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27 New Shale Well Permits Issued for PA-OH-WV Dec 16 – 22
For the week of Dec 16 – 22, permits issued in the Marcellus/Utica remained healthy. There were 27 new permits issued last week, up from 22 issued the week before. In something of an unusual twist, the Keystone State (PA) issued just four new permits, all of them to different drillers. PennEnergy Resources’ permit was in Beaver County; Seneca Resources’ permit was in Tioga County; and Range Resources and EQT (Rice) each had one permit in Washington County. Read More “27 New Shale Well Permits Issued for PA-OH-WV Dec 16 – 22”
This is an interesting pattern we’ve not seen in a long time for the venerable Baker Hughes rig count. The national rig count and the count for the Marcellus/Utica remained the same for multiple weeks in a row. The national count was 589 active rigs last week (now four weeks in a row). The M-U count was 34 last week (now three weeks in a row). The national count remains rangebound between 581 and 589 since June 2024 (except for Sep. 13, when it hit 590 for a single week). The M-U remained static last week, with PA at 15 rigs, OH at 9 rigs, and WV at 10 rigs. 
There was a last-minute roller coaster ride for the NYMEX “front month” natural gas price earlier this week. On Monday, the price soared to $3.936 per million British thermal units (MMBtus). It was the largest one-day dollar gain since Wednesday, Nov. 2, 2022, and the largest one-day percentage gain since Thursday, Jan. 27, 2022. Monday’s closing price was the second-highest closing price of the year, with the highest coming the week before on Dec. 24 at $3.946 (just one penny difference). Then, on Tuesday, the last day of 2024, the price fell by 30.3 cents (7.7%) to $3.633. However, the big news for NYMEX prices in 2024 is that from the first trading day of the year (Jan. 2) to the last (Dec. 31), the price rose 44.51%. Not too shabby given the attacks natural gas suffered under the Biden administration! 
An undisclosed shale driller has asked the Ohio Oil and Gas Land Management Commission (OGLMC) to consider opening up an additional 4,360 acres of state-owned Egypt Valley Wildlife Area for shale drilling under the land. A new “nomination” for drilling was also sent to the OGLMC for 383 acres of Jockey Hollow Wildlife Area, located near Egypt Valley. Both tracts nominated for consideration are in Belmont County, OH. 
On Monday, pipeline giant Williams announced it had placed into full service the Southside Reliability Enhancement Project, an important expansion and modernization of the mighty Transco pipeline network in North Carolina and Virginia. The project adds a total of 423,400 dekatherms per day (423 MMcf/d) of fully contracted pipeline capacity, providing the ability to meet the energy needs of more than 2 million homes in the Southeastern U.S. 
In January 2024, MDN brought you the news that the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) approved a plan by Catalyst Energy to convert an existing conventional gas production well on Route 646 in Cyclone (Keating Township, McKean County, PA) into a shale wastewater injection well (see 
A little over one month ago, we confirmed a rumor that we previously reported regarding EQT Corporation selling a minority stake in its newly-acquired midstream assets from Equitrans to investment firm Blackstone in return for $3.5 billion in cold, hard cash (see 
Just incredible. Not only did New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, an extremist liberal, sign a ban on using carbon dioxide to frack wells in the state at the last minute before the end of the current legislative session (see 
U.S. natural gas demand from LNG plants (the feedgas that flows to the plants) hit a new all-time record high on Tuesday, Dec. 31st, the last day of the year. Feedgas flows climbed to 15.2 billion cubic feed (Bcf) in a sign of a strong year ahead from the startup of two new gas-processing plants. Venture Global LNG’s Plaquemines plant in Louisiana and Cheniere Energy’s Corpus Christi Stage 3 expansion in Texas recently came online (at least partially), driving feedgas flows higher. 
OTHER U.S. REGIONS: Cheniere achieves first LNG at the Corpus Christi Stage 3 project; New Puerto Rico governor pivots to gas to fix crumbling grid; NATIONAL: Supreme Court at a crossroads in oil emissions lawfare campaign; U.S. shale is growing old – a problem for Donald Trump’s oil plans; Biden administration approves 11th offshore wind project; The top 10 RBN energy prognostications – 2024 scorecard; INTERNATIONAL: Russian gas era in Europe ends as Ukraine stops transit; Green hydrogen prices will remain stubbornly high for decades.