Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Dominion Energy | Energy Services | Equitrans/EQT Midstream | Industrywide Issues | Pipelines | Statewide VA | Virginia
Va. Governor Refuses to Stop Mountain Valley Pipeline Work
The pressure DC swamp dwellers and anti-fossil fuelers from across the country (indeed from across the world) have put on Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam (a Democrat) has been intense. They want Northam to abuse his executive authority, in contravention of the law, and block both the Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) and Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) projects in his state. Northam’s predecessor, Terry McAuliffe (also a Democrat) created the state’s first Environmental Justice Advisory Council. That Council, packed with anti-fossil fuelers, has advised Northam to block ACP and MVP. Northam has just given his own Council a polite but firm, NO.
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Que the music with dramatic drums, cymbals and trumpets. Camera A, zoom in on Secretary McDonnell. The whole state is watching. It’s time for the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) to announce the winners of PA’s Hunger Games-style contest to grab a piece of the $12.6 million “fine” paid by Sunoco Logistics Partners for “permit violations related to the construction of the Mariner East 2 pipeline project” (see 
Mountain Valley Pipeline, a project of EQT Midstream, continues to work on constructing its 303-mile long project from West Virginia into Virginia–despite a recent court order overturning some of the permits for the project (see 
In September the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) lifted a stop-work order for the 600-mile Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) project that stretches from West Virginia through Virginia and into North Carolina (see 
Nine Energy Service, an oilfield services company that competes with companies like Halliburton and Baker Hughes, operates in a number of shale basins, including the Marcellus/Utica. Magnum Oil Tools is a “downhole technology” company providing completions products including dissolvable frac plugs and a number of other patented inventions. Magnum also has operations in the Marcellus/Utica. Yesterday Nine announced it is buying out and merging in Magnum in a deal worth $493 million.
On September 21, Dominion Energy stopped pulling gas from pipelines into the Cove Point LNG export facility (on the shoreline of Maryland) in order to conduct scheduled maintenance (see 
It’s one thing for mud and sediment to wash away from a pipeline drilling site due to heavy and relentless rains–as we have experienced in the northeast these past few months. But it’s another thing entirely when actual sections pipeline sitting at the construction site float away! That happened in Franklin County, Virginia last Thursday. The landowner, who was (and is) opposed to the 303-mile Mountain Valley Pipeline from slicing through his property, has complained repeatedly about erosion and sediment from the construction path spilling over onto his farmland. Friday morning he woke up to MVP pipes washed onto his cornfield following torrential rains and wind, the leftovers of Hurricane Michael.
Anti-fossil fuelers are on a holy mission to stop a 3.5-mile, 8-inch pipeline from being built under the Potomac River by Columbia Pipeline (see 
On Tuesday, Enbridge, owner of the Texas Eastern Transmission Company (Tetco) Pipeline, announced it has put part of its Texas Eastern Appalachian Lease (TEAL) natural gas pipeline project in Ohio into service. TEAL boosts capacity along Tetco by 950 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d), to flow Marcellus/Utica gas to the recently-completed-but-not-yet-online NEXUS pipeline (see 
Nuverra Environmental Solutions (formerly Heckmann) is one of the largest companies in the United States that handles transportation and disposal of shale drilling wastewater and leftover rock and dirt from drilling. The company has major operations in the Marcellus/Utica region. Those operations are expanding. Nuverra announced last Friday it has purchased, lock, stock and barrel, ClearWater Solutions, an Ohio injection well operator. Purchase price was $41.9 million. Looks like Nuverra has fully recovered from bankruptcy just one year ago.
Antero Resources, one of the biggest drillers in the Marcellus/Utica, is the latest in a string of companies to shed its master limited partnership (MLP) structure. Antero uses an MLP for two different pipeline subsidiaries. The company announced yesterday that one of the subsidiaries will buy out the other, and then convert the merged entity into a corporation. The move simplifies Antero’s midstream operations. Here’s the details.
More bad news for EQT Midstream’s Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP). Last week the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit overturned a permit issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for MVP in West Virginia (see 
Williams is expanding its mighty, 10,500-mile Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Co (Transco), again. Sometime this month Williams will prefile a request with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission for the Leidy South expansion project. The new project will bump up “compression” (either build new compressors or refit existing compressors) and build new “looping” pipeline in Pennsylvania, in order to increase capacity of Transco in the northeast Marcellus region by another 580 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d).