Research

Industrywide Issues | NG Vehicles | Research

Handy Market Overview of U.S. NG Vehicle Infrastructure
October 24, 2012October 24, 2012

The natural gas vehicle (NG vehicle) market in North America has all the signs of rapidly expanding. FC Business Intelligence, which is hosting the 2nd Natural Gas Vehicle Infrastructure Conference & Exhibition next February in Houston, has created a handy info pack full of charts, facts and figures about the NG vehicle market in North America (see below). The info pack is a clever marketing ploy by FC to garner interest in the conference—but there’s certainly nothing wrong with that! Hey, it worked. The info pack is worth your time if you have an interest in NG vehicles.

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Economic Impact | Industrywide Issues | Research

EIA Backpedals on Lowball Estimates of Marcellus Reserves
October 22, 2012October 22, 2012

An AP story actually sets the record straight and says, in essence, “Yes, the Marcellus really is ‘that big’ after all.” The AP article quotes research from two recently completed independent reports, one from Standard & Poor’s (see this MDN story) and one from ITG Research (see this MDN story), in “correcting” a lowered Marcellus proven reserves estimate from the Energy Information Administration (EIA).

The article quotes the EIA backpedalling on their lowered estimate from earlier this year and says in part:

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Health Impacts | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Research | Statewide PA

New EARTHWORKS “Study” of Marcellus Health Effects in PA
October 19, 2012October 19, 2012

Oh lookie here. A new “research study” (full copy embedded below) has just been released by the extreme environmental anti-drilling group EARTHWORKS that says residents in Pennsylvania who live near Marcellus Shale drilling have a “pattern of health symptoms associated with oil and gas development.”

Let’s use the same standard they use to judge such studies, shall we? If any of the study’s authors have, at any point in time since birth, ever had anything to do with an anti-drilling organization, the study is instantly discredited. That’s the standard used for studies and research that are favorable to shale gas drilling—if the author of such a study has had any experience in the drilling industry, that study is tainted and must be expunged from the public discourse (see this MDN story about the University at Buffalo study and this MDN story about the University of Texas study).

The three authors of this so-called study either work for, or are related to, the enviro-left. So why wouldn’t we apply the same standard here?

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Accidents | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Regulation | Research

API Says EPA Botched Pavillion, WY Fracking Tests
October 19, 2012October 19, 2012

The American Petroleum Institute (API) issued a press release yesterday taking the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to task over their sloppy work in Pavillion, Wyoming.

You may recall the EPA is on a quest to try and prove fracking has contaminated water supplies in the Pavillion area with fracking chemicals. Never mind that the drilling and fracking done in Pavillion is shallow at around 1,200 feet down (not the one mile or more that’s common in shale plays). Never mind that the water table in Pavillion is deep at 800 feet (not the 300 feet as is typical in the northeast). Never mind that drilling and fracking was done in porous sandstone in Pavillion (not tightly-packed shale deposits). And never mind the EPA drilled just two test wells, one of which didn’t produce enough water for a valid sample. (See this MDN story for more background on Pavillion.)

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Industrywide Issues | Research

Marcellus Shale Top 15 Drillers (from S&P Report)
October 18, 2012October 18, 2012

MDN highlighted an important and insightful new study from Standard & Poor’s yesterday titled “How The Marcellus Shale Is Changing The Dynamics Of The U.S. Energy Industry” (see this MDN story). There’s a lot of great content in the study, some of which deserves to be highlighted in separate posts here on MDN. One such section is their “Top 15 Drillers” in the Marcellus, as ranked by how much natural gas is produced by those drillers in the Marcellus. We’ve inserted the chart below, re-worked by MDN.

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Research | Statewide PA

New Website Debuts Listing Research, Articles on Marcellus
October 18, 2012October 18, 2012

Carnegie Mellon University, the University of Pittsburgh and the Pennsylvania State Association of Boroughs have collaborated to create an important new website aimed at providing links to research and articles on the web for public officials and the public in general on the topic of the Marcellus and Utica Shale. The website, called “A Research Guide to the Marcellus and Utica Shales” (www.andrew.cmu.edu/org/marcellus-biblio), links to over 1,200 research studies, articles and other resources. The information is categorized making it easier to locate related articles.

If you happen to click the category for “In the News” (their list of resources that regularly write about the Marcellus/Utica) you’ll find MDN in their select and very short list of 19 news resources. Obviously someone working on the project has good taste. 😉 Here’s the background for how the project and website came to be:

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Erie County (NY) | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Research

UB Defends Shale Institute & Study in Response to SUNY Board
October 15, 2012October 15, 2012

An update on the witch hunt at University at Buffalo (UB). You may recall that UB had the temerity, the gall, to establish a Shale Resources and Society Institute (SRSI) in April of this year. When said institute turned out its first report in May, which detailed how environmental problems caused by Marcellus Shale gas drilling in Pennsylvania were isolated, mostly minor and on the decline, the anti-drillers just about came off the rails. It was an all-hands-on-deck, we-must-obliterate-the-credibility-of-the-report-and-the-people-who-wrote-it campaign. And so the witch hunt began (see this MDN story).

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Commodity Price | Economic Impact | Industrywide Issues | Research

EIA Report Predicts Short-Term NatGas Prices/Usage
October 11, 2012October 11, 2012

The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) released their Short-Term Energy and Winter Fuels Outlook report yesterday (a copy of full report is embedded below). Even though natural gas inventories are above last year’s levels and the price for natural gas is at historic lows, based on long-range weather forecasts by NOAA, the EIA predicts households will spend more money to heat this winter because it’s going to be a lot colder this winter than it was last.

Here’s the main highlights from the report with respect to natural gas:

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Regulation | Research

GAO Issues 2 Reports on Fracking, Favors EPA Oversight
October 10, 2012October 10, 2012

Two new reports just released by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) seek to give political cover to the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to continue it’s expansion of authority over oil and gas drilling in the U.S. (Full copies of both reports are embedded below.)

The two reports say, in essence, that the EPA is having a tough time with inspection and enforcement activities because a) shale gas drilling has expanded so rapidly, and b) states provide information in different forms according to their own schedules. Well duh. The EPA is not charged with regulating oil and gas drilling! Butt out.

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Research | Statewide PA

Heinz Funds Cornell Research – Will We See Outcry like UB?
October 8, 2012October 8, 2012

It’s interesting to MDN how a politically correct witch hunt has gone forth at University at Buffalo (UB) after the “revelation” that the authors of a new study at the university’s new shale institute had (gasp) done work for natural gas drilling companies in years gone by. Somehow the fact they have made a living outside of academe and (gasp) “in the industry” taints their ability to reason and research beyond acceptable (to the left) limits (see this MDN story).

Yet when anti-drilling organizations (like the Heniz Endowments) fund research at major universities (like Cornell and Carnegie Mellon) for millions of dollars in an effort to gin up so-called science to discredit natural gas drilling, not a peep from the same self-righteous crusaders. Why is that?

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Economic Impact | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | New York | Ohio | Pennsylvania | Research | Statewide MD | Statewide NY | Statewide OH | Statewide PA | Statewide VA | Statewide WV | Utica Shale | Virginia | West Virginia

USGS Releases Official Estimate of Oil & Gas in Utica Shale
October 5, 2012October 5, 2012

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) has just released their first official assessment (i.e. estimate) of how much recoverable natural gas, oil and gas liquids is located in the Utica Shale throughout Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, New York, Maryland and Virginia (a full copy of the USGS assessment is embedded below).

The USGS estimates the Utica is #3 in size behind the Marcellus (#1) and Green River Basin (#2) for volume of recoverable natural gas in the U.S. Here are the numbers from the USGS, along with and a brief introduction to their first-ever assessment of the Utica:

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Research

3 Things to Know about Pavillion, Fracking & Water Contamination
September 27, 2012September 27, 2012

The Obama EPA has bungled a lot—chief among their bungles was their attempt to prove a connection between fracking and water contamination in Pavillion, Wyoming. The EPA hoped that Pavillion would be the smoking gun—the single, solitary case (any case!) they could use as an excuse to (illegally) start regulating oil and gas drilling through the back door of the federal Safe Drinking Water Act. But something happened on the way to the “we’ll take over regulating fracking from the states” ball: The wells the EPA used for their data in Pavillion were drilled by the EPA and the high levels of chemicals in the wells may have come from their own botched drilling job. Oops—maybe they ought to leave drilling to the experts. Lots of backpedaling ensued (see this MDN story).

Pavillion is in the news once again. The U.S. Geological Survey yesterday released a mother load of new data about the test wells (see their two reports embedded below). What do the new reports say? Neither those in favor of drilling nor those against drilling have weighed in yet—they’re now pouring over the data. Here’s three things you need to know about Pavillion and a possible link between fracking and water contamination:

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Regulation | Research

Earthworks Releases Faux Study Bashing State Regulators
September 26, 2012September 26, 2012

It’s fascinating to MDN how a single so-called researcher at a single anti-drilling organization (funded by Teresa Heinz Kerry) can write a 124-page “report” that’s critical of the shale drilling industry and the hard-working people who regulate it, and the mainstream media (MSM) swoons and heralds such shameful propaganda as an important new “study” presenting the gospel truth. Yet that’s exactly what’s happening (once again) with a just-released report from Earthworks titled, “Breaking All the Rules: The Crisis in Oil & Gas Regulatory Enforcement” (copy embedded below).

This so-called study was written by a single Earthworks staffer, reviewed by a couple of other staffers, and “peer reviewed” (our words) by several others outside of Earthworks, all anti-drilling organizations. In other words: It’s propaganda beginning to end. The theme of the study can be summed up in a single sentence (saving you a lot of dreary reading): State regulators don’t visit well sites often enough and fines for violations aren’t punitive enough.

In their press release announcing the study, Earthworks quotes the discredited former mayor of DISH, Texas, Calvin Tillman—that’s how deep they have to dig to support this drivel. Here’s the press release:

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Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Research | Statewide PA

Penn State Researcher: Most PA Drill Pads Prone to Erosion
September 25, 2012September 25, 2012

A new 12-month study by a Penn State researcher says that 50-70% of shale gas pads in Pennsylvania are constructed on slopes prone to erosion and sedimentation problems. The researcher, Dr. Patrick Drohan, is quick to point out such problems don’t necessarily exist for those pads—he’s just pointing out they could exist given the right conditions, and he believes the pads need to monitored closely.

Here’s the Penn State press release talking about the newly released study (unfortunately we could not get a copy of the study itself):

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Health Impacts | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Research | Statewide NY

What Will a NY Fracking Health Study Actually Study?
September 24, 2012September 24, 2012

Just what do anti-drilling groups in New York that want a “health impact study” propose to study? How exactly do they think fracking may impact the health of New Yorkers, especially since chemicals don’t leak up to the surface as they sometimes (erroneously) claim? Get this: they want to study potential links between fracking and STDs, homelessness and lack of exercise. Yeah, certifiable wackos.

From an unattributed opinion piece in the New York Daily News (which is not a pro-fracking newspaper):

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Education | Erie County (NY) | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Research

SUNY Bd of Trustees Orders UB to Report on Shale Institute
September 13, 2012September 13, 2012

Started by the George Soros-funded Public Accountability Initiative, the witch hunt at University at Buffalo—the university that dared to establish a Shale Resources Institute—continues full force (see this MDN story for background). Now the State University of New York (SUNY) Board of Trustees is “ordering” UB to report back to them details about the Institute. Interesting the kind of influence money can buy.

Here’s what’s being reported:

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