Industrywide Issues

Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Pipelines | Regulation | Statewide PA

New PA Bill Would Require Real-Time Monitoring of Gas Wells
April 11, 2012April 11, 2012

On Monday, Pennsylvania State Representative Duane Milne, a Republican from Chester, PA (near Philly) held a press conference in his district to announce new Marcellus Shale legislation he will soon introduce. The legislation would require all natural gas wells—wells yet to be drilled and wells already drilled—to install real-time safety monitoring using technology called a wireless mesh network (WMN). The bill will also include real-time monitoring of natural gas pipelines using WMN.

WMN is a series (or network) of wireless transmitters that doesn’t need the Internet in order to “talk” with each other. The transmitters would automatically alert the Department of Environmental Protection and county emergency management organizations if it detects a problem.

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Public Opinion

Fox News Poll: Does Fracking Pollute Well Water?
April 11, 2012April 11, 2012

The Fox News website is currently running a poll which asks the question: Do you believe ‘fracking’ pollutes well water? Head on over and vote.

Here are the results so far, as of early Wednesday morning:

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Economic Impact | Education | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA

The Economic Impact of Marcellus Drilling on PA Schools
April 11, 2012April 11, 2012

Penn State Cooperative Extension and Penn State University researchers continue their research into how the Marcellus Shale gas drilling boom affects the state. Recently they issued findings from a survey of 940 school districts across PA (see this MDN story). Earlier this week, they issued another report in their Marcellus Education Fact Sheet series, titled: “Marcellus Shale Gas Development and Pennsylvania School Districts: What Are the Implications for School Expenditures and Tax Revenues?” (full report embedded below).

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Chesapeake Energy | Commodity Price | Energy Companies | Industrywide Issues

At What Commodity Price Does NatGas Drilling Stop?
April 10, 2012April 10, 2012

How low might the commodity price of natural gas go before drillers really will quit drilling and wait for the price to go up? We’ll give you “the magic number” in a moment. But first, the (rather sketchy) rationale for how we calculate that number.

It seems almost every day we hear in the mainstream news that the low commodity price of natural gas is forcing drillers to suspend or slow drilling operations—especially in the “dry gas” areas of the Marcellus Shale. Contrary to what “everyone” seems to be doing, Shell, Chevron and others have said they will continue drilling regardless of the low price of natural gas. And more than one analyst has said announcements of drilling cutbacks by Chesapeake and others is so much hot air and that they will believe it when they see it.

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Regulation

The EPA and Pavillion: Sloppy or Criminal?
April 10, 2012April 10, 2012

An exceptionally well written article about the EPA and their backpedaling on their own tests in Pavillion, Wyoming appears on today’s American Thinker blog. You may recall that the EPA tried to say there is a direct link between chemical contamination of ground water supplies around Pavillion and hydraulic fracturing of gas wells in the area. MDN pointed out early on that even if such a link is eventually made, the geology where those wells were drilled is sandstone (not shale), and the wells are shallow (not deep, like the Marcellus). In other words, the EPA was trying to gin up hysteria by using an apples and oranges comparison (see this MDN story).

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Commodity Price | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Pennsylvania | Statewide NY | Statewide PA | Steuben County

NY Customers See 50% Price Decrease from PA Marcellus Gas
April 10, 2012April 10, 2012

Utility customers of Corning Natural Gas Corp. in New York State’s Finger Lakes region can thank their neighbors south of the border in Pennsylvania that they are now paying 50 percent less for their natural gas than they paid just one year ago. And they can also thank the energy companies who use hydraulic fracturing in the Marcellus Shale.

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Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA

PA Act 13 Lawsuit and its “Supporters”
April 10, 2012April 10, 2012

The Pittsburgh newspapers want us to believe there is a huge surge of support behind a lawsuit recently filed against what is known as Act 13—a new law passed just a few months ago in Pennsylvania that updates Marcellus oil and gas drilling rules in the state. Although the law brought much-needed new regulations to the Commonwealth, it also contained two measures that have particularly irked those who oppose drilling: an impact fee instead of a severance tax, and preemption of local oil and gas zoning ordinances with a “one size fits all” set of ordinances from the state. MDN will not recount the arguments for and against, you can read them by doing a search for “Act 13 lawsuit” in our search box (upper right corner).

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Chief Gathering | Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Pipelines | PVR Partners | Statewide PA

PVR Buys Chief Gathering/Marcellus Pipelines for $1B
April 10, 2012April 10, 2012

Calling it a “transformational transaction” for the company, Penn Virginia Resource Partners (PVR) today announced they are buying Chief Gathering for $1 billion in cash and stock. Chief Gathering is a midstream pipeline company with assets (pipelines) located mostly in northeastern Pennsylvania in the Marcellus Shale. The deal includes existing pipeline agreements with drilling heavyweights like Chesapeake, Anadarko, Statoil, Exxon Mobil and others. PVR CEO William Shea says the new combined pipeline operation for PVR will represent 75 percent of its business by the end of next year (it’s currently 40-45 percent of their business).

From the PVR press release:

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Accidents | Coterra Energy (Cabot O&G) | Energy Companies | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Susquehanna County

EPA Says Another 20 Dimock Wells Tested are Fine
April 9, 2012April 9, 2012

$fracking is safe - an incovenient truth$ WARNING: This post contains snide and snarky comments. Anti-drillers are encouraged to not read this post. Proceed at your own risk.

Sometimes MDN thinks the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is more of a public relations press release-generating agency rather than an agency to protect the environment. They issue a multitude of press releases—every day. But when they find that another 20 wells in Dimock, PA are fine and have not been (never were) chemically contaminated by hydraulic fracturing, not a single public press release on it. Oh it gets reported, but the EPA slips a short message to the government’s “other” PR agency, the Associated Press. And the good ole AP will warp and spin it in just the right way to please the government overlords.

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Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA

PA Drillers, Industry Groups File to Join Act 13 Lawsuit
April 9, 2012April 9, 2012

The oil and gas industry in Pennsylvania is not sitting on the sidelines idly while a group of municipalities attempts to temporarily halt, and eventually overturn the new Act 13 drilling legislation passed earlier this year. Seven municipalities along with an enviro-leftist group and a doctor are suing the state to stop Act 13 (see this MDN story for background, and this guest post from one of the litigants).

The Pennsylvania Oil and Gas Association and the Marcellus Shale Coalition have filed a petition seeking to join the lawsuit—on the other side, trying to stop the lawsuit by the municipalities.

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Regulation

Industry Reacts to Interior Sec. Salazar Fracking Statement
April 9, 2012April 9, 2012

Last week, MDN reported the comments made by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar as he toured a drilling “man camp” in the Bakken Shale of North Dakota (see this MDN story). Salazar made the comment that his Interior department is working on new rules for hydraulic fracturing, which seems premature given that the Environmental Protection Agency, another federal agency, is working on a multi-year study of fracking. We now know that the rules Salazar was referring to are for fracking on federal lands that come under the jurisdiction of Bureau of Land Management, an Interior sub-agency. We also now have industry reaction to his statement.

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Education | Industrywide Issues | New York | Statewide NY

SUNY’s First Shale Institute to be Located in…Buffalo?
April 9, 2012April 9, 2012

The State University of New York (SUNY) system with 64 campuses across the state has its first bona fide shale institute, but it’s not located in the hotbed of where shale drilling will happen, when it happens. Drilling will likely be prevalent in what is known as the Southern Tier of New York, counties like Broome, Tioga, Chemung, Steuben, and perhaps northward into Tompkins, Cortland and Chenango, and east to Otsego, and Delaware. That’s likely where you’ll see the first permits and the first wells drilled.

But the first SUNY shale institute will be located at the University of Buffalo. From the UB press release:

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CONSOL Energy | Energy Companies | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA | Wildlife

Drillers, Ecologists Work Together to Protect Wildlife
April 9, 2012April 9, 2012

An interesting article in yesterday’s Pittsburgh Post-Gazette explores how drilling firms and wildlife groups are working together to protect endangered species and reviving long-gone habitats for other species. It begins this way:

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Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA | Susquehanna County

PA Supreme Court to Consider Shale Gas Mineral Rights Case
April 5, 2012April 5, 2012

An update on what could be a very important case for many landowners in Pennsylvania: On Tuesday, April 3, the PA Supreme Court agreed to hear a Susquehanna County case called Butler v Powers estate. The case concerns whether or not natural gas rights are a part of “mineral rights” in old leases where it’s not specifically spelled out. PA law precedent since 1882 known as the “Dunham rule” is that natural gas is not part of mineral rights unless specifically stated as such. If the Supreme Court overturns that precedent, it would threaten hundreds of drilling leases now in place throughout PA.

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Broome County | Chesapeake Energy | Energy Companies | Equinor/Statoil | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | New York | Tioga County (NY)

Judge Orders Arbitration in Chesapeake ‘Force Majeure’ Case
April 5, 2012April 5, 2012

U.S. District Judge David N. Hurd ordered that a lease dispute case between a group of landowners in Broome and Tioga counties (New York) and Chesapeake Energy will go to arbitration for about 150 of the landowners. That’s not-so-good news for those landowners who want to keep the case in federal court. But he also ruled a second case with 32 landowners can go forward in federal court because those leases did not contain an arbitration clause. That’s good news for those landowners, and may end up being good news for those in arbitration. A copy of the judge’s order is embedded below.

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Public Opinion

Leftist PRWatch Claims Fracking Causes Breast Cancer
April 5, 2012April 5, 2012

Although it’s preferable to ignore (in an effort to retain one’s sanity) the lie machine that purports to warn us of the environmental holocaust hydraulic fracturing will bring, sometimes we have to respond to the truly egregious whoppers that are spun by the far, far kooky left. Like Daily Kos/Bill Maher kooky. One such organization is the innocent sounding PRWatch, a website of the equally innocent sounding Center for Media and Democracy (CMD). The CMD and PRWatch are somewhere left of Vladimir Putin and Fidel Castro, just to provide perspective.

PRWatch published a whopper yesterday that attempts to tie fracking to breast cancer. Just for good measure, the article also says fracking causes spontaneous abortions and birth defects, and is even responsible for crime against women. Who knew?

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