Sunoco Builds Stronger Case for Mariner East as Public Utility
Brilliant move or manipulating the system? Your view will depend on your drilling proclivity. Late last week Sunoco Logistics, in a bid to strengthen its case before the PA Public Utility Commission (PUC) that the Mariner East pipeline should be considered a public utility, filed an application to deliver propane from western PA to its Twin Oaks terminal in Delaware County (eastern PA) using the Mariner East. By delivering propane from one end of the state to the other and redistributing it to customers in that area, Sunoco is attempting to prove that it is a public utility under PA’s definition.
MDN has chronicled Sunoco’s fight to use eminent domain against some recalcitrant landowners who refuse to allow the pipeline to cross their property in western PA, and homeowners in eastern PA who don’t want new compressor stations built along the pipeline’s existing route (see Sunoco Logistics Faces Hostile Crowd Over NGL Pipeline Station). Sunoco claims they are a public utility corporation with the right of eminent domain. Anti-drillers (and possibly some pro-drillers) fighting them claim they are not a public utility. The case is before the PA PUC and Sunoco has just hired attorney Michael Krancer and the legal beagles from the Blank Rome law firm to help out (see Sunoco Hires Big Gun Law Firms to Help Complete Ethane Pipeline). Looks like the legal assist is already paying off with this new strategy…
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On Friday two major stories developed involving Norse Energy. You may recall Norwegian-based Norse Energy rolled the dice and placed all their bets on shale drilling in New York State, leasing some 180,000 acres, of which 130,000 acres are in the Marcellus and/or Utica Shale region. Never in their wildest dreams did Norse believe it would take six years or more for the state to allow high-volume hydraulic fracturing. Things started to go downhill for Norse when landowners sued to say Norse did not have the right to continue the leases indefinitely (beyond five years) because of New York’s tardiness in approving fracking (see 
Apparently Dr. Nirav Shah, State Health Commissioner in New York, is tired of being Andrew Cuomo’s tool–Andy’s whipping boy. For more than a year Cuomo has been able to hide behind an unfinished so-called public health review of proposed new fracking rules, proposed by the state’s Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC). In what can only be called a conspiracy, DEC Commissioner Joe Martens asked Shah for a review of the SGEIS with an eye to how shale drilling may (or may not) affect this nebulous concept called “the public health.” It’s now obvious that both Martens and Cuomo had set up Shah as the fall guy, requesting (we suspect) that Shah intentionally delay his findings. Shah has been carrying their water for more than a year now. Recently Norse Energy and the Joint Landowners Coalition of New York sued Cuomo, Martens and Shah to force them to finish the health review and release the new drilling regs (see 
Chesapeake Energy continues to find itself under the metaphorical gun with respect to royalty payments in Pennsylvania. The PA legislature is considering a bill (HB 1684) that would plug a legal loophole and require Chesapeake and other drillers to pay landowners a 12.5% minimum royalty regardless of post-production costs (see