Marcellus Drilling News

Accidents | Energy Companies | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Wastewater | Westmoreland County | WPX Energy

Important Update on WPX Energy Leaking Impoundment in SWPA
July 10, 2014July 10, 2014

On Monday MDN told you about three families near a WPX Energy wastewater impoundment near Ligonier (Westmoreland County), PA who say their well water has been contamined by frack wastewater leaking from the impoundment (see WPX Wastewater Impoundment Source of Water Contamination in W PA?). We have an important update on that story. WPX spokesperson Susan Oliver contacted MDN and provided details of their strong response to the situation, and new information that we don’t believe anyone else has bothered to publish…
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Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | Kinder Morgan | MarkWest Energy | NGLs | Pipelines

Kinder Morgan Y-Grade NGL Pipeline from NE to SW Still Alive
July 10, 2014July 10, 2014

In August of last year, Kinder Morgan and MarkWest Energy announced a new natural gas liquids (NGL) pipeline from Ohio to the Gulf Coast (see 2 New OH Projects: Cryo Processing Plant & NGL Pipeline to Gulf). The pipeline will convert some 900 miles of existing Tennessee Gas Pipeline system and build another 200 miles of new pipeline in Texas and/or Louisiana. The project eventually got a nickname–the “Y-Grade Pipeline”–and conducted an open season from last November into December (see Kinder Morgan/MarkWest Proposed NGL Pipeline Gets a Nickname, Map). A sharp MDN reader wrote in to ask, what the heck is going on? Is this project still in the works? So MDN went nosing around…
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Industrywide Issues | Public Opinion

API Issues New Standards for Drillers for “Community Engagement”
July 10, 2014March 14, 2017

With echoes of Fred Rogers singing, “Won’t you be my neighbor?,” yesterday the American Petroleum Institute issued a first-of-its-kind industry standard for how shale drillers should treat the neighbors. The API’s new Community Engagement Guidelines is a template for neighborly etiquette. The API wants their outline to become the “gold standard for good neighbor policies that address community concerns, enhance the long-term benefits of local development, and ensure a two-way conversation regarding mutual goals for community growth,” according to an API director of standards David Miller. Below we have the press announcement and a full copy of the new standard/template for how drillers should treat the neighbors…
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Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | Pipelines | TC Energy/TransCanada

TransCanada to Enter Marcellus/Utica with ANR Pipeline Expansion
July 10, 2014July 10, 2014

TransCanada Corporation, the company perhaps most known (and reviled by the anti-drilling left) for their proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline, is making moves to grab a piece of the action in the Marcellus/Utica Shale. Last week TransCanada announced a non-binding open season until July 28 for shippers to grab capacity on a proposed expansion of their ANR pipeline–something they call the ANR East Project. The Project will provide Marcellus and Utica drillers with options to ship their gas out of the northeast to the Midwest, Gulf Coast, and even to Ontario, Canada. As part of the project, new pipeline would be built…
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Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | Kinder Morgan | Pipelines | Tennessee Gas Pipeline

Survey Work Already Begun on Kinder Morgan TGP Expansion Thru MA
July 10, 2014July 10, 2014

MDN has chronicled Kinder Morgan’s Tennessee Gas Pipeline expansion through Massachusetts to bring badly needed new natural gas supplies to New England. The governors of six New England states (5 Democrats, 1 Republican) want that pipeline–bad (see Blue State Blues: 6 New England States Want New Natgas Pipeline). In fact, the Democrat governor of Massachusetts wants it bad. But some MA communities, like that run by the mob-like town manager of Andover, MA, aren’t thrilled with the plan (see Lib MA Town Tells Tenn. Gas Pipeline: Stay Outta Town!). Seems that Kinder reps were rumored to be contacting landowners around Andover for permission to come on the property to survey. A town meeting in Erving, MA on Tuesday brings us new news about the Kinder TGP project–surveying has already begun…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Ohio | Statewide OH

Liberal “Churches” Tell OH to Dump Fracking, Embrace Renewables
July 10, 2014July 10, 2014

Churches pretending to be apolitical, but very much political, are once again in the news with regard to the fracking issue. On Monday MDN told you of the repugnant efforts by so-called churches who claim they will divest from a blacklist of 200 companies (like ExxonMobil) that produce evil, vile, nasty fossil fuels (see Some So-Called Churches Vote to Divest from Fossil Fuel Companies). The United Church of Christ and the Unitarian Universalist denominations are two of the so-called churches behind the move. Those two are back in the news in Ohio, trying to (irrationally) tell state legislators to move as quickly as possible to so-called renewable forms of energy and leave fracking for Utica Shale gas behind…
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Lease & Royalty Payments | Ohio | Statewide OH

Let’s Play Lease Poker – Calling the Lease Agent’s Bluff
July 10, 2014July 10, 2014

Psst, hey buddy, want to play some poker? A landman with inside knowledge sheds light on how drillers time their lease filings–particularly in Ohio. Bill Dannley writing in Ohio Oil & Gas likens the process to playing poker–knowing when to hold ’em and when to fold ’em. Before landowners are approached to sign a lease, a lot of work has already been done, according to Dannley. Expensive seismic surveys have been conducted and deeds have been researched. When a landowner signs on the dotted line, you might expect the landman to hustle on down to the courthouse to file the lease–but that’s not what usually happens…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | CNG/LNG | Industrywide Issues

Anti-Drilling Rally Against Cove Point LNG Plant in DC on Sunday
July 10, 2014July 10, 2014

Come one, call all, to the greatest anti-drilling show on earth! We’re referring to an anti-drilling rally planned on Sunday, July 13 in Washington, DC. The rally is to oppose the planned LNG export facility in Cove Point, Maryland. Even though it’s already been approved by the Dept. of Energy, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), and even by the State of Maryland. Hey, it’s summertime and the antis have an itch to rally and they intend to scratch that itch this weekend…
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Best of the Rest

Marcellus & Utica Shale Story Links: Thu, Jul 10, 2014
July 10, 2014July 10, 2014

The “best of the rest” – stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading:
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