| |

Atlas Energy Acquiring Hi-Crush to Create #1 Frac Sand Producer

Atlas Energy Solutions Inc. entered into a definitive agreement with Hi Crush Inc. to acquire all of Hi-Crush’s Permian Basin proppant production assets and the company’s North American logistics operations in a transaction valued at $450 million. Although Atlas focuses solely on the Permian, Hi-Crush sells proppant to multiple basins, including deals with drillers in the Marcellus/Utica. The combination of both companies into one new company will create the largest frac sand producer in the U.S.
Continue reading

| | |

ProFrac’s Alpine Silica Frac Sand Subsidiary Launching IPO

ProFrac Holding Corp. is an oilfield service company (OFS) providing well-stimulation services, proppants production, and other complementary products and services to oil and gas companies engaged in the exploration and production (E&P) of unconventional oil and natural gas resources throughout the United States. In other words, ProFrac is a fracker-for-hire. The company has its own subsidiary to provide frac sand called Alpine Silica Holding, LLC. Yesterday, ProFrac, a public company, announced its plans to spin the Alpine subsidiary into its own public company with an initial public offering (IPO).
Continue reading

| | | |

Shortline Railroad Wins Award for PA Marcellus Transload Facility

We can’t resist a good railroad story. The American Shortline and Regional Railroad Association (ASLRRA) has just recognized the Reading & Northern (R&N) Railroad, based in Port Clinton, PA, with one of the industry’s highest honors for marketing achievement. The ASLRRA recognized R&N for its development of a large Marcellus Shale transload facility in Tunkhannock (Wyoming County), PA. Opened in late 2021, the facility began full operations in early 2022 and handled over 2200 carloads of frack sand despite many challenges facing the Marcellus Shale region.
Continue reading

| | | | |

Smart Sand Opens New Rail Transload Terminal in Greene County, PA

We can’t resist a good railroad story. We’ve always loved them (we know, we’re weird). Here’s a good railroad story for you: Frack sand company Smart Sand, Inc., headquartered in The Woodlands, Texas, has just opened for business and is shipping frack sand to a brand new transloading facility in Waynesburg (Greene County), Pennsylvania.
Continue reading

| | |

Proppant Giant U.S. Silica Explores Splitting Company in Two

Sand is big business. Just ask U.S. Silica, the largest proppant/sand provider for the oil and gas industry. Sand, as you may know, is used in fracking new shale wells. LOTs of sand is used. Sand (and alternatives like synthetic beads) is called “proppant” because it’s mixed with water, blasted into cracks in shale rock, and when the water returns to the surface the sand remains behind in the cracks and “props open” the tiny cracks to allow oil and gas to escape. The biggest such sand company in the country, U.S. Silica, announced yesterday that it is exploring separating the company’s non-oil & gas division into a separate company and selling it.
Continue reading

| | |

The Smaller the Utica Frac Sand Size, the Bigger the Profits

We spotted an interesting article on the Forbes website about microproppants–really really tiny particles of sand or ceramic beads–and how the smaller the size of the proppant, the more likely it is to keep cracks in shale rock open and flowing natural gas and oil. In the Utica Shale, for example, a special kind of microproppant called DEEPROP will yield an additional revenue of $315,000 – $585,000 per thousand feet drilled. Show me the money!
Continue reading

| | | |

Chesapeake Energy Shifting to “Wet Sand” for All Well Completions

In February Chesapeake Energy finally emerged from Chapter 11 bankruptcy shedding $7.8 billion worth of debt (see Chesapeake Emerges from Ch. 11 Bankruptcy, Stock Restarts Trading). Also in February, the company announced it would end its ill-advised dalliance with trying to convert the company from exploring for natural gas to oil, refocusing back on natgas (see Chesapeake Refocuses on NatGas, Offers $1B in Post-Bankruptcy IOUs). Chesapeake is one of the biggest drillers in the Marcellus of northeast Pennsylvania, so any major changes it makes to the way it drills and completes wells is big news for us.
Continue reading

|

Frac Sand Company Hi-Crush Emerges from Bankruptcy

In July MDN told you that frac sand company Hi-Crush, which has customers in the Marcellus/Utica, had filed for bankruptcy (see Hi-Crush, Yet Another Frac Sand Co., Files for Ch. 11 Bankruptcy. In August we shared the news that four of Hi-Crush’s top executives got $3 million in bonuses just five days before the company declared bankruptcy (see Hi-Crush Execs Get Millions in Bonuses Days Before Ch. 11 Filing). The company has just emerged from Chapter 11 with a new board and new owners.
Continue reading

|

Hi-Crush, Yet Another Frac Sand Co., Files for Ch. 11 Bankruptcy

Hi-Crush Inc., a frac sand company headquartered in Houston, TX, has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Hi-Crush provides frac sand/proppants to a number of shale plays across the country, including the Marcellus/Utica. In its filing, the company seeks to convert $450 million of its $699 million of debt into equity (shares of stock), diluting existing shares for existing stockholders. As is typical, existing shareholders get the short end of the stick.
Continue reading

| | | |

CARBO Ceramics Files Prepackaged Bankruptcy, Selling to Wilks

Oil billionaire Dan Wilks is going discount shopping. He’s buying up companies in the oil and gas space that are struggling. One of them is CARBO Ceramics, a company that provides a ceramic alternative to sand for use as a proppant in hydraulic fracturing. Proppants, for those new to MDN, “prop open” the fractures created during the fracking process to allow natural gas and natural gas liquids (even oil) to drain out of shale. A special kind of sand called silica, mined mostly in the Midwest is the most prevalent proppant used. However, CARBO has an innovated a ceramic substance–tiny little beads–used as an alternative.
Continue reading

| |

Tiny Ceramic Beads Boost Utica Production, but Not Marcellus

We spotted an interesting article appearing in the American Oil & Gas Reporter about results from using tiny ceramic beads as a proppant in oil and gas wells in several shale plays. Typically sand is used as a proppant to “prop open” tiny fractures to allow oil and gas to escape from shale rock. Sometimes ceramic beads are used. The article is based on a paper delivered at the Society of Petroleum Engineers’ Hydraulic Fracturing Technical Conference & Exhibition, held Feb. 4-6 in The Woodlands, Texas. Of particular interest to us are the findings for the Utica and Marcellus. The “micropropped” Utica wells showed a marked increase in oil production, while no such increase in production happened in micropropped Marcellus wells.
Continue reading

| | |

Northeast PA Rail Yard Expanding to Handle More Miss. Frac Sand

Frac sand

Good news for drillers in the Marcellus/Utica: You’re about to have access to even more frac sand than before. In May 2018 Shale Support Global Holdings signed a deal to become the exclusive provider of frac sand to the Shale Rail terminal located in Wysox (Bradford County), PA (see Shale Support Exclusive Frac Sand Supplier for NEPA Facility). Shale Support and Shale Rail have just signed an extension to keep working together, and Shale Rail announced it’s adding an extra new track in their Wysox rail yard, to increase capacity of incoming shipments.
Continue reading

| | | |

H&H Bends Over Backwards to Reduce SWPA Well Pad Truck Traffic

Frac sand truck

Shale driller Huntley & Huntley (H&H), headquartered in Monroeville (Allegheny County), PA, leases land and drills in the Pittsburgh suburbs. They’ve picked a tough place to do business. The company works hard to win over residents who live near their shale drilling projects. The latest example is what H&H is doing to reduce truck traffic in Murrysville (Westmoreland County), PA.
Continue reading

| | | |

Caught on Video: Frack Sand Train Goes Off Rails Near Scranton

Derailed train in Dickson City – click for larger version

Around noon yesterday, a train moving slowly, at 10 miles per hour, was hauling lumber and frack sand from Scranton to nearby Carbondale, when a video surveillance camera caught the train leaving the rails. Ten cars derailed, with three tipping over completely (spilling sand) and one teetering on the brink. The video, taken from a police station across the street, is amazing.
Continue reading