ECA Marcellus Trust I Gives Investors 18 Cents per Unit in 3Q22
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 will issue a payout (the equivalent of a dividend) to unitholders of 18 cents for 3Q22. That is the highest payout we’ve seen since we’ve been actively tracing it quarter by quarter. The company continues to hold back some profits ($90,000 in 3Q22) in order to build a cash reserve.
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EQT has sued its own (former) law firm, Baker Botts, and one of the partners at the firm, for allegedly giving the company bad advice with respect to the Hammerhead Pipeline gathering system owned by Equitrans Midstream (EQT’s former subsidiary). The lawsuit seeks at least $1 million in damages. Baker Botts is based in Texas, so the lawsuit was filed in the 61st District Court in Harris County, TX. Hammerhead is a $555 million, approximately 190-mile gathering system created by Equitrans to gather EQT’s production in southwest PA and haul it (64 miles) to Mobley, WV, where it will connect with the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) and EQT’s Ohio Valley Connector pipeline (see 
Enerplus is based in Calgary, Alberta (Canada). It is a Canadian energy company. And yet the company has just announced the sale of its remaining Canadian assets located in Alberta and Saskatchewan to Surge Energy Inc. on Nov. 2 for CA$245 million (US$180 million). The reason for the sale? Enerplus wants to focus most of its time and effort (and money) on drilling in the Bakken Shale in North Dakota. However, Enerplus does maintain (and wants to continue) an active position in the Marcellus Shale, in northeastern Pennsylvania.
CNX Resources has done it again. Earlier this week CNX announced a deal to provide “abated” methane to New Frontier Aerospace, Inc. (NFA) to fuel NFA’s soon-coming hypersonic passenger jets. The NFA concept is beyond cool. The jets will take off and land vertically, fly at 5,000 miles per hour, covering up to 8,000 miles in just two hours. How about a trip from New York City to London in a little over 40 minutes?!
Anti-fossil fuelers continue to pressure the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (and Pennsylvania itself) over the grievous sin of approving the Shell ethane cracker plant project (see 
Upper Burrell (Westmoreland County, PA) town supervisors held a hearing last Wednesday, and following that hearing, voted unanimously to approve a new well pad proposed by Olympus Energy. This is the fourth such well pad approved by the town. Unlike previous meetings, no one (of the 20 or so residents attending) objected to the project. The well pad is 630 feet or more from about 20 homes–which is farther than the state-required setback of 500 feet.
We continue to be impressed with CNX Resources and its CEO Nick DeIuliis. CNX and the CNX Foundation are having a huge impact on the southwestern Pennsylvania (and tri-state) region where the company operates. In the past, we’ve told you about CNX and the work it is doing supporting underserved communities and populations in the tri-state region with $30 million in donations (see 
In 2020 EOG Resources, one of the largest oil and gas drillers in the U.S. (with international operations in Trinidad and China), sold *all* of its Marcellus assets, which were located in Bradford County, PA, to Tilden Resources for $130 million (see 
Something of an improvement from last week’s new permits report when there were only 11 new permits. For the week of October 24-30, there were 28 new permits. But not because of the return of new permits in Pennsylvania. Instead, Ohio was the shining light. PA reported 11 new permits, all of them in Lycoming County, with seven going to Repsol and four going to Inflection Energy. Ohio issued 16 new permits, with Encino Energy grabbing six, Southwestern Energy getting five, and Ascent Energy receiving four. Finally, WV had a single new permit, for Tug Hill Operating (soon to be EQT), in Wetzel County.
Love is a verb–an action. And actions speak loudly–more loudly than words. Chesapeake Energy issued its third quarter update yesterday. The company is big and getting bigger with each quarter. Chessy produced 4.1 Bcfe/d in 3Q. The company operated an average of 16 rigs in 3Q, drilling 58 wells and placing 50 wells online to production. Chesapeake is currently operating 13 rigs, including five in the Marcellus, two in the Eagle Ford, and six in the Haynesville. The company plans to add a seventh Haynesville rig by the end of November. Actions speak louder than words. The company drills more in the Haynesville, indicating it loves that play more.
Gulfport Energy, the third-largest driller in the Ohio Utica Shale (by the number of wells drilled), emerged from bankruptcy in May 2021 with a new board and new top management. By September of last year, rumors began circulating that the company was shopping itself for sale (see 
Spanish-owed Repsol owns 214,000 net acres of leases in the Marcellus Shale, primarily located in northeastern Pennsylvania in Bradford, Susquehanna, and Tioga counties. Earlier this year, Repsol said it was working with certification authority MiQ to have all of its Marcellus production certified as “responsibly produced” (see 
