We have some significant news coming out of yesterday’s 2Q update from Equitrans about the company’s Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) project. Equitrans is seriously considering expanding compression along MVP to flow an extra 500 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d) of natural gas along the pipeline after it’s up and running.
Read More “Equitrans Looks to Expand Capacity on MVP by Extra 0.5 Bcf/d”
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) finally got its butt in gear and issued a favorable environmental assessment (EA) for an amended request by PennEast Pipeline to break the project into two phases–building the pipeline through Pennsylvania in Phase One, and through New Jersey in Phase Two. FERC was supposed to issue its findings on or by July 10. Finally, after two weeks with no report, no explanation, and no communication, PennEast goosed FERC on July 24 (see PennEast Pipe Gooses FERC to Release Updated Enviro Review). The squeaky wheel…
Read More “FERC Finally Approves PennEast Pipe Split into 2 Phases”
On August 1, 2019, Enbridge’s Texas Eastern Pipeline Company (TETCO) pipeline exploded in Lincoln County, Kentucky–killing one and sending six to the hospital (see TETCO Pipe Explodes in Kentucky Killing 1; Southbound M-U Gas Stops). In September we reported that at least two lawsuits had been filed against Enbridge and TETCO–one for wrongful death, the other by a couple severely injured and burned following the incident (see Two Lawsuits Filed Against Enbridge for KY TETCO Pipe Explosion). A third lawsuit, on behalf of 80 people “affected by the blast,” has just been filed by a personal injury lawyer now a year after the accident.
Read More “Third Lawsuit Filed Against Enbridge for KY TETCO Pipe Explosion”
In July Dominion Energy announced it is throwing in the towel and canceling the 600-mile Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) project that would have stretched from West Virginia to North Carolina. The company also announced it is selling its pipeline business to Warren Buffett (see Dominion Cancels Atlantic Coast Pipe, Sells Pipe Biz for $9.7B). Landowners along the pipeline’s route who signed leases to allow the pipeline across their property are now asking: What happens now? Are those leases terminated? Can someone else buy the leases and build a different pipeline?
Read More “What Happens to Leased Land for Now-Canceled Atlantic Coast Pipe?”
Range Resources has cut a deal to sell its Haynesville Shale assets (220,000 acres plus the wells they’ve drilled since buying those assets) to Castleton Resources, a privately owned company majority-owned by Tokyo Gas, for $245 million (plus an extra $90 million, maybe, contingent on the price of gas). Range bought those assets in 2016 for $4.4 billion (see Range Resources Buys Louisiana Driller in Deal Worth $4.4B). Yeah, Range just took a bath, selling their Haynesville assets for pennies on the dollar…
Read More “Range Sells Haynesville Assets to Japan for “Pennies on the Dollar””
Yesterday the price of natural gas trading on the NYMEX futures exchange, a price based on the spot price at the Louisana Henry Hub trading point, zoomed up, closing 30 cents higher than the trading day before (up 14%). There does not appear to be a single, specific reason why trading took off like wildfire. Some speculate it rose based on the good news that U.S. LNG exports are once again on the rise. Others say short-term forecasts are now predicting continued hot weather. Whatever the reason, we’ll take it!
Read More “Price of NatGas Up Huge $0.30 in 1 Day as LNG Exports Pick Up”
New Fortress Energy (NFE), which is building an LNG liquefaction facility in northeastern Pennsylvania and a dock on the Delaware River to export their PA LNG, is expanding rapidly. NFE issued its 2Q20 update yesterday. In reading a transcript of a conference call with analysts, the light bulb went off for MDN. NFE has figured out how to deliver (sell) LNG to just about any market on the planet. It’s pure genius. We’ll explain it below.
Read More “New Fortress Cracks the Code to Sell LNG Anywhere in the World”
What is it with Democrats and the urge to tax everything–even things that breathe? They have a particular fascination with taxing carbon dioxide–the building block of life and the substance every living thing breathes out with every breath. The latest Democrat who wants to tax CO2 is Pennsylvania Senate Minority Leader Jay Costa, Jr. (from Pittsburgh) who introduced Senate Bill (SB) 15. Costa falsely calls it a “cap and invest” plan. In reality and normal plain English, it’s a tax plan–taxing natural gas-fired power plants.
Read More “PA Senate Democrats Introduce New Carbon Tax Bill”
The experts at RBN Energy have been analyzing pipelines and natural gas flows out of the Marcellus/Utica region and warn of a coming problem this fall. Production in the M-U remains high. Storage is quickly filling up. The gas needs to exit the region in order to fetch better prices. According to RBN, “This fall, the situation could be even worse and may force producers to shut-in gas for a second time this year.” Pipeline constraints are coming, and that spells problems.
Read More “M-U Gas May Have Trouble Getting to Other Markets This Fall”
It’s been a tough past five months in the shale industry. While it’s been tough in the gas-focused plays like the Marcellus/Utica, it’s been tougher in the oil-focused plays like the Permian. Employment in the O&G space has shrunk, by one account, by some 86,000 jobs. We’re now at the same employment level as we were following the downturn in 2014-2016. “But everyone knows this industry is cyclical. It’ll bounce back again, right?” This time it may be different. According to analyst John Kemp, this time some of the jobs (and companies) leaving the industry will be gone for good…
Read More “Oil & Gas Supply Chain Heading for Permanent Downsize”
We’ve asked the following question for years: “Is it possible to build ANY kind of natgas pipeline in New England?” We now have the answer: No, it’s not. New England has slipped into The Twilight Zone where reality no longer exists. In May 2018, Liberty Utilities, a New Hampshire company, announced a new pipeline project called Granite Bridge–27 miles of new natural gas pipeline to be buried along Route 101 from Stratham to Manchester (see Liberty Utilities Floats Plan for 27-Mile Pipeline in Southern NH). Liberty has just announced they are giving up on Granite Bridge.
Read More “NH’s Liberty Utilities Gives Up on $440M Natural Gas Pipeline”
Last year, in an effort to flow more natural gas to a starving New York City, Kinder Morgan cut a deal with utility company Consolidated Edison to provide more gas by beefing up capacity along its Tennessee Gas Pipeline (TGP) that feeds NYC, allowing Con Ed to avoid cutting customers off from natgas hookups (see Con Ed Deal May End Westchester, NY Gas Moratorium…in 2023). Part of KM’s plan to beef up TGP includes building a super-quiet, totally electric compressor station in West Milford Township (Passaic County), NJ.
Read More “NJ Town Wants Say in TGP NatGas Compressor Station Project”
Pennsylvania State Sen. Gene Yaw, Majority Chair of the Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee, is hammering ICF International, a consultant hired by the PA Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP). The DEP has paid $874,000 (so far) to ICF for research relating to “climate change.” ICF is providing research used by the DEP to justify Gov. Wolf’s harebrained idea to join the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), a carbon tax scheme meant to drive natgas electric plants out of existence in the state. All in the name of saving Mom Earth. Ludicrous. ICF, supposedly impartial, appears to be anything but according to Yaw.
Read More “DEP Consultant ICF Accused of Supporting Carbon Tax, Conflicts”
Over a year ago, in March 2019, MDN told you about a new Williams plan to beef up the Transco pipeline in Pennsylvania and New Jersey to deliver an extra 760 MMcf/d (originally 1 billion cubic feet per day) of Marcellus gas to PA, NJ, and Maryland (see Williams Announces Transco Competitor to PennEast Pipe in NEPA). The project is called the Regional Energy Access expansion project.
Read More “FERC Begins Enviro Assessment for Williams’ PennEast Competitor”
While we were bitterly disappointed that Dominion Energy decided to cancel the 600-mile Atlantic Coast Pipeline project from West Virginia to North Carolina because they’re exiting the pipeline business altogether (see Dominion Cancels Atlantic Coast Pipe, Sells Pipe Biz for $9.7B), there is one good thing that came from ACP. Dominion fought through to completion a court case that went before the U.S. Supreme Court to allow ACP (and other pipelines) the right to cross under the Appalachian Trail (see Victory! Atlantic Coast Pipeline Wins US Supreme Court Case). One of the beneficiaries of that case is Equitrans’ Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) project.
Read More “MVP Gets Permission to Cross Appalachian Trail from Park Service”
Some exciting news to share about a potential new (or rather expanded) customer for Marcellus/Utica gas in Illinois. TC Energy (formerly TransCanada) announced yesterday it will spend $400 million on the Elwood Power/ANR Horsepower Replacement Project. The project will replace, upgrade, and modernize certain facilities along the ANR Pipeline system, one of the largest interstate natural gas pipeline systems in the U.S.
Read More “ANR Pipeline Upgrading Compressors to Flow More Gas to Midwest”