NY Legislature Spits in Face of Natural Gas, No New Connections
It’s not a good look for New York State that not long after Governor Kathy Hochul made a deal with President Trump to allow two natural gas pipelines to get built in return for allowing an offshore wind farm, the state legislature passed a bill that essentially spits in the face of the natural gas industry in the state. The Assembly passed A8888, already approved by the Senate as S8417, which forces new homes and businesses that want to connect to the natural gas line that runs down their street to pay the full cost of connecting—$10,000 or more. Meaning if Gov. Hochul signs it, no new natural gas customers will be added anywhere in the state. It is a de facto ban on connecting new customers to use natural gas in the so-called Empire State. Read More “NY Legislature Spits in Face of Natural Gas, No New Connections”
Permitting reform—shortening the amount of time and eliminating some of the onerous regulations that stand in the way of permitting new energy projects—has been a hot topic for at least the last three years, if not longer. Before leaving the Senate last year, West Virginia’s then-Senator, Joe Manchin, tried to get a bill passed to address permitting reform (see 
Cayuga Station, owned by Duke Energy, is a three-unit coal-fired power plant built between 1970 and 1993 in Vermillion County, Indiana. The existing plant produces as much as 1,040 megawatts (MW) of electricity. Duke recently filed a request with the Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission (IURC) for permission to build two new gas-fired plants at the Cayuga site to replace the coal-fired units (see 
A month ago, NRG Energy announced a deal to acquire LS Power’s portfolio of natural-gas power plants in a deal valued at roughly $12 billion, including debt, that will expand NRG’s footprint in Texas and along the East Coast (see 
Marcellus/Utica molecules may be heading to Malaysia. Commonwealth LNG yesterday identified PETRONAS LNG Ltd., a subsidiary of Malaysia’s national oil and gas company, as the major Asian energy company referenced in the company’s May 5 announcement of a buyer to purchase 1 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) of LNG for 20 years from Commonwealth’s 9.5 MTPA facility under development in Cameron, Louisiana. Commonwealth LNG currently has 4 MTPA of offtake under long-term agreements. The company expects to finalize all of the deals it needs before making a final investment decision (FID) in Q3 2025. The Commonwealth facility targets its first LNG production in 2029. 
A situation that’s been playing out for nearly two years is just now becoming public. In late 2023, a welding inspector working on the 303-mile Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) said he had discovered three sections of the pipeline were corroded and violated construction standards and federal guidelines. He reported it to his superiors at MVP, who allegedly ignored his objections. So he filed a report with the federal Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA). The pipeline sections got replaced, and the inspector got fired. In April of this year, the inspector filed a lawsuit against MVP (and Equitrans Midstream, and EQT) for wrongful termination. 
We experienced a nice jolt in the NYMEX futures price for natural gas yesterday, rising 16.7 cents to close at $3.748/MMBtu. Those in the know say the main factors behind the price increase were (a) a hot weather forecast beginning next week for the eastern half of the country, and (b) lingering uncertainty over the Israel-Iran war and its potential impact on oil and LNG shipments in the Persian Gulf. 
When referring to Big Green groups in Pennsylvania and elsewhere, we often refer to the groups as “colluding,” meaning they coordinate their legal and public relations attacks against fossil fuel companies. It is something we have long suspected but (unfortunately) can’t prove definitively. Somebody is about to prove it. Several of these groups, including POWER Interfaith, Sierra Club, Physicians for Social Responsibility Pennsylvania, Clean Air Council, Vote Solar, PennEnvironment, and the Pennsylvania Public Interest Research Group, attacked a recent proposal by Philadelphia Gas Works (PGW) to raise rates. PGW is asking the PA Public Utility Commission (PUC) to order these groups to provide internal communications that would prove they have been colluding together. 
We spotted an op-ed appearing in the Lower Hudson Valley area of New York State (just north of New York City) that makes some great points. Frankly, they are points we’ve made here on MDN a number of times—how natural gas is critical to the Empire State. The op-ed points out that natural gas powers 60% of the homes in the state and powers over half of the state’s electricity generation. Yet the dunderheaded politicians (Democrats) in Albany insist on destroying fossil energy and replacing it with unreliable renewables. But we digress. The op-ed states that “New York will not grow without natural gas. It’s just that simple.” What’s so unusual (“man bites dog”) about this op-ed is that it was written by the Chairman and President of the National Offshore Wind Research and Development Consortium (NOWRDC)! 
Sometimes, some of the best news can be learned from your political enemies. The wackadoodle environmental left worldwide has, for years, tried to pressure Big Banks into defunding (refusing to loan to) fossil energy companies. While there are other sources of funding available, getting Big Banks to refuse loans has hurt the oil and gas industry. And for a while, it seemed like the left was winning, pressuring banks to pull back. Not anymore. An arrogant coalition of eight green groups, coordinated by the Rainforest Action Network, recently published a report showing that the world’s largest banks boosted the amount of financing given to fossil fuel companies last year (2024), committing $869 billion to those involved in coal, oil, and gas. That’s up significantly, from $162 billion spent the year before (2023). 
Olympus Energy wants to drill six wells on a single pad in rural Elizabeth Township, a borough in Allegheny County, on the east bank of the Monongahela River. The pad would sit about 2,400 feet (nearly half a mile) away from Elizabeth Forward High School. Some parents of students and members of the administration pushed back against Olympus’ drilling plan, using the children as an excuse (see 
Following President Trump’s quid pro quo deal with New York Governor Kathy Hochul in which Trump is allowing a $5 billion offshore wind project to proceed in return for Hochul allowing two Williams gas pipeline projects, Williams has restarted one of the two projects, the Northeast Supply Enhancement (NESE) project (see 
Pennsylvania’s community colleges stand to be big winners in the data center sweepstakes. In January, MDN brought you the news that TECfusions, based in Tampa, Florida, had purchased 1,395 acres in Upper Burrell (Westmoreland County), PA, for a groundbreaking data center project called TECfusions Keystone Connect (see 
We’ve reported, with some excitement, the recent news about a host of new AI data centers coming to the Keystone State (Pennsylvania), including several large projects in southwestern PA and Amazon’s big announcement last week about spending $20 billion on at least three data centers in the eastern part of the state (see 
MDN recently brought you the news that the Trump U.S. Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) was blocking at least three (possibly more) cargoes of ethane by rejecting permits to export to Enterprise Products Partners (see