PA DEP Withdraws Order to Fix Equitrans Rager Gas Storage Leak
Last November, one of the ten natural gas storage wells at the Equitrans Rager Mountain Gas Storage Area in Jackson Township, Cambria County (in Pennsylvania) began to leak. The well ended up leaking roughly 100 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d) of gas into the atmosphere (see Equitrans Gas Storage Well in Cambria County, PA is Leaking). It took two weeks (14 days) for the leak to get fixed, after it had leaked roughly 1.4 billion cubic feet into the air (see Storage Well Leak Fix in Cambria County Failed, Leaked 1.4 Bcf). Both the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) and the federal Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) investigated (see Feds Investigate Equitrans Storage Well Leak in Cambria County, PA). The PA DEP ordered Equitrans to plug several of the 12 wells at the Rager area and ordered the company to make certain (expensive) upgrades to the other wells. Equitrans appealed that order, and the DEP has just backed down.
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Equitrans Midstream, an important midstream (pipeline) company in the Marcellus/Utica, issued its fourth quarter and 2022 update yesterday. Equitrans is the builder and soon-to-be (hopefully!) operator of the 94% complete, 303-mile Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) project. There were some important updates on the MVP project yesterday. Along with MVP, Equitrans owns and operates the Rager Mountain Gas Storage Area in Jackson Township, Cambria County, PA, which suffered a massive leak last year. Officials provided some updates on that situation as well.
Once a month, the analysts at the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) issue the agency’s Short-Term Energy Outlook (STEO), their best guess about where energy prices and production will go in the next 12 months or so. We sometimes poke good-natured fun at the EIA because one month, their predictions go up, the next month, down, etc. What about the latest STEO dart board, published yesterday? EIA slashed the price of natural gas at the Henry Hub another 30% from the previous monthly STEO, saying natgas will average $3.40/MMBut in 2023, down from a forecast of $4.90 the month before. EIA’s new average price, if it holds, would be 50% lower than 2022’s average of $6.42/MMBtu.
Late last week, the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) slapped Equitrans with three orders related to the Rager Mountain Gas Storage Reservoir in Cambria County, PA. The George L Reade 1 storage well located in the Rager Storage Reservoir vented natural gas uncontrolled into the atmosphere from Sunday, November 6, 2022, until the evening of Saturday, November 19, 2022, when it was plugged. The DEP has been onsite during the entire event (and since). An investigation by the DEP has found all but one of the 12 storage wells at the Rager field are leaking methane to one degree or another. The DEP has closed down all injections into the field, although withdrawals from the field (in order to prevent customers from going without) have continued.
Three weeks ago, one of the ten natural gas storage wells at the Equitrans Rager Mountain Gas Storage Area in Jackson Township, Cambria County (in Pennsylvania) began to leak and ended up leaking roughly 100 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d) of gas into the atmosphere (see 
Three weeks ago, one of the ten natural gas storage wells at the Equitrans Rager Mountain Gas Storage Area in Jackson Township, Cambria County (in Pennsylvania) began to leak and ended up leaking roughly 100 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d) of gas into the atmosphere (see 
U.S. natural gas prices closed at a fresh six-week low of $7.75/MMBtu yesterday. The Wall Street Journal says the natural gas market has lost its bullish momentum due to a lack of hurricanes off the Texas coast. U.S. production has reached triple digits for the first time ever, topping 100 Bcf/d, as we reported yesterday (see 
Yesterday the NYMEX natural gas price lost 20% of its value in a single day for the second time in two weeks. When news broke on June 14 that the Freeport LNG plant would not likely return to full service before the end of this year, the NYMEX front-month contract lost $1.42 (19.75%) to close at $7.19/MMBtu (see 
Strap in–the roller coaster ride continues. Yesterday the NYMEX Henry Hub front-month (July) futures contract for natural gas plunged 10%, by $0.62, following news that more gas was stored (“injected”) than previously anticipated by analysts and traders. Storage inventories rose to 2.169 Tcf (trillion cubic feet) for the week ended June 17 following a 74 Bcf (billion cubic feet) injection. Most people thought the injection would be no more than 60 Bcf. No doubt the ongoing outage at Freeport LNG pushing an extra 2 Bcf/d on the domestic market had something to do with the extra storage build. Models predict cooler weather is coming in the next few weeks. Throw it all into the pot–higher storage, Freeport offline, and cooler weather–and traders got spooked.