FERC Green Lights Construction of Dominion Project in Upstate NY
In June 2014, MDN told you about the Dominion New Market Project–a project that will build two new compressor plants and upgrade one other compressor station in upstate New York–to help flow more abundant, cheap and clean-burning Marcellus Shale gas from Pennsylvania (and beyond) into the northeast (see Dominion Asks FERC for New Compressors in Upstate NY, WV). The project is projected to cost $159 million and provide 112,000 dekatherms per day (Dth/d) of extra natural gas capacity along ~200 miles of existing Dominion pipeline across upstate New York. The existing Dominion pipeline runs through the Horseheads, Ithaca, Syracuse and Albany areas. In March 2015 MDN friend Andy Leahy wrote about the pitched battle antis waged against the project (see NY Antis Flood FERC in Fight Against Dominion’s New Market Project). The antis were unsuccessful. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approved Dominion’s New Market Project in October 2015 (see FERC Approves Expansion of Dominion Pipeline in Upstate NY). And then a REAL miracle happened. The corrupt New York Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC) approved the New Market compressor stations on Dec. 23, 2016 (see Miracle! NY DEC Approves Dominion’s New Compressor Stations). Barbara Lifton, an eco-left Democrat from Ithaca who serves in the New York Assembly, recently tried to stop the project from proceeding by sending letters to both FERC and the DEC, hoping she could (ab)use her position to pressure one or the other (or both) to delay the project, which is the antis’ first step in killing a project (see NY State Legislator Tries to Derail Dominion New Market Project). We’re delighted to report she failed. Last Friday FERC sent a letter to Dominion to let them know, now more than three years after filing, they can start the bulldozers and begin construction. In Communist NY! Who woulda thunk?!…
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The West Virginia Oil & Natural Gas Association (WVONGA) has just raised the stakes significantly in a bid to pass new “forced pooling lite” legislation. In the past six years, the oil and gas industry in WV has pushed for a forced pooling law five times. It’s failed every time. So this year the industry, represented by WVONGA, said it would not push forced pooling but instead would try to get a bill passed to address two of the issues that were previously part of a larger forced pooling bill–something called co-tenancy and joint development (see 
The Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) yesterday released a new online search tool for the public which enables anyone to search through electronic documents filed by Marcellus Shale drillers. Last year the DEP created new regulations for shale drillers called Chapter 78a (see 
We find it kind of amusing. Anti-drillers and Democrats (usually one and the same) in Pennsylvania bellyache and moan and groan that PA is “the only oil and gas state without a severance tax” and how life would be SO much better if only PA had a severance…blah blah blah. They point out that Ohio has a severance tax. West Virginia has a severance tax. EVERYBODY has a severance tax. Of course they conveniently ignore (or lie about) the fact that PA has an impact fee, or an impact tax, if you will. The impact fee levies a charge on new wells for a number a years on a sliding scale. Think of the impact fee like a property tax, and a severance tax like a sales tax on goods sold. The beauty of the impact fee is that 60% of it stays in the communities where drilling actually happens. Impact fee revenue goes to local municipalities to offset the “impacts” of drilling in those communities, money used for things like fire departments, police, roads, etc. An impact fee is superior to a severance tax in many ways. While OH and WV’s severance tax revenue went over a cliff when the price of natural gas went over a cliff, PA’s impact fee was far less affected. But the point of this post is not in the relative merits in the type of taxation. The point is that legislators in Ohio want to reallocate some of their severance tax revenue to be used in communities where Utica drilling happens. That is, they want to convert some of the OH severance tax into, essentially, an impact fee. So while PA bellyaches about having an impact fee and not a severance tax, states (like OH) that actually have a severance tax, would rather have an impact fee!…
It sure seems like it’s taking a long time for President Trump and his team to announce and put forward his nominees for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). Shortly after taking office, Trump elevated one of the three sitting, Democrat Commissioners, Cheryl LaFleur to be Acting Chairman of the agency. That ticked off the then-current Chairman, Norman “crybaby” Bay, who promptly resigned (see 
A disappointing setback for the much-needed Constitution Pipeline–a $683 million, 124-mile pipeline due to run from Susquehanna County, PA to Schoharie County, NY carrying Marcellus gas. As you may recall, in April 2016, New York’s anti-drilling governor, Andrew Cuomo, decided he would cave to pressure from radical environmentalists and block the building of the federally-approved Constitution Pipeline (see 
There were early signs that Maryland’s newly elected “Republican” governor was weak on the subject of fracking, as we pointed out in 2015 when we said that then-new Gov. Larry Hogan, who was elected on a platform of supporting shale drilling, had decided to let a two-year moratorium on shale drilling become law without his signature (see 
Yesterday President Trump released a detailed budget proposal which includes reducing the way-overbloated (and insidiously bureaucratic) Environmental Protection Agency budget by 31%. The budget would also ax some 3,200 EPA employees–about 21% of the 15,000 employed at the agency. It is sheer brilliance and long overdue. The EPA, under Barack Obama, sought to enforce national regulation of the oil and gas industry–something not permitted under the Constitution. It’s about time the agency was right-sized and its mission reigned in. Of course the reaction by the left has been predictable–from apoplexy to terror (snowflakes always melt so quickly). Here’s how the EPA budget news is being spun by mainstream media…
The Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) held a regularly scheduled business meeting yesterday in Washington Crossing, PA. As predicted, a number of anti-fossil fuel zealots turned up to make noise about the PennEast Pipeline project–and about the prospect of the DRBC allowing shale drilling. As we disclosed yesterday, the zealots all read from the same document prepared by Her Eminence, THE Delaware Riverkeeper, Maya van Rossum (see 
On Feb. 3, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approved a long-delayed project–National Fuel Gas Company’s (NFG) Northern Access 2016 pipeline project (see 
Today is the day that (some of) Maya’s minions will show up at a meeting of the Delaware River Basin Commission to attempt to bully DRBC staff during the public comments period. As we’ve been reporting (from a well-placed mole on the DRBC email list) Maya has been issuing orders to her minions–people who apparently aren’t bright enough to form their own thoughts about matters like the PennEast Pipeline (see 
You’ve heard the phrase, “The Emperor has no clothes.” A lawsuit against the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) by a Wayne County, PA landowner over the DRBC’s ongoing moratorium of shale gas drilling, is exposing the DRBC as having “no clothes” when it comes to their authority over shale drilling (see 
On Monday, MDN wrote about a new bill introduced in the West Virginia legislature that would exempt storage tanks used by the oil and gas industry from a 2014 law passed following a coal industry storage tank failure that temporarily polluted the drinking water for 300,000 WV residents (see