“Look ma, no hands on the steering wheel!” Forget about self-steering/self-driving cars. That’s yesterday. Now we have self-steering (or “autonomous”) directional drilling–oil and gas drilling that steers itself using artificial intelligence. Brought to you by the largest oilfield services company in the world: Schlumberger.
Read More “Schlumberger Introduces Self-Steering Directional Drilling”
Halliburton is reporting it used an “advanced” electric fracking solution for the first time (partnering with VoltaGrid) on a Marcellus well pad in Bradford County, Pennsylvania for Chesapeake Energy. This project is the first pad in a multi-year contract with Chesapeake. What makes this e-fracking “advanced”? Halliburton joined its massive Zeus 5,000 horsepower electric pumping unit with VoltaGrid’s advanced power generation system. The combo is the first pairing of the two.
Read More “Chesapeake Energy Uses Halliburton E-Fracking in NEPA Marcellus”
Seneca Resources, the drilling arm of utility giant National Fuel Gas Company, is conducting its first experiment with electric fracking. We’re aware of at least three other Marcellus/Utica drillers that currently use electric fracking: Range Resources, CNX Resources, and Olympus Energy (former Huntley & Huntley). Seneca, like Range, will use U.S. Well Services to provide e-fracking. Seneca is conducting a field trial for a 6-well pad in Lycoming County, PA.
Read More “Seneca Resources Uses Electric Fracking for 6-Well Pad in PA”
You know we are 100% pro-fracking here at MDN. But you also know we champion the rights of landowners and the people who live in areas where fracking happens. Drillers *must* be mindful of the impacts they have on the neighbors. Those impacts include truck traffic, lights (at night), and noise. Fracking equipment is loud. Some residents who live miles from fracking locations in Brooke County, WV are complaining to the County Commission that the noise is bothersome.
Read More “Brooke County, WV Residents Fed Up with Fracking Noise”
A Pennsylvania Democrat lawmaker from Beaver County (southwestern PA) who professes to support the Marcellus industry, Rep. Rob Matzie, has written a letter to Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) Secretary Pat McDonnell (a fellow Dem) asking him to deny a request by PennEnergy Resources to withdraw as much as 3 million gallons of water a day from Big Sewickley Creek and one of its tributaries for shale fracking. Matzie says that’s just too much water to withdraw from the creek.
Read More “Dem PA Lawmaker Wants to Block Use of Creek Water for Fracking”
In a brilliant move aimed at boxing in the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC), two northeastern Pennsylvania State Senators–Gene Yaw and Lisa Baker–along with members of the PA Senate Republican Caucus (27 Senators in all), filed a lawsuit in January against the DRBC accusing the quasi-governmental agency of “taking” the property rights of PA residents without just compensation under the law (see PA Senators Sue DRBC for “Taking” Property re Frack Ban). Unfortunately, in June a federal district court judge in Philadelphia appointed by RINO George W. Bush dismissed the case claiming the Senators, who represent people shafted by the DRBC, don’t have “standing” to bring the lawsuit (see Fed Court Dismisses PA Senate Lawsuit Against DRBC Frack Ban). Senators Yaw and Baker have just appealed the dismissal to a higher court.
Read More “PA Senators Appeal Dismissed DRBC Frack Ban Lawsuit”
Seneca Resources Company, the exploration and production subsidiary of National Fuel Gas Company (NFG), is the latest company to jump on the ESG (environmental, social, governance) bandwagon. Seneca is partnering with NexTier Oilfield Solutions, an oilfield services company that fracks and completes wells for companies like Seneca, to study the carbon emissions that come from fracking shale wells.
Read More “Seneca Partners with NexTier to Test Carbon Emissions from Fracking”
We recently spotted an article in the Wall Street Journal about the prospect of combining horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing (collectively called “fracking”) with geothermal energy. The article claims fracking could be used to generate energy with “no carbon emissions.” Green nirvana! At last!! But is this really possible? Is it actually economical? Let’s take a closer look.
Read More “Fracking for Geothermal Energy – Reality or Pipe Dream?”
Evolution Well Services, headquartered in Houston with a regional office in Pittsburgh, specializes in “electric” fracking–using natural gas from the well pad (instead of diesel fuel) to power turbines to create electricity that drives fracking pumps. The company reports hitting a major milestone: Completing over 30,000 frac stages, the most electric frac stages completed to date in the industry. The stages were completed for numerous clients across the Marcellus/Utica, Permian, Scoop, Stack, and Eagle Ford shale basins.
Read More “OFS Co. Evolution Well Services Passes 30K Electric Frac Stages”
In a brilliant move aimed at boxing in the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC), two northeastern Pennsylvania State Senators–Gene Yaw and Lisa Baker–along with members of the PA Senate Republican Caucus (27 Senators in all), filed a lawsuit in January against the DRBC accusing the quasi-governmental agency of “taking” the property rights of PA residents without just compensation under the law (see PA Senators Sue DRBC for “Taking” Property re Frack Ban). Unfortunately, last week a federal court judge in Philadelphia appointed by RINO George W. Bush has dismissed the case claiming the Senators, who represent people shafted by the DRBC, don’t have “standing” to bring the lawsuit. They represent those people! How is that not standing?
Read More “Fed Court Dismisses PA Senate Lawsuit Against DRBC Frack Ban”
In March we told you about House of Representatives (HR) Bill 1512, the Climate Leadership and Environmental Action for our Nation’s Future Act (or CLEAN Future Act). The bill gives vast powers to the unelected bureaucrats at the EPA to set new regulatory demands before permits can be approved for facilities that produce plastics or the raw materials used to produce plastics, such as ethylene or propylene (see Democrat Bill in Congress Blocks Petchem Growth in M-U, Beyond). It turns out the CLEAN Future Act is far worse than we had imagined.
Read More “Democrat CLEAN Future Act Would Kill Fracking Across the U.S.”
Here’s a new one for us. An oil and gas consultant says maybe we should just forget about fracking. Keep drilling oil and gas wells, but don’t use fracking. He says natural micro and macro fractures already exist in the rock and if you drill it right using a technique called “Near Balanced Reservoir Drilling,” you can tap existing deposits of gas and oil at half the price. Is he right?
Read More “O&G Expert Says It’s Time to Forget Fracking, Use Natural Cracks”
While the Philadelphia Inquirer has at least one reliable and objective reporter working in its ranks–Andrew Maykuth–the same can’t be said for the lefties who populate the editorial board at the newspaper. Yesterday’s unsigned editorial declares that “Fracking jobs will disappear. Pennsylvania has to manage the decline.” Like he!!. The lefties on the editorial board base their brazen (and false) statements on Joe Biden’s plan to decimate the fossil fuel industry with his warmed-over Green New Deal vomit. The editorial board presumes Biden’s attempts will be successful. They will not.
Read More “Philly Inquirer Goes Hard Left – PA Must “Manage Fracking Decline””
Terms are often thrown around that remain somewhat amorphous and undefined in our minds. Especially in a complex industry like oil and gas. What do certain terms really mean? Today we define what a “clean frac”–otherwise known as a “green completion”–actually means, and why it’s so appealing to pimple-faced, woke millennials who place a premium on ESG (environmental, social, and governance) investing.
Read More “Clean Fracs (i.e. Green Completions) Appeal to ESG Investors”
A lawsuit against the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) and their illegal ban on hydraulic fracturing filed by a group of Republican Senators from Pennsylvania continues to heat up in federal court. Two more counties (Philadelphia suburbs) have filed to “intervene” against the lawsuit (they like the ban). There’s talk of another county joining the lawsuit on the supportive side. Anti-fossil fuelers are spitting and sputtering because if this lawsuit moves forward and prevails, the DRBC will either be bankrupted or forced to rescind its ban on fracking.
Read More “Lawsuit Over DRBC “Taking” of Property Rights Heats Up in Court”
In February Chesapeake Energy finally emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy shedding $7.8 billion worth of debt (see Chesapeake Emerges from Ch. 11 Bankruptcy, Stock Restarts Trading). Also in February, the company announced it would end its ill-advised dalliance with trying to convert the company from exploring for natural gas to oil, refocusing back on natgas (see Chesapeake Refocuses on NatGas, Offers $1B in Post-Bankruptcy IOUs). Chesapeake is one of the biggest drillers in the Marcellus of northeast Pennsylvania, so any major changes it makes to the way it drills and completes wells is big news for us.
Read More “Chesapeake Energy Shifting to “Wet Sand” for All Well Completions”