Republican Blocks Mass. Democrat Plan to Forcibly Remove NatGas
Something incredible is happening in Massachusetts. The entire legislature, minus one brave Republican (maybe the only patriot left in New England), wants to pass a law that empowers state regulators to “terminate [natural gas] service to consumers so long as they have access to ‘safe, reliable, and affordable alternatives.'” It is a breathtaking seizure of freedom from the residents of the state. Government weenies can decide whether or not to rip pipelines out of the ground that feeds your home with natural gas. Except Sen. Ryan Fattman, a Sutton Republican, who used a procedural tactic to push off debate by another day. It’s a desperate move to buy time to sound the alarm like Paul Revere. Fattman is a modern-day Paul Revere. Wake up, Massachusetts residents! Stop this insanity while you can!
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The Dems are all about handing out other people’s money. It keeps them in power (tantamount to bribes). Incidentally, Alexander Fraser Tytler said in the late 1700s: “A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury.” The U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) recently began soliciting applications to hand out nearly $200 million in grants from the $1.2 trillion Infrastructure law to upgrade natural gas pipelines. Spreading around $200 million from the total of $1.2 trillion a rounding error — below two-tenths of a single percent.
There’s no way to sugarcoat bad news. The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (PUC) predicted in January that money raised by the shale impact fee (PA’s version of a severance tax) would plummet this year (see 
As we report in a companion post today, Pennsylvania is currently dishing out close to $180 million in impact fees raised from 2023 shale activity — PA’s version of a severance tax (see PA PUC Distributes 2023 Impact Fee – Revenue Dropped $99M YOY). As the name implies, some 60% of the money raised goes to the counties and municipalities where drilling happens, those “impacted” by shale drilling. The other 40% goes to the black hole of Harrisburg for redistribution to various state agencies and the other counties with no shale drilling. Let’s look at how some counties and towns will spend the money coming their way.
Radicalized environmental groups, including Trout Unlimited and the Mid State Trail Association, have devolved into trying to block gathering and water pipelines in Pennsylvania. Driller Pennsylvania General Energy (PGE) wants to install 3.7 miles of a gathering pipeline to connect several wells to the Transco pipeline system, along with two 8-inch water pipelines of about the same length, in Lycoming County. Nearly all of the pipeline projects are located on state-owned land.
Danskammer Energy, which operates a gas-fired peaker power plant along the Hudson River in Newburgh, NY, has been working on a project to upgrade the plant since 2018 — seven years. On Monday, Danskammer Energy withdrew its permit application with the fossil fuel-hostile state, formally ending attempts to expand after years of trying. It’s time to throw in the towel in NY State and let the idiots who keep the Dems in power sit in the dark.
For those (like the dunce who heads up the Dept. of Energy, Jennifer Granholm) who say Uncle Joe’s “pause” on authorizing new LNG export requests isn’t having an impact, how do you respond to this?… Russia has overtaken the United States as the top exporter of natural gas to Europe. Why? Because the Europeans are scared to death they will run out of natgas promised by the U.S. Biden’s pause on new export authorizations has Europe scrambling to ensure their citizens don’t freeze to death next winter.
We often mention gas-fired power generation here on MDN for a reason — it’s a HUGE customer for the natural gas locally extracted. The more power plants we build in the Marcellus/Utica region, the more our gas stays right here at home (a win/win for everyone). The power grid that covers the M-U region is called PJM. New data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) shows coal-fired generation in PJM accounted for 14% of the market’s total generation in 2023, down from 44% of total generation in 2013. That’s a whopping 68% fall in the use of coal in just ten years. The reason? Coal generation was largely replaced by natural gas-fired generation.
Being reasonable and seeking compromise and the middle ground exited American politics about a decade ago. Maybe 20 years ago. What we have today, at least on the left of the political spectrum, is “my way or the highway.” Tyranny. It is the very definition of unreasonableness. Here is a perfect example: Yesterday, the Pennsylvania House Environmental Resources & Energy Committee, chaired by Democrat Rep. Greg Vitali (a Marcellus shale hater), held a hearing on Hydrogen Hubs and Climate Change. The name of the hearing says it all. Vitali paraded mind-numbed robots (“we hate fossil fuels, we hate fossil fuels”) from radicalized organizations like Earthjustice to testify before the hearing. The stupidity on display was breathtaking.
Tallgrass Energy, majority owner of the Rockies East Express (REX) pipeline — a 1,712-mile pipeline that runs from Colorado and Wyoming to Ohio — has owned 75% of REX since buying out a 25% share from Sempra Energy in 2016 for $440 million (see 
President Joementia Biden’s regulators recently finalized a flood of major energy and environmental rules in hopes they’ll stick when Donald Trump returns to the White House next January. A sort of “burn the ships” strategy. Bidenistas embedded across the D.C. swamp hustled to complete sweeping new regulations in recent months — including everything from a high-stakes power plant rule to a policy governing the conservation of public lands. When Trump came to power in 2016, he used something called the Congressional Review Act (CRA) to reverse such policies put in place by the Obamadroids. The Bidenistas think they have bullet-proofed their regulations against the use of the CRA.
On Friday, Equitrans Midstream, the builder and majority owner of the 303-mile Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) that runs from Wetzel County, WV, to Pittsylvania County, VA, announced the pipeline has, after a decade of planning and building, finally begun to flow Marcellus/Utica molecules. Who is buying those molecules? We know of at least one company. In a separate announcement, Roanoke Gas Company (a large local utility) said it had begun to purchase M-U molecules from MVP on Friday. Roanoke Gas said for the first time since 1965, the Roanoke Valley now has access to a new interstate natural gas pipeline via two interconnections Roanoke Gas has with MVP.