MDN is happy to help promote the 4th Annual Appalachian Storage Hub Conference coming August 27. This conference provides comprehensive information about the development of the petrochemical industry in the Appalachian Basin. Here’s the exciting part: You can attend the event in-person at the Southpointe Office Park (near Pittsburgh), or for the first time, attend online virtually. At this event, you’ll hear…
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Each year the folks at Petrochemical Update (now owned by Reuters Events) hosts two concurrent events in Houston, Texas: Petrochemical Supply Chain & Logistics Conference & Exhibition, and the Downstream Conference & Exhibition. This year’s events were due to be held in June. That has just changed. Due to the virus pandemic and travel restrictions, both events will now be virtual. Same great speakers and topics, but now you can tune in to hear them. The best part? IT’S FREE!
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Over 700 people gathered yesterday in Columbus, OH for OOGA’s (Ohio Oil & Gas Association) 73rd Annual Meeting. Industry leaders soberly assessed the state of current affairs. According to OOGA president Matt Hammond, the industry may have to downsize for a while. Jeff Fisher, CEO of Ascent Resources, agreed. Hammond said, “it’s just going to look a little bit different in the next few years” before the price of gas rebounds. The sentiment was clearly what we’ve been preaching: Expect lower for longer when it comes to gas prices.
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MDN is proud to partner with Petrochemical Update, now owned by Reuters Events, to promote the forthcoming Northeast US Petrochemical Conference & Expo 2020, being held June 29-30 in Pittsburgh. As part of that event, Petrochemical Update recently released the Northeast Petrochemical Industry Market Outlook 2020 report. We have details below on how you can get a free copy. Also below are details on how to register for the upcoming June conference–and save $150! Please join MDN at this year’s event. We promise it will be well worth your time.
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One of the privileges of writing about the Marcellus/Utica industry is the occasional opportunity to attend worthwhile events and connect with the terrific people who work in this industry. Shale Insight (last week in Pittsburgh) was one of those events. MDN editor Jim Willis will attend another such event in a few weeks: Midstream PA 2019. Joe Barone, founder of Shale Directories, is the guy behind Midstream PA and similar events. Joe always puts on a good conference. Joe and Bryce Custer, from NAI Ohio River Corridor commercial real estate brokerage, have created a brand new event called the Appalachian Basin Real Estate Conference. Looks like another winner!
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MDN is on the road in beautiful Pittsburgh, covering the Shale Insight 2019 event, so today’s lineup of stories is all about yesterday’s opening day. We will return with full strength MDN news on Friday. Meanwhile, tag along with MDN and be a virtual attendee at our industry’s marquee event!
President Trump was in rare form as he addressed several thousand people at the 2019 Shale Insight event. He was the closing keynote speaker of the first day of the conference. MDN editor Jim Willis was there to capture the speech for our readers. After acknowledging and praising three cabinet officials who came along with Trump–Dept. of Interior Secretary David Bernhardt, Dept. of Energy Secretary Rick Perry, and EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler (all of whom Trump had high praise for)–Trump opened his remarks this way: “I was here three years ago and you’re much happier now. You’re much wealthier now.” Trademark Trump!
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We snapped a number of pictures of President Trump’s speech yesterday. Unfortunately the camera on our phone isn’t the greatest, and we were sitting far back, so the shots are a bit blurry. We snapped quite a few of the big monitor to improve the images. We’re not sure it helped. At any rate, come along to virtually attend the rally!
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We thought we would bring you coverage of Trump’s speech from other sources, mainstream media sources. Believe or not, it was hard to find coverage! There was plenty of reporting on a small group of Trump haters who protested hours before (and even after) Trump visited Pittsburgh. A few were arrested for sitting down in an active roadway. The haters and their message largely had nothing to do with energy, which was the focus of Trump’s speech (excepting the sign you see in the picture, which we found hilarious). Haters gonna hate, just shake it off (Taylor Swift). Below we have several articles by reporters who attended yesterday’s Trump speech at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center in Pittsburgh.
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Shale Insight 2019, being held in Pittsburgh on Wednesday and Thursday, kicked off with a “fireside chat” between Marcellus Shale Coalition President Dave Spigelmyer and EQT CEO Toby Rice. While President Trump’s visit later in the day was certainly a highlight and focus (who doesn’t want to tell their kids and grand kids they saw the President?!), we would say, in all honesty, that the bigger highlight for those in the industry was the opportunity to hear Toby Rice. We would say his talk was more anticipated than Trump’s visit.
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Look who’s coming to town! President Trump will be the keynote speaker at Shale Insight in Pittsburgh next week. Trump previously addressed Shale Insight attendees in 2016 when he was running for president, and MDN was there (see Highlights from 2016 Shale Insight, Day Two – Trump!). MDN will be there again this time to capture Trump’s comments and share them with you. But President Trump isn’t the only reason to go…
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The National Association of Royalty Owners’ national convention has been under way this week in Pittsburgh, wrapping up today. One of the big topics at the event has been a push to get a “royalty check stub” bill passed in Pennsylvania. What’s that? It’s a bill that forces drillers to do a better, more detailed job of breaking down royalty statements so landowners/rights owners can see what expenses have been deducted from their royalty checks. Such a bill passed and went into law in West Virginia last year (see WV Royalty Transparency Law Sheds New Light Beginning June). PA landowners want the same kind of transparency that WV landowners get.
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One of the highlights for MDN editor Jim Willis in attending last week’s Northeast Petrochemical Conference in Pittsburgh was the opportunity to meet and hear speak Steve Schlotterbeck, former CEO of EQT. Steve is the guy who pulled off the buyout/merger of Rice Energy into EQT, creating the largest natural gas producing company in the United States. He had the guts to walk away from EQT when the board refused to pay him what he was worth (see EQT CEO Steve Schlotterbeck Suddenly Quits, Leaves Company). Last Friday morning Steve opened the final day of the conference with more guts and plain talk. He said the shale industry has been “an unmitigated disaster for buy and hold investors.” Whoa! What did he mean?
UPDATE: We have a full transcript of Steve’s speech below.
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Several analysts at last week’s LDC Gas Forum Northeast conference in Boston offered their opinion that further growth in production for the Marcellus/Utica region is on the cusp of stalling. Why? Because they don’t see any new major pipeline projects on the horizon beyond the final “big 3” (Atlantic Coast Pipeline, Mountain Valley Pipeline, and PennEast Pipeline), and because major LNG export plants along the Gulf Coast will receive most of their gas from bountiful associated gas that comes from plays much closer to the Gulf, including the Permian and Midcontinent regions.
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Natural gas was front and center at the ninth annual Marcellus and Manufacturing Development Conference, an event of the West Virginia Manufacturers Association, held yesterday in Morgantown, WV. Among the speakers was Steve Winberg, U.S. Department of Energy assistant secretary for fossil energy. He mouthed strong support for the Appalachian Basin ethane “hub” saying the region can easily support up to five ethane crackers, and that could lead to $35 billion of investment and 100,000 jobs in the region.
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CERAWeek (by IHS Markit) is held each year in Houston, Texas. There is no doubt it is the world’s premier energy event. Last week U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo addressed attendees, as did Secretary of Energy Rick Perry and the Chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commissioner Neil Chatterjee. Movers and shakers. Everyone from Saudi Arabian oil sheikhs to wildcatting frackers from America’s shale plays were there.
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