Invenergy Gets Notice of Violation in PA for Disturbing 3 Mud Puddles
One more twist in what is shaping up to be a very long process to build the state’s largest electric generating plant powered by Marcellus Shale gas. Invenergy hopes to build the 1500-megawatt plant in the borough of Jessup (Lackawanna County), near Scranton, on an 80-acre former coal mine and landfill site (see UGI to Feed Jessup, PA Electric Plant with Marcellus Shale Gas). The project was announced in 2013. Part of the evaluation process for the site is to determine if there’s nasty stuff left over from the landfill that needs to be moved. Invenergy hired a company to drill some test holes to analyze what’s down there. As part of drilling those holes, the company hired “disturbed” three wetlands areas. In other words, they pushed some dirt around in three mud puddles/swamps. Invenergy recognized the error and immediately notified the Dept. of Environmental Protection who has now, nine months later, issued a notice of violation to Invenergy for disturbing the mud puddles. It remains to be seen how costly the error was…
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The third shoe has now dropped. On Monday we told you that Schlumberger has cut an additional 11,000 jobs–20,000 total now gone–from the payroll (see 
It seems that unfortunately, Schlumberger’s second round of layoffs was an omen and indeed a predictor of things to come (see 
Patterson-UTI operates (leases out) drilling rigs for shale and conventional drilling. They are one of the biggest rig firms in the Marcellus/Utica. They were also, a few years ago, a juicy target for the mob. The mob told Patterson that the goodfellas didn’t like Patterson’s hiring patterns. Patterson wasn’t treating all of its employees exactly the same. And the color mix of employees was a bit off for the mob’s taste. So the mob did what they do best–a shake down. Patterson could pay them big bucks and the problems would all magically disappear. It’s called protection money. The cost to Patterson to “protect them” would run into the millions–which is why the company originally opposed such a scheme. But in the end, Patterson caved and handed over $12.26 million in protection money to the mob. Oops. Did we say “mob”? We meant to say “U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.” And did we say “protection money?” We meant to say “settlement.” Here’s the details behind the shakedown of Patterson-UTI…
This is a strange and complicated tale that boils down to this: Aubrey McClendon has a singular talent for finding and taking money from people who later turn around and stick a knife in his back. You may remember in February the story we brought you that Chesapeake Energy had sued its former co-founder, Aubrey McClendon, claiming he stole data on his way out the door (see 
Apparently torrential rains in Marshall County, WV last week softened up the earth and led to soil shifting and two Williams pipelines rupturing–within hours of each other. One of the pipelines is a 12-inch gathering line that runs from wells in the area to the nearby Fort Beeler processing plant. The other pipeline is a 4-inch condensate pipeline. Condensate spilled out of a hole and into the nearby Little Grave Creek. Cleanup efforts are ongoing. For a short time, five families who live near the 12-inch gathering line were evacuated as a precautionary measure–but they returned home within a few hours…