Chesapeake Settles Royalty Lawsuit in TX; Implications for PA?
Landowners in Pennsylvania have been upset with shenanigans by Chesapeake Energy in shorting them out of royalties for years. In 2013 a group of landowners in Bradford County, PA filed a lawsuit against Chesapeake over the royalty issue (see Bradford County, PA Landowners Sue Chesapeake over Royalties). Since that time a number of lawsuits have popped up in PA against Chesapeake over the same issue (see Judge Rules Royalty Lawsuit Against Chesapeake in PA Continues). PA is not the only state where landowners have problems with Chesapeake’s royalty calculations. Another such case was filed in Texas in 2013–and Chesapeake just settled that case out of court…
Read More “Chesapeake Settles Royalty Lawsuit in TX; Implications for PA?”
A couple of bits of news from Gulfport Energy, a driller focused primarily on the Utica Shale in eastern Ohio. In April, MDN reported that Gulfport had inked a deal with Paloma Partners III, a small energy & exploration company headquartered in Houston, to purchase 24,000 acres in Belmont and Jefferson counties (Ohio) for $12,500 per acre (see 
In an example of yet another instance of our wonderful industry blessing the communities in which it works, Rice Energy has just completed an annual fundraising event which raised $600,000 which they donated to 36 different first responder organizations in Pennsylvania and Ohio at a ceremony last Friday, September 11th. The first responder organizations include local volunteer fire departments, emergency medical services, regional safety organizations and police departments. Kudos to Rice for being good corporate citizens. By the way, when was the last time you heard about a “green” group like Delaware Riverkeeper, Food & Water Watch, or the Sierra Club raising and donating money to anyone but themselves? Oil & gas industry = generous givers; Environmental wackos = selfish takers…
We occasionally bring you news of when senior management or members of the board of directors for an upstream (drillers) or midstream (pipelines) company either buy or sell shares of stock in their own company. It’s called “insider trading.” There are good reasons to do both–buy or sell. But let’s be honest, if you see upper management/board members repeatedly selling their shares of stock, it just doesn’t look good (see 
On June 1 Carrizo Oil & Gas CEO Chip Johnson sold 24,661 shares of company stock for $1.2 million (see 
We have a troubling development to report about the future of drilling in West Virginia–something that has happened largely under the radar, until now. More than 200 residents in WV (likely those who don’t own the mineral rights under their land) began filing “scores” of “nuisance” lawsuits over the past couple of years against Antero Resources and Hall Drilling, in places like Doddridge County. The lawsuits claim excessive traffic, odors and noise from nearby drilling make it “impossible” for them to enjoy their homes. Each lawsuit has its own unique circumstances and should be handled separately–one size does not fit all. The troubling development is that all of these lawsuits (dozens? hundreds?) have been rolled up into one mega lawsuit that sits before the WV Mass Litigation Panel…
Pennsylvania landowners Andrew and Sally Dewing signed a 10-year lease for 493 acres of land in Bradford County, PA with Central Appalachian Petroleum in April 2001. The lease was later sold to a consortium including Abarta Oil & Gas Co., Talisman Energy USA and Range Resources. The terms of the lease require rent payments of $5 per acre per year ($2,465) for each year when their property has not be drilled on or under. After not receiving payments on time in 2010, the Dewings served the drillers notice of nonpayment. Eventually the three partners figured out who was supposed to pay and made the payment–but because the payment was late (more than 60 days late), the Dewings claimed the lease was terminated under the original terms of the lease. To make a long story short, Pennsylvania Superior Court ruled last Friday that no, the terms of the lease do not allow the Dewings to get out of the lease because the payment was late…
Pennsylvania-based Marcellus driller Rex Energy, which we’ve long called our “little energy company that could, and does,” has had a string of bad news this year. Even though production was up 61% in the second quarter of 2015, revenue was down 37% (see 
Is Marcellus drilling about to come to a suburb of Pittsburgh? It appears the answer to that is a resounding, “Yes!” EQT, according to a landman that works for the company, plans to put a mega drill pad with up to 14 wells on an abandoned golf course in the eastern burbs of Allegheny County. EQT has approached neighbors surrounding the property, attempting to sign them to leases. Predictably, some of the neighbors are for it, and some are against it…
Magnum Hunter Resources has become the third Marcellus/Utica drillers (out of eight) on David Fessler’s “Oil Company Death List” (see 
Midstream giant Williams and drilling giant Chesapeake Energy are cuddling a little bit closer in the Ohio Utica Shale. Williams announced today they have signed an agreement with Chesapeake to run gathering pipelines in a new area of the dry gas Utica for Chesapeake in return for signing a contract that binds Chessy to using Williams until 2035. Williams was already gathering natural gas for Chessy on 140,000 acres of Utica Shale land in Ohio. This agreement extends the time on that 140,000 acres by adding another 20 years, and adds another 50,000 acres to the mix…
EV Energy Partners (EVEP), an upstream master limited partnership (MLP) created by EnerVest, announced they will purchase oil and natural gas properties from the mothership EnerVest in four different locations, one of them being Appalachia (i.e. Marcellus/Utica). EVEP will pay the parent company $259 million for properties in Appalachian Basin, San Juan Basin, Michigan and Austin Chalk with cumulative estimated proved reserves of 302 billion cubic feet equivalent (Bcfe)…
The McKeesport City Council (Allengheny County, near Pittsburgh) voted Wednesday evening to lease 133.257 acres of Renziehausen Park for drilling under (not on) for Marcellus Shale gas by EQT. The city will receive a $3,000 per acre signing bonus–$400,000 total. No word on what kind of royalty rate they agreed to. The city has been grappling with whether or not to lease the park for more than a year. The vote was 6-1. In typical fashion, one anti-drilling resident attending the meeting wouldn’t shut up and had to be escorted out of the meeting by a police officer. Two other loud mouth anti-drillers continued to spit and sputter and comment from the audience, speaking out of turn (but they weren’t thrown out). Here’s how it went down…
We have an update on the story we broke yesterday–that Chief Oil & Gas is closing its Wexford (Pittsburgh) office (see