Butler County | EdgeMarc Energy | Energy Companies | Industrywide Issues | LOLA Energy | M&A | Pennsylvania
LOLA Energy’s Purchase of EdgeMarc Assets – The Backstory
Yesterday we brought you the news that LOLA Energy continues to transform itself with the purchase of what was EdgeMarc Energy’s shale assets in Butler County, PA (see LOLA Energy Buys Former EdgeMarc Shale Assets in Butler County, PA). LOLA picked up 22,000 net acres of Marcellus/Utica leases, 48 producing shale wells, and 18 DUCs. Ace reporter Paul Gough from the Pittsburgh Business Times spoke with LOLA CEO Jim Crockard and got the backstory behind the deal. It seems Crockard had his eye on that part of the state “for a long time.” He even considered an offer to work for EdgeMarc years ago. Good thing he didn’t take the job.
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LOLA Energy (LOLA stands for 
Some two and a half years after Energy Transfer’s (ET) Revolution Pipeline entered service in western Pennsylvania and exploded following a landslide, the pipeline finally returned to service yesterday. The Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) issued a press release to say it had extracted another $125,000 from ET and has allowed the pipeline to resume service.
Once you sort through all of the subsidiaries of subsidiaries of subsidiaries, you’ll find this news from a press release we spotted this morning: PennEnergy Resources has sold a gathering pipeline system in western Pennsylvania, called Pine Run Midstream, to a joint venture partnership between venture capital firm Energy Spectrum Partners (based in Texas) and utility/pipeline company UGI (based in Pennsylvania). Sale price: $205 million.
Last week Pennsylvania issued 12 new shale well drilling permits with a mix of permits issued in both the southwest (wet gas) and northeast (dry gas) regions of the state. Ohio issued 7 new permits, all of them except one in the same county (Jefferson). West Virginia was a goose egg–no new permits issued last week.
Last Friday the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced a “settlement” (with no admission of guilt) with MarkWest Energy, with MarkWest paying a $150,000 fine for failure to monitor for air emissions leaks at its Liberty Bluestone facility in Butler County, PA.
This is getting ridiculous. Does anyone really believe that a single pipeline project already built and now getting a redo could possibly have racked up 680 “violations” during construction work over the past five months? We certainly don’t believe it. Yet that’s what the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) alleges. Energy Transfer (ET), the builder and fixer of Revolution, has their own allegation: The DEP itself is “not in compliance with its own guidelines.” Who inspects the inspectors for compliance?
Energy Transfer’s Revolution Pipeline runs through Bulter, Beaver, Allegheny, and Washington counties in southwest PA. The 24-inch gathering pipeline shifted and exploded in September 2018, just as it was entering service (see 
In a speech delivered October 31 to the P4 Climate Action Summit in downtown Pittsburgh, Mayor Bill Peduto declared his hatred for the petrochemical industry. He doesn’t want any more Shell crackers junking up his regional backyard. The highly negative reaction to Peduto’s idiotic (and pandering) remarks was swift. What petchem company wants to build in a region where the mayor of its largest city is trash talking the industry? In a bid to counter Peduto’s economically damaging remarks, some 20 county officials from Allegheny, Beaver, Butler, Fayette, Greene, Lawrence, Mercer, Washington and Westmoreland counties issued a joint statement on Wednesday to show their support for the petrochemical and shale industries in the region.
Here is what we believe to be an exclusive: In June, PennEnergy Resources sold/transferred four well pads (with multiple wells) located in Butler and Lawrence counties in western PA to Geopetro LLC. We have the names of the well pads and proof of the transfer. We’ve not seen this news anywhere else.