Spanish oil and gas company Repsol, with major assets in the northeast Pennsylvania Marcellus, has signed a deal to provide Venture Global’s Louisiana-based Plaquemines LNG export project with 18.25 billion cubic feet (Bcf) per year of natural gas beginning in 2024. Will the Respol gas come from the Marcellus? We think so. We outline our theory below.
Read More “Repsol Marcellus Gas to Feed Plaquemines LNG Exports in La.”
The ace reporters at Reuters have sussed out another inside exclusive: Williams, the pipeline giant, has hired “two veteran executives” to help the company set up an LNG marketing operation. The operation will put Williams into direct competition with other big LNG marketers including Cheniere Energy, Shell, and QatarEnergy. The big question is this: How successful will this effort be if Williams doesn’t actually own an LNG export terminal of its own?
Read More “Pipeline Giant Williams Making Moves into LNG Marketing”
On Monday the U.S.-EU Energy Council held a meeting in Washington chaired by U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, U.S. Secretary of Energy Jennifer M. Granholm, EU High Representative/Vice President Josep Borrell Fontelles, and European Energy Commissioner Kadri Simson. There was some talk about natural gas and ensuring sufficient supplies for Europe, especially with Russia’s Vladimir Putin threatening to shut off half of Europe’s supplies over Ukraine. There was plenty of blah blah blah talk about a “clean and just energy transition” to so-called renewables. Whatever. It was a forum held after the official meeting that caught our attention. Duncan Wood, Ph.D., Vice President for Strategy & New Initiatives at the Wilson Center made a statement with great insight about the U.S.’s potential role in supplying natural gas to the world via LNG.
Read More “U.S. Could Become “Swing Producer” for Natural Gas, If…”
Venture Global LNG expects to load the inaugural cargo at its Calcasieu Pass LNG export facility in Louisiana on or after February 9. This is fantastic news! In addition, Cheniere Energy’s Sabine Pass export facility (a competitor with Calcasieu Pass) received FERC clearance to start commercial production on its sixth processing train. The best part for both bits of news? Marcellus/Utica molecules flow to Sabine Pass and either already do, or will flow to Calcasieu Pass in the future. New markets for our gas!
Read More “Calcasieu Pass LNG Loads Inaugural Cargo; Sabine Pass LNG Expands”
This *really* has our blood boiling. The same Democrat politicians in New England who have blocked new natural gas pipelines from the Marcellus (just 200 miles away) to their region, preferring so-called “renewable energy” instead, have just asked the hapless, incompetent Secretary of the Dept. of Energy, Jennifer Granholm (a fellow Democrat) to restrict LNG exports so their constituents don’t have to suffer the pain of their (the politicians’) decision to block pipelines. We’re talking about Massachusetts’ two U.S. Senators, Elizabeth “Pocahontas” Warren and Ed “Lackey” Markey, and Sen. Pat “Leaky” Leahy whose home state of Vermont has banned all fracking and blocks pipelines. Talk about chutzpah!
Read More “New England Democrats Ask DOE to Restrict LNG Exports”
National Grid is desperately trying not to run out of natural gas for its customers in Brooklyn and Queens (on Long Island). For several years the company has fought a battle to run a tiny pipeline to its Greenpoint, Brooklyn facility, to provide extra natural gas. That project is being investigated by the Biden administration on charges of racism (see Woke Nation: 2nd Fed Agency Investigating Brooklyn Pipe as Racist). Don’t get us started. National Grid has a backup plan–add two extra LNG vaporizers to the Greenpoint facility to turn trucked LNG back into gas that can flow through the system. Irrational anti-fossil fuel fanatics are now trying to block even that minor project.
Read More “Delay then Deny: NY DEC Postpones Decision on Brooklyn LNG Regas.”
In recent weeks and months, MDN has beat the drum about the high price of natural gas and electricity (generated by burning natural gas) in New England (see our stories here). The simple truth is this: New England blocked pipelines, so now it must import LNG from foreign countries in order to keep the lights on and to keep furnaces blowing hot air during our particularly cold winter. New England is paying international prices (obscenely high) for their LNG, competing for LNG on the open market along with Europe and Asia.
Read More “New England Paying Equivalent of $180 Oil for Natural Gas”
Full-scale war in Eastern Europe, with Russia set to invade and annex Ukraine, seems closer now than at any time since the breakup of Yugoslavia and, before that, World War II. One very important key NATO member is resisting calls from Joe Biden to send troops and threaten sanctions against Russia if it invades: Germany. Why? Because Germany sucks on Russia’s oil and natural gas teat for a significant portion of its energy. Is there a connection between the global crisis half a world away and the Marcellus/Utica?
Read More “Connecting the Dots: Russia, Ukraine, and the Marcellus/Utica”
In July 2021 Pieridae Energy, a Candian driller and LNG company, hired Peters & Co. Limited to help it conduct an internal review about the best path forward. Should the company sell itself? Should it merge with another company? Sell some of its assets but not others? The review is now over and done and the decision is…to keep on going just the way they have been. No sale, no merger, no asset sale. Why are we interested? Because of Pieridae’s proposed Goldboro LNG project.
Read More “Pieridae Energy Concludes Review – Won’t Sell or Merge Co”
As Yogi Berra once quipped, this feels like déjà vu all over again. In 2019 New York City and Long Island experienced an epic showdown with National Grid, which supplies natural gas to all of Long Island including Brooklyn and Queens. National Grid slapped a moratorium on new gas hookups due to short supplies and then-Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s blocking of a pipeline to bring more supplies to the region. After extreme blowback from customers, Cuomo threatened to rip National Grid’s franchise away and give it to someone else unless they paid $30 million in bribes and started hooking up new customers again. National Grid caved and the bad guy, Cuomo, won (see Andrew “Don Corleone” Cuomo Extorts National Grid, Wins Pipe Battle). Once again National Grid is sounding the alarm that they likely will need to restrict new gas hookups. A new battle is brewing.
Read More “National Grid Threatens New Gas Hookup Moratorium for Downstate NY”
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), natural gas spot prices at Henry Hub averaged $3.91/MMBtu for 2021. Each month the EIA issues a Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO). In the latest STEO update for January, EIA predicts that the annual average HH price will average $3.79/MMBtu in 2022, down $0.12 from 2021. EIA further predicts the HH price in 2023 will go down yet more, to an average of $3.63.
Read More “U.S. EIA Predicts Henry Hub to Average $3.79 in ’22, $3.63 in ’23”
On Jan. 6 construction of a barge at the Fincantieri Bay Shipbuilding facility in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin got underway. That barge is special. It has the ability to fundamentally impact the Marcellus/Utica. How? It is an LNG bunkering barge–the largest such ship to be built in the U.S. What is LNG bunkering, and how does this all tie into the M-U? We will explain…
Read More “Largest US LNG Bunker Barge Coming to East Coast – Fill ‘Er Up!”
In June 2020 the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA), in coordination with the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), published final rules to allow LNG (liquefied natural gas) to be safely transported by special rail cars (see PHMSA and Fed Railroad Admin Publish Final LNG by Rail Regs). Anti-fossil fuel zealots hate fossil fuels, including natural gas, so much, they launched two lawsuits to prevent the new LNG-by-rail rules from taking effect. One lawsuit was filed by 14 Democrat state attorneys general, including PA AG Josh Shapiro (see 14 AGs Join Radical Green Groups Suing to Block LNG by Rail). Those same 14 AGs are now pushing the PHMSA to indefinitely suspend the LNG-by-rail regulation.
Read More “14 Democrat Attorney Generals Pressure Feds to Block LNG-by-Rail”
New England has a problem, and Massachusetts Senator Elizbeth “Pocahontas” Warren is clueless as to its source. The problem is super high, continuously spiking prices for natural gas, which in turn lead to high and spiking prices for electricity (most of New England’s electricity is generated by natural gas-fired power plants). This week the futures price for natural gas traded at the Algonquin Citygate, the major gas delivery hub near Boston, hit almost $30 per MMBtu. Earlier this week the spot price for physically traded gas at Algonquin went over $38/MMBtu. The reason? New England depends on imported LNG to help with heating and electric production, and LNG cargoes have gotten a LOT more expensive.
Read More “Boston NatGas Futures Hit Nearly $30/MMBtu, Spot Price $38/MMBtu”
The amount of gas flowing to an LNG (liquefied natural gas) facility, which the facility then turns into a liquid, is called feedgas. Yesterday, Dec. 21, the six major US liquefaction facilities in operation were running at full capacity and used a staggering 13 billion cubic feet per day (Bcf/d) of natural gas, furiously converting it into liquid natgas for exports. A significant amount of that gas comes from the Marcellus/Utica.
Read More “US LNG Export Plants Hit New Record High of Using 13 Bcf/d”
TC Energy Corp., the former TransCanada, held its annual investor day on Dec. 1. TC owns extensive liquids and natural gas pipelines across North America, including the Columbia Gas Transmission interstate pipeline network that blankets Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia. If anyone has its ear to the ground and watching for/discerning longer-term trends, it is big pipeline companies like TC Energy. During the investor day update, one of TC’s executives, Tracy Robinson, said she expects natural gas demand in North America to grow 25% by 2030. That’s a remarkable amount of growth!
Read More “TC Energy Predicts N.A. NatGas Demand Will Grow 25% by 2030”