New Biden EPA Regs a “Death Sentence” for Fossil-Fuel Power Plants
Yesterday the Bidenistas at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released a hellscape of new regulations aimed at forcing coal- and natural gas-fired power plants to close. That’s the sum total of what’s contained in a proposed 681-page behemoth new rule released (inflicted) yesterday by the EPA. But that’s not just MDN’s wild claim about this hellscape being created by Biden. The editors of the Wall Street Journal called the new EPA regulations “An EPA Death Sentence for Fossil-Fuel Power Plants,” with the subtitle “The Biden agency’s new rule means the end of natural gas-fueled electricity.”
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Yesterday two radicalized Big Green groups–the Environmental Integrity Project (based in D.C.) and the Clean Air Council (based in Philadelphia)–filed a lawsuit against the Shell Polymers Monaca Plant (ethane cracker plant in Beaver County, PA), claiming the plant has repeatedly violated federal air pollution limits. The lawsuit requests the court assess huge fines and force it close down unless it can operate without any further violations of the federal Clean Air Act (CAA) and the federal Air Pollution Control Act (APCA). In other words, the radicals seek to shut down the $10 billion plant and keep it shut down–throwing 600 permanent employees out of work. Nice people at the Environmental Integrity Project and Clean Air Council, eh?
Ascent Resources, originally founded as American Energy Partners by gas legend Aubrey McClendon, is a privately-held company that focuses 100% on the Ohio Utica Shale. Ascent, headquartered in Oklahoma City, OK, is Ohio’s largest natural gas producer (352,000 leased acres) and the 8th largest natural gas producer in the U.S. The company issued its first quarter 2023 update yesterday. Ascent net production averaged 2.2 Bcfe/d (billion cubic feet equivalent per day) during 1Q23, up 12% over 1Q22. The company made $1.1 billion in profit during 1Q23, a massive +$2.7 billion swing from losing $1.6 billion in 1Q22.
ECA Marcellus Trust I, the royalty interest holder in some of the wells drilled and maintained by Greylock Energy in Greene County, PA, announced it would issue a payout (the equivalent of a dividend) to unitholders of 4.3 cents per unit for 1Q23. That is down from 4Q22 when the Trust paid out 12.4 cents per unit, and down from 3Q22 when the Trust paid out 18 cents per unit. The company continues to hold back some profits ($90,000 in 1Q23) in order to build a cash reserve.
When the public teat is full of taxpayer money, ready to dispense, and big business can’t get its mouth around that teat to start sucking, big business begins to whine and moan. That about sums up what happened at the Pennsylvania Energy Summit held yesterday in Pittsburgh. The Bidenistas went on a drunken spending spree over the past two years, unleashing what amounts to trillions of dollars to be made available for so-called renewable energy projects via the poorly crafted Infrastructure bill and the misnamed Inflation Reduction Act. Now, big business wants to start feeding on that money, but it can’t because it takes too long to get projects permitted. Too bad, so sad.
Spotlight PA, a partisan Democrat “newsroom” (propaganda outfit) powered by the Philadelphia Inquirer in partnership with Harrisburg Patriot-News, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, and WITF PBS Public Media, is taking aim at the conventional drilling industry. In an article about the “crisis” of unplugged orphaned and abandoned conventional oil and gas wells, Spotlight PA, via interviewees, says the $400 million coming from the federal government is not nearly enough money to plug some 200,000+ old wells in the state.
New shale permits issued for May 1-7 in the Marcellus/Utica rose slightly from the prior week. There were 20 new permits issued last week, up from 18 in the prior week. Last week’s tally included 15 new permits for Pennsylvania, 5 new permits for Ohio, and no new permits in West Virginia. Last week the top receiver of new permits was PennEnergy Resources, with 5 permits issued in Armstrong County, PA. Chesapeake Energy was second-highest, with 4 permits issued in Bradford County, PA.
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