We have sad news to report. Yesterday a 50-year-old man was unloading a large excavator off a trailer at natural gas well pad in Lycoming County, PA when the tailgate/ramp he was trying to lower knocked him to the ground and landed on his chest resulting in “traumatic asphyxiation.” We don’t have a lot of details, but we do have some…
Read More “Worker Killed Delivering Equipment to Well Pad in Lycoming County”
Last December MDN told you about a second natural gas-fired power plant planned for Charles City County, Va. (near Richmond) being developed by C4GT (see 2nd Gas-Fired Power Plant, Pipe Coming to Charles City County, VA). It appears the project is in trouble, which means a 24-mile pipeline to feed it is also in trouble. It is because of the pipeline and a regulatory filing that we know about the gas-fired plant’s troubles.
Read More “Va. NatGas Pipeline Project in Trouble, Gas-Fired Plant in Doubt”
On Monday we brought you the news that Gulfport Energy, the third-largest driller in the Ohio Utica Shale, had filed for bankruptcy over the weekend (see Gulfport Energy Files for Pre-arranged Chapter 11 Bankruptcy). The company issued an update yesterday to say federal bankruptcy court has approved its “first day” motions that allow Gulfport to borrow more money, pay certain people, etc.
We have an update (11/19/20) below.
Read More “Gulfport Energy Looks to Cancel Pipeline Contracts via Bankruptcy”
The Pennsylvania Senate previously passed and yesterday “concurred” (signed-off on) Senate Bill 790, sending it to Gov. Tom Wolf for his signature. SB 790 restores sanity to regulations for conventional oil and gas drillers in the Keystone State. Unfortunately, Gov. Wolf has stubbornly said he will veto this common sense bill. Why are we not surprised?
Read More “PA Lawmakers Send Bill Splitting Conventional & Shale Regs to Gov”
Yesterday our favorite government agency, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), published our favorite monthly report, the Drilling Productivity Report (DPR). The latest DPR, which shows estimates for oil and gas production from the seven largest shale plays in the U.S., shows a drop in shale gas production across every single play, including the Marcellus/Utica, coming next month in December. The M-U is forecast to drop another 133 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d) from production levels in November.
Read More “DPR: All Shale Plays, Incl. M-U, Continue Big Drop in Production”
Seth A. Shapiro will become the new CEO of the Philadelphia Gas Works (PGW) at the end of next year when current CEO Craig White retires. Beginning Jan. 4, Shapiro will become PGW’s new chief operating officer. In an interview with the Philly Inquirer, Shapiro shared his thoughts on the future of the country’s largest municipally-owned natural gas utility. What will no doubt be a disappointment to Big Green radicals, Shapiro is not looking to stop the sale of natural gas. In fact, he wants to expand it.
Read More “New Phila. Gas Works CEO-in-Waiting Wants to Expand Gas Sales”
New England “doesn’t produce a barrel of crude oil, a gallon of NGLs, or a cubic foot of natural gas.” All of the considerable quantity of fossil fuels the region uses for energy must be brought in–by pipeline (very few pipelines), truck, ship, or rail. Propane is one of the primary heating fuels used in New England. Guess where the region’s propane comes from, and how it gets there?
Read More “Railed Marcellus Propane Keeps New England Warm in Winter”
Once again the price of natural gas traded on the Henry Hub in south Louisiana, the NYMEX December futures contract, has tanked. The price fell $0.30 yesterday to close at $2.70/Mcf. There were two primary reasons why: (1) The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) released a storage report last Friday showing storage levels are near record-highs (too much supply), and (2) longer range weather models show temps staying warm (not enough demand).
Read More “Warm Temps, High Storage Level Drives NatGas Price Down $0.30”
In August Southwestern Energy announced it is buying out and merging in Montage Resources in an all-stock deal (see Stop Press! Southwestern Energy Buying Montage Resources for $857M). As of Friday Montage, which was itself a merger of two companies (Blue Ridge Mountain Resources and Eclipse Resources) is no more. Montage is now a part of Southwestern.
Read More “Southwestern Completes Montage Merger, Now 3rd Largest M-U Co.”
Once again PTT Global Chemical is changing the timeline for a final investment decision (FID) to build a $10 billion ethane cracker plant in Belmont County, OH–for the umpteenth time. The most recent timeline had a decision coming by the end of this year or in the first quarter of next year. Whoops, they did it again! The new timeline is now “at least the middle of 2021.”
Read More “PTT Delays Final Cracker Decision to at Least Middle of 2021”
When a pipeline company considers whether or not to build a new pipeline, the company conducts an “open season”–a time when drillers (producers) can sign long-term contracts to use capacity along the pipeline. Such contracts guarantee pipeline companies will be able to make back the considerable amount of money they have to spend to build the pipeline. What happens when a driller that signed to a 10- or 20-year contract goes bankrupt? Or what happens if a contract will force a driller into bankruptcy? Can such a contract be canceled?
Read More “Shale Driller Bankruptcies Spur Requests to Cancel Pipe Contracts”
Here’s a little known fact: Fracking for natural gas in shale only extracts about 20% of the methane gas that’s trapped in shale rock, meaning (of course) that 80% of the gas gets left behind. Researchers with the Dept. of Energy’s (DOE) Los Alamos National Laboratory have made what we consider an astonishing breakthrough discovery: Too much pressure used during fracking actually locks some of the methane away tighter in the shale, instead of loosening it. In a published paper revealing their results (full copy below), researchers recommend a range of pressures to use to optimize (increase) recovery rates for methane in the Marcellus.
Read More “DOE Marcellus Research Finds High Frack Pressure Keeps Gas Trapped”
Like a bad Stephen King horror flick, the Sisters of the Corn (our name for a group of leftist nuns in Lancaster County, PA) have returned to file yet another frivolous lawsuit against Williams over a pipeline that crosses their land–a pipeline (Atlantic Sunrise) that has been up and running for years. The Sisters claim an infringement of their “religious liberties” in the lawsuit. They tried this argument once before and the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear the case.
Read More “Sisters of the Corn Return – Sue Williams re Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline”
The Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) continues to block Energy Transfer’s Revolution Pipeline gathering system in western PA from restarting. In September the DEP finally, after two years, gave ET permission to fix problems that caused the pipeline to explode. Even though ET has fixed the original site of the explosion, the DEP says there are other areas of concern and forbids certain sections of the pipeline from restarting, until…
Read More “PA DEP Blocks Revolution Pipe Restart Even Though Repair is Done”
The Enverus U.S. rig count rose by a whopping 20 to 379 over the past week. Prior to that, the count rose by 11, 11, and 13 for each of the three weeks prior, respectively. That’s up 55 rigs over the past month! The Marcellus and Utica each remained constant last week, not adding and not dropping. The Marcellus stands at 27 rigs, and the Utica at 6.
Read More “Enverus U.S. Rig Count Jumps Up 20 to 379, M-U Holds Steady at 33”
A cool new initiative called Shale POWER was unveiled yesterday at the Third Annual Marcellus to Manufacturing Conference hosted by the Pennsylvania Independent Oil & Gas Association (PIOGA) in Wheeling, WV. Shale POWER provides technical assistance and business support to small and medium manufacturers and companies seeking to expand business, production, and jobs in the growing shale gas and downstream manufacturing sectors in the Marcellus/Utica region.
Read More “Shale POWER Launches to Connect Manufacturing to Shale Energy”