Coterra Energy (Cabot O&G) | Energy Companies | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Susquehanna County
Coterra Fined $299K for Methane Migration in 13 PA Water Wells
Here we go again. We can see the headlines now: Dimock II…Paging Josh Fox!…Shale Drilling Contaminates Water Wells, Again. Coterra Energy is responsible for methane migrating more than a mile away to 13 “water supplies” (wells?) located around a nearby lake, according to the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP). The offending nine wells sit on the Housel R Well Pad 1 in Susquehanna County’s Lenox Township. Coincidentally, Lenox Township is not all that far from Dimock Township. Read More “Coterra Fined $299K for Methane Migration in 13 PA Water Wells”
Two pipeline kingpins are engaged in a scuffle with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to get their competing pipeline projects approved. One is Williams’ Transco Southeast Supply Enhancement Project, the other is EQT’s MVP Southgate project. Both projects would be built in the same general area, starting at the same point near Chatham, Virginia, and ending near Eden, North Carolina. Both claim they have customers ready to take their gas. In a recent FERC filing, Williams said that its project could easily handle Southgate MVP’s capacity by adding meter tubes and regulation at an existing station. EQT is not pleased with the attempt to undercut Southgate. The question is: Will FERC approve both, or just one? 
In June, MDN told you that Venture Global (VG) had begun construction on the Calcasieu Pass 2 (CP2) LNG export facility in Cameron Parish, Louisiana (see 
President Donald Trump has been visiting Europe. Lucky him. While there, he finalized a trade agreement with the European Union (EU) that is “the biggest [trade] deal ever,” according to Trump. While there are many components to the deal, the key, the big piece we are interested in, is energy. The EU has agreed to buy $750 billion worth of our energy exports (mostly LNG) over the next 3 1/2 years of Trump’s presidency, and invest another $600 billion in the U.S. during the same period. Massive! The deal is so big, so massive, and such a success that mainstream media is panning it as unrealistic and an impossible fantasy. They haven’t learned their lesson with Trump. Never underestimate him. 
According to a new report from Enverus and its research division, only 30% of solar and 57% of onshore wind projects are likely to survive the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (OBBBA) recently signed into law by President Trump (see 
Last week, the Baker Hughes U.S. rig count continued its downward trend, losing two rigs to end at 542 active rigs nationwide. The count has been down 12 of the last 13 weeks, with the only slight increase happening two weeks ago. However, there was good news in our region. The Marcellus/Utica count increased by one to a combined 36 active rigs. The reason for the bump up was that Pennsylvania added a Marcellus rig last week. PA now runs 18 active rigs. OH remains at 11 rigs. And WV remains at 7 rigs. 
Last week, CNX Resources issued its second quarter 2025 update. The company reported a profit of $432.5 million for the quarter, compared with a loss of $18.3 million in 2Q24. The company generated $188 million in free cash flow, marking the 22nd consecutive quarter of FCF generation. Production was 167.6 Bcfe (billion cubic feet equivalent) in 2Q25 — which works out to 1.84 Bcfe/d — up from 134.0 Bcfe last year (a 25% increase). The reason for the dramatic increase was that CNX closed on the purchase of Apex Energy during the first quarter, and Apex’s production numbers were fully added to CNX’s numbers beginning in 2Q25. 
In May 2021, MDN told you that Louisville Gas and Electric Company (LG&E) had won Kentucky state approval to build a new 12-inch, 12-mile pipeline south of Louisville to supply gas to homes and businesses (including a Jim Beam distillery) in Bullitt County—homes and businesses that can’t connect to LG&E’s local natgas utility system because it is currently maxed out (see 
We’re sorry to have to say this, but New York State Senator Lea Webb is either a liar or a really dumb person. Prompted by some of her supporters (nine people, to be exact), Webb held a press conference in Binghamton, NY, last week to repeat the same tired old lies that building a pipeline (e.g., the Constitution Pipeline) will jeopardize lives, livelihoods, and water quality for residents of the Southern Tier. That’s a flat-out, 100% lie, and she should be ashamed. 
At the end of the last legislative session in December, New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, an extremist liberal, signed into law a new climate bill forcing a short list of Big Oil companies to pay $75 billion in “recovery” assessments over the next 25 years for their alleged role in causing mythical global warming (see 
BlackRock, the world’s largest investment firm with some $9 trillion of assets under management, managed to get itself off the poopy list in Texas by ending its participation in a number of so-called ESG (environment, social, governance) groups and by groveling before Texas officials. The Texas Permanent School Fund (PSF) pulled $8.5 billion of its investments away from BlackRock in March 2024 after the state determined that BlackRock was engaged in a boycott of energy companies by pressuring companies to avoid the fossil fuel sector by using ESG litmus tests (see 
Range Resources issued its second quarter 2025 update on Wednesday. Range’s production averaged 2.20 Bcfe/d, approximately 68% natural gas. Range drilled ~285,000 lateral feet across 20 wells, while turning to sales ~156,000 lateral feet across 12 wells. 2Q25 drilling and completion expenditures were $136 million. In addition to D&C spending, Range spent approximately $11 million on acreage and $7 million on infrastructure, pneumatic devices, and other investments. The company announced it is targeting power generation to grab some of the 4-5 Bcf/d of forecasted new demand coming from the powergen sector. 
Pennsylvania’s Republican Attorney General, Dave Sunday, has turned out to be a MAJOR disappointment. Yesterday, Sunday’s office filed 14 criminal counts against Equitrans Midstream (now owned and part of EQT Corporation) for an accident that happened in 2022. In November 2022, one of the ten natural gas storage wells at the Equitrans Rager Mountain Gas Storage Area in Jackson Township, Cambria County, began to leak. Equitrans is the owner/operator of Rager Mountain. The well leaked roughly 100 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d) of gas into the atmosphere (see 