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EQT Closes Midstream JV Deal with Blackstone for $3.5 Billion
A little over one month ago, we confirmed a rumor that we previously reported regarding EQT Corporation selling a minority stake in its newly-acquired midstream assets from Equitrans to investment firm Blackstone in return for $3.5 billion in cold, hard cash (see Reuters Was Right – Blackstone Paying EQT $3.5B for Pipeline Stake). The deal is now done as of Dec. 30. Read More “EQT Closes Midstream JV Deal with Blackstone for $3.5 Billion”
Just incredible. Not only did New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, an extremist liberal, sign a ban on using carbon dioxide to frack wells in the state at the last minute before the end of the current legislative session (see 
U.S. natural gas demand from LNG plants (the feedgas that flows to the plants) hit a new all-time record high on Tuesday, Dec. 31st, the last day of the year. Feedgas flows climbed to 15.2 billion cubic feed (Bcf) in a sign of a strong year ahead from the startup of two new gas-processing plants. Venture Global LNG’s Plaquemines plant in Louisiana and Cheniere Energy’s Corpus Christi Stage 3 expansion in Texas recently came online (at least partially), driving feedgas flows higher. 
The Baker Hughes national rig count dramatically increased three weeks ago, adding seven rigs for a national count of 589 (see 
It took a full nine months, but New York’s leftist Governor, Kathy Hochul, didn’t disappoint her radicalized base of supporters. The NY legislature (both chambers controlled by Democrats) passed a ban on “CO2 fracking” (uses carbon dioxide instead of water) back in March of this year (see 
A lawsuit that slipped by us (and is still playing out) that began in Carroll County, OH, has major ramifications for landowners and drillers across the state. The case is EAP Ohio LLC v. Sunnydale Farms LLC, et al. in which 13 oil and gas leases were executed in 2008 and 2009 in Carroll County, Ohio. The 2008 Leases contained an identical royalty clause that limited post-production deductions to three categories: transportation, compression, and/or dehydration to deliver the gas for sale. After drilling wells on those properties, EAP (Encino Energy) deducted several other items from royalties, including costs incurred for processing, treating, fuel, gathering, and trucking. The lawsuit tussles with the issue of how terms are defined and whether these “extra” categories are allowed under the lease’s language. 
Last week, MDN brought you the news that the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) had not followed up on the cleanup work needed for a shale well drilled some 12 years ago (see 
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 company in the country. In May 2023, TVA announced that it would convert the Kingston Fossil Plant (coal-fired plant) in East Tennessee to a natural gas-fired plant capable of generating 1,500 megawatts of electricity (see 
The NYMEX futures price for natural gas keeps climbing. Significantly. Last week, the “front month” contract for the NYMEX gained 46.8 cents per MMBtu (up 14% for the week). On Friday, the price closed at $3.748/MMBtu. The price soared 16.4 cents on Friday alone! Friday’s closing price was the highest since Monday, Jan. 9, 2023—in nearly two full years. U.S. natural gas storage withdrawals are “exceeding seasonal averages, and record liquefied natural gas (LNG) export volumes are maintaining strong demand,” said Brian Swan, senior commodity analyst at Schneider Electric, in a daily note. What’s next for the price? 
The dataheads (sounds better than geeks or eggheads) at the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) published an interesting analysis on Friday detailing which states export the most and import the most electricity. In 2023, Pennsylvania exported 83.4 million megawatt-hours (MWh) of electricity to other states in the PJM electric grid. That’s roughly 26% of all the electric power the Keystone State produced. Meanwhile, for the first time in years (maybe in forever?) Virginia became the #1 state importing electricity, importing 50.1 million MWh. Virginia is also in PJM, so it’s not a stretch to suggest Pennsylvania’s electric exports went (largely) to Virginia. 
In November, MDN told you that Diversified Energy and EQT Corporation had settled a class action lawsuit originally brought by several West Virginia landowners (see 
Penneco Environmental Solutions wants to build a second wastewater injection well in Plum Borough (Allegheny County), PA, next to an existing injection well. Penneco’s first wastewater injection well in Plum finally opened for business in mid-2021, overcoming all sorts of smears, slanders, and lawsuits by the enviro-left (see 
Just yesterday, we noted the recent run-up in the NYMEX futures price for natural gas (see 
Just as the pandemic began to unfold in early 2020, Shell pulled out of a 50/50 joint venture partnership with Energy Transfer (ET) to build a new LNG export facility in Lake Charles, Louisiana (see