NFG Building Pipe to Feed Shippingport Power Station in Beaver, PA
National Fuel Gas Company (NFG), headquartered in Buffalo, NY, is the parent company for Marcellus/Utica driller Seneca Resources and the parent of midstream company NFG Midstream (and subsidiary Empire Pipeline). Last week, NFG issued its latest quarterly update, which is the company’s fiscal 3rd quarter (but everyone else’s 2nd quarter). The update was loaded with good news for Seneca and NFG’s midstream sector. We learned that the company has been retained to build a 7-mile pipeline expansion off the company’s Line N system in Western PA, called the Shippingport Lateral Project, to feed natural gas to the Shippingport Power Station, announced in July (see Frontier Group Converting Coal to Gas-Fired Plant, NatGas from EQT). The report also shows M-U driller Seneca will spend 4% less on capital expenses yet produce 6% more natural gas this year. Seneca produced a record-high amount of natural gas during the quarter! Read More “NFG Building Pipe to Feed Shippingport Power Station in Beaver, PA”
For the week of July 7 – 13, the number of permits issued to drill new wells in the Marcellus/Utica remained the same as the previous week. There were 21 new permits issued across the three M-U states last week. The Keystone State (PA) issued seven new permits. Range Resources secured three permits, spread across Beaver and Washington counties, in the southwestern part of the state. Seneca Resources received two permits in Tioga County, in the northeastern part of the state. Greylock Energy and Coterra Energy each received a single permit, in Potter and Susquehanna counties, respectively. 
The highly functional and responsible Susquehanna River Basin Commission (SRBC), unlike its highly dysfunctional and irresponsible counterpart, the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC), continues to support the shale energy industry by approving water withdrawals and consumptive use for responsible and safe shale drilling. The SRBC published a notice in the June 21 Pennsylvania Bulletin that the Executive Director of the SRBC renewed 38 general water use permits in May for individual shale gas well drilling pads in Bradford, Cameron, Clearfield, Lycoming, Susquehanna, Tioga, and Wyoming counties in Pennsylvania. So far in 2025, the SRBC has issued or renewed 225 general water use permits for shale gas development. 
The data center high tide is lifting all gas drilling boats. That’s according to a new study from S&P Global Commodity Insights that finds the expectations of a coming boom in demand for electricity for data centers, which will create a boom in demand for natural gas to produce the electricity, is causing gas drilling companies to increase in value. It’s hard to accurately quantify the value for private companies, but for public companies (those with stock that trade on the open market), we can confirm that over the past year, the value for drillers with significant operations in the Marcellus/Utica has, on average, risen dramatically. 
The experts at RBN Energy track 38 exploration and production (E&P) companies to monitor financial and operational performance. In a recent blog post, RBN found the 10 gas-weighted E&Ps (all but one with significant operations in the Marcellus/Utica) experienced a rebound in earnings during Q4 2024 after a rough first three quarters of the year. Earnings for the 10 gas-weighted E&Ps averaged $3.02/boe (barrels of oil equivalent) in Q4 2024 after losses in Q2 and Q3 2024. Cash flow averaged $10.18/boe, 52% higher than the $6.71/boe generated in Q3 2024. Realized prices averaged nearly $18/boe in Q4 2024, 24% higher than the $14.52/boe recorded in Q3 2024. Things are looking up for M-U drillers.