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Gulfport’s Biggest Shareholder Says Current Board has Made a Mess

Gulfport Energy, one of the biggest drillers in the Ohio Utica Shale (210,000 acres), concentrates its drilling in the Ohio Utica and the Oklahoma SCOOP plays. Earlier this week the company made a major announcement: They are laying off 13% of the workforce, ending (for now) their stock share buy-back program, and “refreshing” the board with three new members (see Gulfport Fires 13% of Workers, Ends Stock Buy-Back, Board Changes). According to Gulfport’s largest shareholder, investment firm Firefly Value Partners, those changes are not enough.
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Ohio Approves Duke Energy 14-Mile Cincinnati NatGas Pipe

Credit: Duke Energy

Duke Energy has a plan to build a critically-needed natural gas pipeline near Cincinnati, OH to replace an old pipeline built in the 1950s. Duke needs to replace the pipe or some of the half million Duke customers in the region won’t get natural gas any more. A group calling themselves NOPE–Neighbors Opposing Pipeline Extension, tried their best to defeat the project. We call them DOPEs–Dummies Opposing Pipeline Extension. The good news is that the DOPEs lost. Yesterday the Ohio Power Siting Board (OPSB) gave Duke final approval to build the alternative route proposed by Duke for the project.
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American Water Selling PA Frack Water Co. Keystone Clearwater

In February 2015 Rex Energy announced it would sell its Keystone Clearwater Solutions subsidiary which provides water services for shale drillers in the Marcellus/Utica (see Rex Energy Looks to Sell 28,300 Marcellus Acres in Bid to Raise $). In June 2015 American Water Works, the country’s largest publicly traded water and wastewater utility company, announced it was buying Keystone from Rex for $130 million (see American Water Announces Agreement to Acquire Keystone Clearwater Solutions). Four years later, Keystone is being sold once again.
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WV Commerce Secretary Says His State *Will* Get a Cracker Plant

It seems like MDN has reported on the possibility that an ethane cracker plant would get built somewhere in West Virginia forever–at least back to 2013 when then-Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin went to Europe looking for a cracker (see Did Gov Tomblin Find a European Investor for a WV Cracker Plant?). For a while it seemed there was a legit cracker project heading to Wood County, in the Parkersburg area, from Odebrecht/Braskem (see WV Announces Brazilian Company to Build Ethane Cracker Complex). That plan eventually petered out. But WV has not given up hope. In a visit to Jackson County on Wednesday, WV Commerce Secretary Ed Gaunch said he believes a cracker plant will come to the Mountain State. When?
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PA AG Continues NatGas Witch Hunt – 2 Dozen DEP Workers Testify

Last week Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro sat down to talk with the editorial board/reporters of the Washington (PA) Observer-Reporter. He refused to confirm or deny he’s actively conducting a witch hunt of the PA Marcellus Shale industry, including trotting dozens of people before a grand jury–even though the media has been reporting on his grand jury fishing expedition since February (see PA AG Continues Marcellus Witch Hunt, Impanels Grand Jury). No worries. None other than the Deputy Secretary of the PA Dept. of Environmental Protection (head of the DEP’s Office of Oil and Gas Management) has confirmed he appeared before Shapiro’s witch hunt grand jury.
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Long Island Gas Moratorium Blocks “Hundreds of Millions” in Projs

We previously told you New York Gov. Andrew “man-child” Cuomo is getting desperate in his bid to deflect blame from himself for his own actions in blocking new natural gas supplies to the New York City/Long Island area. He’s so desperate he threatened utility company National Grid with kicking them out of the state and giving their franchise to another company (see Psychotic Cuomo to Cancel National Grid Gas Franchise in 2 Weeks). Cuomo gave National Grid a deadline of next Monday to hook up all remaining requests for natural gas service or else. Why is the man-child so desperate? Because of stories like the one below that say, “National Grid’s moratorium on new natural gas hookups has stalled hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of local development and pushed some businesses to build projects off Long Island.” Cuomo doesn’t like the deserved label: economic hit man.
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SWPA County Political Leaders Voice Support for Petchem, Shale

In a speech delivered October 31 to the P4 Climate Action Summit in downtown Pittsburgh, Mayor Bill Peduto declared his hatred for the petrochemical industry. He doesn’t want any more Shell crackers junking up his regional backyard. The highly negative reaction to Peduto’s idiotic (and pandering) remarks was swift. What petchem company wants to build in a region where the mayor of its largest city is trash talking the industry? In a bid to counter Peduto’s economically damaging remarks, some 20 county officials from Allegheny, Beaver, Butler, Fayette, Greene, Lawrence, Mercer, Washington and Westmoreland counties issued a joint statement on Wednesday to show their support for the petrochemical and shale industries in the region.
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Shale Energy Stories of Interest: Fri, Nov 22, 2019

OTHER U.S. REGIONS: FERC approves three LNG export projects, additional liquefaction train in South Texas; Restaurant group sues over Berkeley’s natural gas ban; NATIONAL: Fracking Ban?! (video); US oil, gas rig count up 1 ahead of holiday season start; Harold Hamm: Private equity’s rush to get into shale development helped push oversupply issues; Gas prices languish as storage falls to near-record lows; Fossil fuels create jobs so why do Democrats hate them?; US agencies to push LNG by rail in 2020.
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