NatGas Trading Volume Goes Up in 2015, Reverses 4-Year Slide
The amount of natural gas that gets produced, and the amount that actually gets traded (bought and sold) are two different numbers. Don’t try to figure out–just accept it on faith. The companies that buy and sell (i.e. trade) natural gas are required to file “Form 552” with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) once each year, to inform FERC of the volume of gas they’ve traded. Form 552 says right on it that its purpose is: “FERC Form No. 552 collects transactional information from natural gas market participants. The filing of this information is necessary to provide information regarding physical natural gas transactions that use an index and transactions that contribute to, or may contribute to gas price indices.” Cornerstone Research, an economic and financial consulting company, does a yearly deep dive into all of those Form 552 filings, producing a report of their findings (full copy of the report below). What did Cornerstone find from the 552 filings for 2015? The big news is that the volume of gas traded in 2015 went up 4% over 2014. It’s big news because the the volume of gas traded has gone down each year since 2011. Here’s what else they found…
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Look! Up in the air! It’s a bird…it’s a plane…it’s a,a,a,a…energy drone? Yep. Drones used to inspect pipelines, keep an eye on refineries, processing plants and compressor stations–drones used for just about anything related to the oil and gas industry–have just been approved by Congress. The oil and gas industry is delighted…
Last year Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf completely botched his first-ever budget, by holding out for nine months seeking a Marcellus-killing severance tax as payback to teachers’ unions that helped elect him (see 
In April 2015 PTT Global announced they had chose a site in Belmont County, OH as the site of for their $5.7 billion ethane cracker complex (see 
Good news for Marcellus/Utica drillers. There are signs that a Youngstown, OH-area injection well that has been shuttered since 2013 will re-open. You may recall the sad story of D&L Energy, a Youngstown, OH operator of several wastewater injection wells. D&L’s owner was Ben Lupo, who also owned sister company Hardrock Excavating, operating both companies under the D&L Energy Group umbrella. In September 2012, Lupo instructed a Hardrock employee to dump untreated frack wastewater down a sewer drain that emptied into the Mahoning River. Lupo and the driver were found out in early 2013 (see 
The Attorney General from Massachusetts, Maura Healey, the AG from New York, Eric Schneiderman and several other far-left radicals drunk on their own power have made fantastical claims that Exxon “knew” that burning their evil, filthy, nasty oil and natural gas is causing Mom Earth to warm up, so they serving subpoenas to Exxon to turn over every piece of communication the company has ever had, so they can build a case against Exxon’s free speech (see 
The Obamadroids are once again ganging up on the semi-independent Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). Last week the Obama Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) filed comments with FERC critical of the Williams/Transco Atlantic Sunrise pipeline project (see 
South Fayette (Washington County), PA is one of seven selfish PA towns that sued the state after the Act 13 law was enacted in 2012 (see 
Earlier this month MDN brought you the exciting news that Cabot Oil & Gas, which only drills in the Marcellus in Susquehanna County, PA, will provide the low-cost natural gas that will power Pennsylvania’s largest natgas-fired electric generating plant, to be built in neighboring Lackawanna County by Invenergy (see 
A study funded entirely by the National Science Foundation (no Big Green money involved, no oil and gas money involved) has found that fracking operations in Colorado have not led to an increase in methane migration into groundwater supplies. The study, titled “Groundwater methane in relation to oil and gas development and shallow coal seams in the Denver-Julesburg Basin of Colorado” (full copy below) was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) and is significant. The research examined methane levels going back 25 years, long before any horizontal fracking took place in the state. It focuses on an area of Colorado where there has been a great deal of drilling and fracking over the past 16 years. In looking at levels of dissolved methane in groundwater both before and after fracking began, the researchers found, “The rate [of groundwater methane] did not change after the introduction of horizontal drilling combined with high-volume hydraulic fracturing in 2010.” We predict you’ll hear crickets in mainstream media–with no coverage of this very important finding…
The news is now months old that Halliburton and Baker Hughes ended their attempt to merge. The reason they called it off was because of opposition from the Obama Department of Justice (see 
One of the opponents of new pipelines to New England has been LNG importers in the region–specifically GDF Suez importing gas at the Everett, MA LNG import terminal, near Boston (see 
In November 2015 MDN brought you a list of 36 North America drillers that had, as of that time, declared bankruptcy (see 
We can not be more crystal clear on this: a vote for Hillary Clinton is a vote to end the use of fossil fuels, and a vote to plunge our great nation into economic depression. Over the weekend the Democrat Party hashed out its official party platform–the tenants by which the party, if it should be so lucky as to hold on to power, will live by for the coming four years. The Dems are composed of radical idiots of all stripes, but some are more radical than others. The official platform calls for a tax on carbon (the stuff you breathe out with every breath) to tackle so-called (and non-existent) “climate change.” The platform also calls for a “phase down” of drilling on public lands. What the platform does not call for, however, is a total ban on all fracking. And that lack of a total ban in the official platform has set off some of the craziest of the crazies in the party. A group of them, spurred on by the odious and misnamed Food and Watch Watch, are making the rounds in Philadelphia. Near the convention center are several dozen donkey statutes, placed there in honor of the upcoming Dem convention in two weeks. So what are the FWW crazies doing? Placing piles of papier-mâché poop under the business end of the donkeys and spray painting “No ban on fracking, the Dem platform is crap.” Hilarious! We’re finally seeing the Dem party crack up and self-implode, thanks to anti-frackers…
Last week MDN reported that a previously trumpeted so-called research study of air quality near fracking sites in Ohio had been retracted (see