti-drilling protesters who, among six others, were arrested in January for disorderly conduct at the inauguration ceremony of Democrat Gov. Tom Wolf. The two appealed their conviction (see Anti Protesters Who Disrupted Wolf Inauguration Appeal Conviction). There was a hearing yesterday in Dauphin County Court and, unfortunately, the Dauphin County District Attorney’s office failed to produce witnesses to finger the two as lawbreakers. So the judge (whom we presume is anti-drilling) used that as an excuse to dismiss the charges against the pair of hippies, er, ah, protesters…
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