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Oil & Gas Jobs Continue To Grow – Latest Numbers for PA, OH, WV
The Energy Workforce & Technology Council, based in Houston, TX, is the national trade association for the global energy technology and services sector. The Council reports jobs in the O&G sector increased in November, adding 1,286 jobs. The O&G industry employs 652,398 jobs across the country, just 54,130 jobs away from returning to pre-pandemic levels. And how much do those jobs pay? The average hourly earnings for frontline oil-and-gas workers rose 1.3% in October from the previous month to $44.11, according to a Labor Department report released last week.
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New shale permits issued for Nov 27 – Dec 3 in the Marcellus/Utica were much improved over the previous few weeks. There were 25 new permits issued last week versus 14 issued two weeks ago and just one new permit three weeks ago. So the trend is our friend! Last week’s permit tally included 15 new permits in Pennsylvania, 8 new permits in Ohio, and 2 new permits in West Virginia. Three companies tied for top place with 4 permits each: Seneca Resources in PA, Ascent Resources and Encino Energy in OH.
Hart Energy keeps the hits rolling, publishing interviews and articles from the recent DUG Appalachia event held in Pittsburgh in November. The latest is a transcript of an interview between Hart Energy’s editorial director and Encino Energy’s CTO. According to the CTO, the company uses “machine learning” to perfect its oil drilling in the northern Ohio Utica, and it’s paying off. Encino is looking to expand in the Ohio Utica — looking to lease more and drill more.
The Ohio Dept. of Natural Resources (ODNR) released production numbers for the third quarter of 2023 late last week, and nobody noticed…except MDN (thanks to a tip from a good friend). ODNR no longer issues a press release to summarize the results as they once did. We’ve got the full spreadsheet with oil and gas production details for all 3,281 active shale wells in the Buckeye State. We’ve sliced and diced the numbers and have our usual Top 25 lists for natural gas and oil wells. We’ve included a couple of charts summarizing the data, showing the total production by driller (gas and oil) and the total production for the quarter by county. You’re gonna love it!
Anti-fossil fuel fanatics in Ohio (and beyond) still can’t accept that they lost a battle to block drilling under (not on) Ohio state-owned land, including some Ohio state parks. Several weeks ago, the Ohio Oil & Gas Land Management Commission (OGLMC) met in a public forum and voted to allow shale drilling under three state-owned tracts of land: (1) all 20,000 acres of Salt Fork State Park in Guernsey County, (2) more than 300 acres of Valley Run Wildlife Area in Carroll County, and (3) 66 acres of the Zepernick Wildlife Area in Columbiana County (see 
Columbiana County, OH, located in the northern portion of the Utica Shale play in the Buckeye State, has recently come roaring back to life. In 2022, there were 41 permits issued to drill in the Utica in Columbiana County. So far, in 2023, there have been 35 permits issued to drill in Columbiana County. But here’s the thing: 16 of this year’s 35 permits (half!) were issued in November! It’s like Columbiana had been asleep for most of this year, and then it suddenly came alive.
Yesterday and today, Hart Energy is hosting the 
The dead cat bounce bounced a little higher last week (i.e., the slight bounce a dead cat makes when it hits the ground). The rig count hit a new low for 2023 three weeks ago (see 
In February 2021, Northern Oil and Gas, Inc. (NOG), a company that invests in non-operated oil and gas assets (they let others do the drilling), announced it had purchased 64,000 net acres producing ~120 MMcfe/d (million cubic feet equivalent per day) in the Marcellus/Utica from Reliance Industries Limited (see 
In December 2017, MDN told you about a second proposed natural gas-fired power plant planned by CME Energy for Oregon (Lucas County), Ohio (see 
Yesterday, the Ohio Oil & Gas Land Management Commission (OGLMC) met in a public forum and voted to allow shale drilling under (not on top of) three different state-owned tracts of land: all 20,000 acres of Salt Fork State Park in Guernsey County, more than 300 acres of Valley Run Wildlife Area in Carroll County, and 66 acres of the Zepernick Wildlife Area in Columbiana County. In addition, commissioners voted against shale drilling under Wolf Run State Park. Approximately 100 anti-fossil fuel zealots were on hand at the meeting and nearly made the votes impossible with their prancing, chanting, and singing. They made horses rear ends of themselves by making the meeting miserable for everyone else.
For more than a decade, MDN has brought you stories about shale development on and under land controlled by the Muskingum Watershed Conservancy District (MWCD), an agency formed in 1933 to help control flooding and promote water conservation in the Muskingum River watershed area of Ohio, an area that covers 8,000 square miles (
In January, Ohio House Bill (HB) 507 became law with the signature of Gov. Mike DeWine (see 
In 2020, EOG Resources, one of the largest oil and gas drillers in the U.S. (with international operations in Trinidad and China), sold all of its Marcellus assets, which were located in Bradford County, PA, to Tilden Resources for $130 million (see