Energy Companies | EQT Corp | Greene County (PA) | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Rice Energy
DEP Clips Rice (EQT) $147,250 for Polluting Rain Gardens in SWPA
We’ve heard of vegetable gardens. We’ve heard of flower gardens. We’ve heard of rose gardens. Remember the Lynn Anderson song, “I beg your pardon, I never promised you a rose garden”? We’ve also heard of rock gardens, raised gardens, herb gardens, and indoor gardens. One garden we hadn’t heard about until today is a “rain garden.” Ever heard that term? Rice Energy (now part of EQT Corporation) is paying a big fine, $147,250, for work done at a well site in Greene County, PA, in 2019 that allowed erosion and soil to contaminate not one but three rain gardens. I beg your pardon!
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There have been a number of project proposals by Marcellus/Utica states (PA, OH, WV), and even proposals by private companies within those states, to attract one of the 6-10 regional hydrogen hub projects on offer from the Bidenistas as part of the so-called Infrastructure Bill passed last year. While we think it’s important that one of those hubs ends up in the M-U region, we have not (will not) root for any particular effort (we love all our children equally). However, as a purely outside observer, it sure seems to us that a recently announced effort by West Virginia called ARCH2 (Appalachian Regional Clean Hydrogen Hub) has pulled into the lead among a number of competing proposals.
Energy Capital Ventures (ECV) is a venture capital firm focused on investing in startups that in turn, will focus on ESG (environment, social, governance) imperatives and digital transformation of the natural gas industry. ECV trademarked the term “green molecules™”–a term it developed to describe technologies spanning decarbonization, sustainability, and digitization of the natural gas industry. ECV announced it had received $61 million to fund its Fund I initiatives. Many of the investors come from the M-U region.
There’s little doubt that Vladimir Putin ordered the bombing of his own undersea natural gas pipelines, the Nord Stream pipelines, for some sort of political purpose. Crazy? Sure. But also calculated. In a brilliant column on the Forbes website, author Dan Markind, a Philadelphia-based attorney, compares Putin’s actions in sabotaging his own pipelines to the politicians in New York and New England who are sabotaging pipelines to their respective regions.
The federal government is falling all over itself to spend YOUR money on hydrogen and carbon capture projects. The so-called Infrastructure Bill from last year allocates $8 billion on hydrogen projects (with $7 billion being spent on 6-10 regional hubs). The misnamed Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) includes roughly $369 billion in incentives for energy and climate-related programs, including tax credits, research loans, and more. In other words, there are mountains of money available that companies can potentially access. Why shouldn’t M-U companies participate? Learn how to tap into all of that dough at the 
Just nine new permits to drill shale wells were issued across the three Marcellus/Utica states for Sept. 26 to Oct. 2. Pennsylvania turned in the second week in a row of very low new permits–just three issued, all of them to different companies in different counties. Ohio issued just four new permits, with two of them going to Encino Energy in Carroll County. And West Virginia issued just two new permits, both to Southwestern Energy in Brooke County.
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: Plan to drop Erie County sales tax on heating fuels includes natural gas; Business groups call on Biden to strengthen U.S. energy production; NATIONAL: Biden turns to Venezuela as Europe commits economic ‘suicide by genuflecting to green utopia’; INTERNATIONAL: Nord Stream leaks caused by detonations; The radical plans to counter high oil prices.