The Long Ridge Energy Terminal, host to a Utica shale gas-fired power plant that went online in November 2021, scheduled brief downtime for routine maintenance during the fourth quarter of 2022. But when the techs started to analyze the equipment, they discovered a problem, turning a couple of weeks of downtime into more than a month.
Read More “Utica Gas Power Plant on Ohio River Returns to Service After Outage”
A Marcellus gas-fired power plant in Nicetown (a neighborhood in North Philadelphia) received a permit to build in 2017 (see Antis “Shocked” Philly Approved Marcellus Power Plant for SEPTA). SEPTA’s (Southeastern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority) Marcellus gas-powered electric plant, which finally went online in 2020, provides electricity to the organization’s northern Regional Rail lines and a bus garage. When it appeared the plant would get approved, antis got desperate and made shrill arguments that the plant is racist (see Nicetown Claims “Environmental Racism” re Gas-Fired Plant). The permit that allows the plant to continue operating is now up for review. Here come the not-nice antis to blather on once again about racist electric plants…
Read More “Not-Nice Antis Oppose Permit Reissue for Nicetown Power Plant”
MDN has highlighted Capstone Turbine Corporation, a California company that manufactures small electric-generating plants that run on natural gas, several times in the past (see our Capstone stories here). Capstone, at some point, renamed itself. The company is now called Capstone Green Energy Corporation. (It’s practically a requirement that businesses in California must insert the word “green” into their names or risk being banned from the state.) Capstone announced it has secured an “follow-on” order for two C200S Microturbines from “a leading oil and gas producer.” The two microturbines will power two different compressor stations where there is no nearby electric line for power. The microturbines create electricity by using gas from the pipeline itself.
Read More “Capstone Sells Microturbines to Power Remote Marcellus Compressors”
Last Thursday, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court dismissed the Dept. of Environmental Protection’s (DEP) claim that the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), an obscene carbon tax on gas-fired power plants being forced on PA businesses (and electricity consumers) by former Gov. Tom Wolf and his henchman DEP Secretary Pat McDonnell, was unlawfully delayed by the PA Senate. It is a good news/bad news decision.
Read More “Commonwealth Court Sides with PA Lawmakers on RGGI Carbon Tax”
On January 18, every single Republican member of the Pennsylvania State Senate signed (and sent) a joint letter to newly-minted Gov. Josh Shapiro urging him to take steps “immediately” to undo PA’s entrance into the insane Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) carbon tax, a plan forced on the state by Shapiro’s wacky predecessor Tom Wolf. During the campaign, Shapiro prevaricated on whether or not he would pull PA’s plan to enter RGGI.
Read More “PA Republicans Urge New Gov. Shapiro to Repeal RGGI Carbon Tax”
PJM is the largest electric grid operator in the U.S. It serves 65 million people in 13 states plus the District of Columbia (including PA, OH, and WV). PJM is coming under criticism for an almost-blackout during the recent Christmas cold snap. If not for certain gas-fired peaker plants, like that in the Little Town of Bethlehem, the lights would have gone out during a brutal cold snap (see Bethlehem Marcellus-Fired Power Plant Kept PA Lights on During Xmas). Some 23% of the electricity supplied to PJM was not available during the cold snap due to equipment failures and lack of supply (including natural gas frozen off at well pads). So PJM is “investigating” and threatening to assess up to $2 billion in fines on power producers who failed to supply electricity according to their contracts.
Read More “PJM Threatens Gas-Fired Power Plants with $2B in Fines re Cold Snap”
The radicals of Earthjustice have struck again. Representing two other disgusting radical groups–the Sierra Club and Clean Air Coalition of Western New York–last week Earthjustice filed a lawsuit to block the sale of a truly tiny (55 megawatt) gas-fired power plant in Western New York (near Niagara Falls) to a Canadian bitcoin operator. Gov. Hochul wonders why more people are fleeing NY than any other state in the country. This is why.
Read More “Green Radicals Sue NYS for Approving Niagara Falls Bitcoin Plant”
In a modern twist on an old story, the little town of Bethlehem (this one in Pennsylvania) provided a savior this past Christmas–in the form of a natural gas-fired power plant. The Bethlehem Energy Center, owned by Calpine, received permission (indeed, strong encouragement) from the U.S. Dept of Energy (at the request of the PJM grid operator) to “ramp up production” of electricity while other gas-fired power plants that are part of the PJM system began to fail due to the super-cold weather. Bethlehem powered up, keeping the lights (and heat) on Christmas Eve. Otherwise, Pennsylvanians living in the Lehigh Valley would have frozen their derrieres off. Marcellus gas as savior. Has a ring to it, eh?
Read More “Bethlehem Marcellus-Fired Power Plant Kept PA Lights on During Xmas”
The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) is a federally-owned electric utility corporation in the U.S. TVA’s service area covers all of Tennessee, portions of Alabama, Mississippi, and Kentucky, and small areas of Georgia, North Carolina, and Virginia. TVA is the sixth-largest power supplier and the largest public utility in the country. In December 2021, MDN told you that TVA is spending over $1 billion to replace six coal-fired plants with natgas-fired turbines (see TVA Investing $1B to Build New Natgas-Fired Electric Plants). In December 2022, TVA recommended moving forward with replacing one of the six–a coal-fired plant located near Cumberland City, Tennessee–with a natural gas combined-cycle power plant (see TVA Recommends Replacing Cumberland Coal Plant w/Natural Gas). Right on cue, a group of rabid radicals is pressuring the Bidenistas to shut down TVA’s plan to build gas-fired power plants.
Read More “Leftist Radicals Mount Attack to Block TVA’s Planned Gas Plants”
James Daly, vice president for energy supply at New England’s largest electric utility, Eversource, recently delivered some blunt truth to regulators in Massachusetts and Connecticut. Daly told them if they want to lower the insanely high price of electricity in the region right now, in the short term, they need to import more foreign LNG, which is high-priced too. But not as high as burning oil (see New England Used Mostly Fuel Oil to Generate Electric During Storm). With some of the world’s biggest supplies of natural gas at some of the cheapest prices on the planet located a few hundred miles away (in the Marcellus), how did we get to the point of needing foreign LNG?
An important update was added to this post on 1/5/23. See below.
Read More “Eversource Tells New England to Import Foreign LNG to Lower Elec $”
It’s that time of year. Typically at the end of a year, or the very beginning of a new year, publications will pontificate on what they predict will happen in the coming 12 months. We’ve seen a number of such articles about the energy space, including some predictions targeted specifically for the Marcellus/Utica. We’ve selected three such articles to share with you–all of them from authors and publications we highly respect.
Read More “Natural Gas Predictions 2023 for the Marcellus/Utica & Beyond”
We came “this close” to a major electricity blackout in New England over the Christmas break, during the bomb cyclone cold snap called Winter Storm Elliott. The ONLY thing that prevented a major blackout (with people freezing to death) was…oil. Fuel oil, specifically. So-called renewable energy–solar and wind–bombed out during the bomb cyclone. Natural gas did what it could, but there wasn’t enough natgas to keep the power generators turning because people like newly-elected Gov. Maura Healey (Massachusetts wacko leftist) blocked new natgas pipelines during her tenure as the state’s Attorney General. What was left was to burn to keep the lights on and to keep people from freezing to death was fuel oil (much dirtier than natural gas). Welcome to the leftist utopia of New England. During the next bomb cyclone, New England may not be so lucky.
Read More “New England Used Mostly Fuel Oil to Generate Electric During Storm”
The Freeport LNG export terminal, located in Quintana Island, Texas, has been offline and not producing LNG since early June due to an explosion (see Explosion Rocks Freeport LNG Export Plant – Offline for 3 Weeks). Freeport has changed its estimated restart date multiple times. The most recent declaration by Freeport LNG that it will begin to return to service by the end of this year, in another ten days (see Freeport LNG Changes Restart Date from Mid- to End-December). It’ll be a miracle if that happens. But hey, Christmas is the time of miracles, right?
Read More “Freeport LNG Dips Toe Back in Water with 25 MMcf Intake of Gas”
Last week PPL Corporation subsidiaries Louisville Gas and Electric Company and Kentucky Utilities Company announced a plan to replace 1,500 megawatts of aging coal-fired generation (nearly one-third of Kentucky’s coal fleet!) with two 621-megawatt natural gas combined-cycle units along with several unreliable, intermittent solar projects. The coal-fired plants are due to be retired by 2028.
Read More “PPL Replacing Coal-Fired Power Plants with NatGas in Louisville, KY”
The Rice boys–Dan, Toby, and Derek–have done it again. Yesterday, the Rice boys’ second publicly traded shell company (or SPAC), called Rice Acquisition Corp II, announced it is acquiring NET Power–an electric power developer with revolutionary new technology to capture every last molecule of carbon dioxide from natural gas-fired power plants. The deal values NET Power at $1.46 billion. Existing shareholders, including Occidental Petroleum, Constellation Energy, and Baker Hughes, will roll their existing equity into a new public version of the company. Both the Rice boys and Oxy will contribute another $100 million in equity each. When the deal is done, the current CEO of NET will retire, and Dan Rice will take over as CEO.
Read More “Dan Rice Buys Co. that Builds Zero-Carbon Gas-Fired Electric Plants”
The U.S. power system is facing “unprecedented” and “widespread” reliability risks this winter, according to the nation’s grid reliability coordinator, the North American Electric Reliability Corporation. Why? Because the Biden-controlled Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has blocked new natural gas pipelines and has introduced new policies aimed at forcing the electric grid to switch over to so-called renewable energy sources prematurely–before those sources are ready to handle the load. So says the CEO of the Electric Power Supply Association.
Read More “U.S. Electric Grid Faces “Unprecedented” Risk Due to FERC Decisions”