60% of Free Pipeline Course Grads Get Jobs in 1st Month
A number of times we’ve highlighted a cool training program offered by the The Gas Technology Institute (GTI). The four-week program, offered in Freeport, PA and St. Clairsville, OH is free and trains students how to build pipelines. Each location is limited to 20 students. GTI has run the program a number of times (three times so far just this year, next week begins the fourth time). According to organizers, somewhere around 60% of those who take the course and graduate get jobs within 30 days with salaries beginning in the $40,000-$50,000 range. The program is paid for by grants from the Appalachian Regional Commission (costs $3,500 per person). What are YOU waiting for? This free (to you) training can help you find a very good-paying job. Check it out.
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Flashback: In May of this year, Energy Transfer CEO Thomas Long said Rover Pipeline would be fully online by June 1st (see 
In September, MDN told you that Dominion Energy had sold two “merchant” (non-regulated) natural gas-fired electric generating plants for $1.23 billion to Starwood Energy. And at the same time, Dominion announced it was shopping its 50% ownership stake in Blue Racer Midstream (see 
Dominion Energy shared two bits of big news yesterday during their third quarter 2018 update. The first is that they’ve agreed to sell their 50% stake in Blue Racer Midstream (see Dominion Sells Its 50% Share in Blue Racer Midstream for $1.5B). The second bit of news, big news (for us), is that Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) is now officially delayed–from late 2019 to “mid-2020” for a full startup. The price tag for ACP is going up too: $7 billion (up from $6.5 billion). But it’s not all bad news for ACP. Some pieces of the project will still go online in 2019, just not all of it. Dominion is taking a “phased in-service approach” to bringing the project online. The delays are due to the “FERC stop work order and delays obtaining permits necessary for construction.” We put it this way: The delays due to a myriad of frivolous lawsuits from Big Green groups means everyone will now pay more. Thanks Big Green.
Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Co. (Transco) is the crown jewel of Williams. Transco is a 10,200-mile pipeline system with 53 compressor stations extending from South Texas to New York City. The recent Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline project in northeast PA that went online Oct. 6 is part of Transco, feeding more Marcellus gas into the Transco system to flow that gas south. During yesterday’s Williams third quarter update, CEO Alan Armstrong hinted that yet another new Transco project, “Project #1,” is in the works and will be announced during 4Q18. Project #1 will expand Transco’s capacity in Zones 3-6, allowing more Marcellus/Utica gas to flow south–perhaps all the way to the Gulf Coast.
Williams’ Transco Pipeline has just won a major eminent domain court case for its Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline project that will have implications for all pipelines. Yes, Atlantic Sunrise is now in the ground and flowing natural gas (see 
We previously highlighted Virginia Natural Gas’ (VNG) “Southside Connector” project, a 9-mile pipeline from Norfolk, VA to Chesapeake, VA that VNG says will fill a gap between two main supply lines, essential to meet growing natural gas demand in the Chesapeake area. The final 2,000 feet of pipeline needs to be laid, but will run under a river and shipyard located on the bank of the river. The shipyard owner adamantly opposes the pipeline and has launched an all-out campaign to stop it (see 
The Laborers’ International Union of North America (LIUNA) is ramping up to begin training local Virginia residents as construction workers for Dominion Energy’s Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP). The initial training will start in Buckingham County. LIUNA’s training includes both classroom and hands-on training. Folks have been pestering LIUNA for months, asking why they have not already begun training. The reason is simple: You don’t begin training until you’re ready to put people into the field to use that training. You don’t train them and then wait for months on end–while they forget what they just learned. LIUNA’s training program launch means that construction on ACP in Virginia is about to ramp up in a big way.
“Come on Jim, quit writing so much about pipelines! Write more about upstream/drilling!” We have had MDN subscribers tell us that (no lie). But here’s the thing: What happens with pipelines *directly* affects what happens with drilling–the willingness of companies to drill more. Case in point: Over the past few weeks two new pipelines have come online: Williams’ Atlantic Sunrise and DTE Energy’s NEXUS. More capacity along Energy Transfer’s recently completed Rover also recently came online. The effect of the three combined has been dramatic. Production volumes have shot up another 1 Bcf (billion cubic feet) in the past month, to over 30 Bcf/d. And get this: While the Appalachian spot price for gas was $1/Mcf (thousand cubic feet) on Oct. 8 ($2 *below* the Henry Hub price), on Oct. 24 the Appalachian price was averaging $3/Mcf! Just 12 cents below Henry. A movement of $2/Mcf! Behold the power of pipelines and why we write about them so much.
EQT Midstream, which is about to be renamed to Equitrans Midstream Corp. in a few weeks, recently issued its third quarter 2018 update (same day that EQT the driller issued its update). As you know, the two are about to split and become two independent companies. As part of the EQT Midstream update, the new midstream company leaders spoke about Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP), a 303-mile pipeline from West Virginia into southern Virginia. MVP has experienced a lot of setbacks, most of them from a campaign of lawsuits filed by Big Green organizations (like the odious Sierra Club). A new pipeline project related to MVP was mentioned prominently in this week’s quarterly update. The pipeline is called Hammerhead.
On Sept. 10, Energy Transfer’s 24-inch gathering pipeline in Beaver County, PA, called the Revolution Pipeline, caught fire and exploded during testing (see 
A group of 13 landowners in Virginia whose property was force taken by Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) using eminent domain is appealing a case they already lost in federal court to the U.S. Supreme Court. The landowners claim MVP has taken private land–their land–to use for private/corporate gain and not (as the law requires) taken for a “public” benefit. Eminent domain allows the taking of private land for public benefit, but not taking private land for private benefit. The issue really revolves around the question of, What is a public benefit? Can a private company use government powers because what they provide benefits the public? The big question is, will the Supreme Court, which gets some 8,000 such appeals each year, make this appeal one of the 80 or so they consider?
Columbia Gas of Massachusetts (NiSource) continues to try and recover (physically and reputationally) from a series of explosions in its local delivery pipelines north of Boston in mid-September (see 
For some time we’ve covered the story of MLPs–master limited partnerships–and how they are being phased out. An MLP is an alternative form of organizing a company (or subsidiary company), different from a corporation. The primary purpose of an MLP is for investors, who buy “units” in the MLP instead of shares of stock, so the investor can pay less in taxes. Trump’s tax cut, while benefiting the little guy (yeah!), disadvantages MLPs (boo!). Which has caused many pipeline companies organized as an MLP to give up that form of structure. Meanwhile, new companies are being formed to buy royalty rights–using the MLP structure! So while pipeline companies are dumping the MLP structure, royalty companies are embracing it.
In early October NEXUS Pipeline, a $2.6 billion, 255-mile interstate pipeline that runs from Ohio into Michigan, received permission from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to begin partial operation (see 
Although EQT Midstream’s 303-mile Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) project has experienced a number of legal and regulatory setbacks and is currently blocked from constructing pipeline across/under/near any river, stream, or wetland in all of West Virginia and all of Virginia (some 1,100 different locations), believe it or not there are still many places where MVP can and is still installing pipeline (see