FERC Approves 122-Mile East Tennessee Pipe Project for TVA Plant
The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) is a federally-owned electric utility corporation in the U.S. TVA’s service area covers all of Tennessee, portions of Alabama, Mississippi, and Kentucky, and small areas of Georgia, North Carolina, and Virginia. TVA is the country’s sixth-largest power supplier and the largest public utility company. In May 2023, TVA announced that it would convert the Kingston Fossil Plant (coal-fired plant) in East Tennessee to a natural gas-fired plant capable of generating 1,500 megawatts of electricity (see TVA Proposes NatGas Power Plant, 122-Mile Pipeline for East Tenn.). The project includes contracting with Enbridge subsidiary East Tennessee Natural Gas Pipeline to build a new 122-mile pipeline, called the Ridgeline Expansion Project. Good news for the pipeline portion of the project: Last Wednesday, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) fully approved the project. Read More “FERC Approves 122-Mile East Tennessee Pipe Project for TVA Plant”
Last year, radical environmental groups (including the Clean Air Council and Environmental Integrity Project) petitioned the state Environmental Quality Board (EQB), asking the board to amend 25 Pa. Code Chapter 78a by increasing “setbacks” for oil and gas well drilling to a minimum of 3,281 feet from any building or water wells (5,280 feet from hospitals and schools), and 750 feet from any river, creek, or mud puddle (i.e., surface waters). Such an increase in setbacks would stop ALL new shale drilling in the state, which is the goal of these radicals. In March of this year, the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), controlled by Josh Shapiro, recommended to the EQB that it accept and seriously consider the proposed rulemaking (see 
It has taken President Trump and his ‘energy dominance’ agenda less than 60 days to put the entire climate juggernaut – over 30 years in the making – at risk of collapse. So says an excellent article by one of our favorite (former) Forbes authors, Tilak Doshi. Trump’s energy team is “charging full steam ahead, firing off policy and regulatory initiatives at a pace designed to overwhelm the capacity of opponents to respond.” It is leaving climate zealots “scrambling to oppose the Trumpian counter-revolution.” This is what winning looks like—and we LOVE it! 
The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is America’s largest nonpartisan, voluntary membership organization of state legislators dedicated to limited government, free markets, and federalism. Comprised of nearly one-quarter of the country’s state legislators and stakeholders from across the policy spectrum, ALEC members represent more than 60 million Americans and provide jobs to more than 30 million people in the United States. Even though Pennsylvania is a natural gas haven, Pennsylvania ranks only 32nd in energy affordability according to ALEC’s recently-released Energy Affordability 2025 report (full copy below). ALEC says PA’s existing policies under Gov. Josh Shapiro, meant to wean the state off fossil fuels, have made affordability WORSE. 
Two weeks ago, Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) staff issued the agency’s annual State of the Markets report for 2024 (full copy below) to provide the industry and public with key information on market conditions and emerging issues in natural gas and electricity markets as well as significant market trends and fundamentals for the year. According to FERC Chairman Mark Christie, “The combination of rapidly increasing electricity demand, driven by hyperscale customers such as data centers, paired with the alarming rate of base load generation retirements and lack of new dispatchable generation, is not sustainable and must be addressed.” FERC is sounding the alarm that more dispatchable (i.e., natural gas) power generation is urgently needed. 
Penneco Environmental Solutions wants to build a second wastewater injection well in Plum Borough (Allegheny County), PA, next to an existing injection well. Penneco’s first wastewater injection well in Plum finally opened for business in mid-2021, overcoming all sorts of smears, slanders, and lawsuits by the enviro-left (see 
During a webinar yesterday, the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) announced it would use a new state General Air Quality Permit to implement Biden-era federal oil and gas facility methane reduction requirements. The DEP is pushing forward with implementation even though the Trump EPA has publicly announced it is revisiting those onerous regulations with an eye on revising them. Perhaps this is a no-win situation for the DEP. If they don’t implement the stated, in-effect (new) regulations by the Bidenistas, they could be dinged by the EPA. Yet, if they implement these onerous Biden-era regulations (via a new permit) and the Trump EPA rolls it all back, the DEP will have to redo the work all over again. Darned if they do and darned if they don’t. 
We’re still coming to grips with understanding how the power generation market works with respect to providing electricity for AI data centers. Data centers can potentially be huge and important new customers for natural gas—especially Marcellus/Utica molecules, as some 25% of all the data centers currently operating in the country are located in northern Virginia, where they use M-U molecules. In February, we brought you a post to help you better understand the various scenarios for how powergen gets provided to these data centers (see 
The European Union’s idiotic methane regulations will be enforced beginning this year. Domestic (European) oil, gas, and coal companies must monitor, measure, and report their emissions. The same restrictions apply to energy imports from other countries, including the U.S. (see 
The highly functional and responsible Susquehanna River Basin Commission (SRBC), unlike its completely dysfunctional and irresponsible cousin, the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC), continues to support the shale energy industry by approving water withdrawals and consumptive use for responsible and safe shale drilling. The SRBC published a notice in the March 29 Pennsylvania Bulletin that the Executive Director of the SRBC gave his approval to or renewed 50 (!) general water use permits in February for individual shale gas well drilling pads in Bradford, Centre, Clearfield, Clinton, Lycoming, Potter, Susquehanna, and Tioga counties in Pennsylvania. 
On March 27, the Susquehanna River Basin Commission (SRBC) online Hydrologic Conditions Monitor showed low stream flows have triggered restrictions on 18 shale gas water withdrawal points in Bradford, Potter, Susquehanna, Tioga, and Wyoming counties. Another 17 shale gas withdrawals are approaching restrictions. Of the water withdrawal points regulated by SRBC, only shale gas development water withdrawals currently have restrictions because they take water from smaller streams. 
Donald Trump has taken significant actions to eliminate “environmental justice” programs within the federal government during his second term, which began on January 20, 2025. What is so-called environmental justice (EJ)? EJ is the leftist theory that energy projects like pipelines and well pads target locations where there are black, brown, or poor people who can’t fight back legally. They don’t want the projects, but they have no way ($$) to fight them. And so their populations suffer the negative environmental consequences of living near polluting energy projects. Energy projects are presumed to be inherently racist. It is a disgusting, loathsome political theory peddled mainly by the far-left of the Democrat Party. Although Donald Trump has quashed EJ on the federal level, the Josh Shapiro Department of Environment Protection’s EJ program keeps chugging along, oblivious that nobody wants it, nobody respects it, and it’s a “dead man walking.”