IFO: Pennsylvania Natural Gas Production Slips in 2Q21
Yesterday the Pennsylvania Independent Fiscal Office (IFO) released their latest quarterly Natural Gas Production Report for April through June 2021 (full copy below). It’s sort of a mixed bag with some good and some not-so-good. In 2Q21 the number of wells spud (begun to be drilled) was 120 new shale wells, up from the 113 spud in 2Q20, which was the point when the pandemic began to take hold in a big way. Sadly, gas production slipped in 2Q over the previous quarter, but not by much. It was still the second-highest quarterly production in the state for all time.
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Something unthinkable is now being thought. Since the beginning of the shale revolution, Texas has been the country’s number one producer of not only crude oil, but also natural gas. Why? Because when you drill for oil you also get natural gas. Because of “associated gas” production, Texas has held the #1 natgas slot for years. However, Pennsylvania may actually have a shot at taking the #1 slot for natgas production.
Last week both Pennsylvania and West Virginia issued permits to drill new shale wells. Ohio remained skunked for a fifth week in a row. PA issued 18 new shale permits, mainly in the western part of the state (a few in the northeast). WV issued 7 new shale permits, all of them for the same pad being drilled by EQT in Wetzel County. This is the second week in a row EQT scored all of WV’s new permits, and the second week in a row they were all in Wetzel County.
A far-left “environmental” group calling itself POWER pretends to be religious in nature. Perhaps it is religious–the religion of worshipping the creation instead of worshipping the Creator. The Pennsylvania-based group claims fossil fuels are racist, that fossil fuel companies intentionally target communities of color to install pipelines, compressor stations, and oil/gas wells. Yes, these people are wack in their views. But they have the ear of PA’s failed governor, Tom Wolf, and they intend to try and pack the state’s Public Utility Commission (PUC) with people who are as equally wack as they are.
Several mainstream media outlets who either didn’t read or intentionally lie about the results revealed in a new study are reporting a link between fracking and impacts on surface waters–particularly in the Marcellus Shale. In fact, the study, published in the journal Science, shows the authors found no such link. They found “a small increase in certain ions associated with hydraulic fracturing across several locations” that likely come from accidental spills of brine. And those slight increases disappear after a few months.
A profoundly biased and inaccurate article published by Environmental Health News attempts to paint two proposed shale gas wells as an environmental disaster and existential health threat akin to a nuclear meltdown. The article is so over the top it’s laughable–but instructive nonetheless. Apex Energy has proposed drilling two wells on a pad in a rural part of Trafford, PA township, straddling Allegheny and Westmoreland counties. The location is “within one mile of Level Green Elementary School and within two miles of 12,733 residents in Penn Township and Trafford Borough (about 17 miles east of Pittsburgh).” Are the kiddies at nearby schools and residents of Trafford really in danger?
On Wednesday, the Pennsylvania Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee approved a letter to the state’s Independent Regulatory Review Commission (IRRC), asking the IRRC to oppose the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), an obscene carbon tax aimed at closing down coal and natural gas-fired power plants in the state. Democrats on the committee railed against the vote calling it meaningless when they know it’s anything but. If the IRRC turns against RGGI, the left’s carbon tax scheme will die.
The Pennsylvania House Environmental Resources and Energy Committee held a hearing on Tuesday that investigated the economic benefits of the state’s 1,000-plus miles of gas pipelines. The adults in the room all acknowledged even if there is a transition away from fossil fuels “someday,” pipelines hauling natural gas around the state will need to be kept up and running for *at least* the next 30 years (likely longer). Pipelines are here to stay. A band of radical anti-fossil fuel nutters behaved badly during the hearing, as they so often do, and had to be ejected.
Although quarter after quarter and year after year natural gas production in the Pennsylvania Marcellus continues to go up (see 
Mariner East 2 (ME2) Pipeline is the gift that keeps on giving…for the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP). The DEP keeps assessing fines for alleged construction violations that happened a year or more ago. This time the DEP has fined ME2 for supposed violations happening in early 2020 in four Pennsylvania counties: Blair, Cumberland, Juniata, and Lebanon. The problems were “inadvertent returns” of drilling mud in several swamps (“wetlands”) and creeks. Yes, ME2 is once again up Snitz Creek…
A new report (full copy below) commissioned by the American Petroleum Institute (API) and undertaken by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) has found the oil and natural gas industries directly or indirectly supported over 188,000 jobs in Pennsylvania in 2019, or 6.1% of the total share of commonwealth employment. Furthermore, the oil and gas industries produced $14.2 billion in labor income, which was 7.9% of the state total share, and had a statewide economic impact of $31.9 billion, for 9.7% of the state total share. The percentages for the impact of oil and gas on the West Virginia economy are similar.
Some disturbing news out of Pennsylvania. You may recall that PennEast Pipeline, a 120-mile, primarily 36-inch pipeline that will cost $1 billion to build and run from Dallas, Luzerne County, in northeastern Pennsylvania, and terminate at Transco’s pipeline interconnection near Pennington, Mercer County, New Jersey, won a huge and important victory at the U.S. Supreme Court in June (see 
Yet another fine for Energy Transfer (ET), assessed by the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP). This time the DEP has fined ET $140,000 for violations that occurred in 2019 and 2020 during the construction of ET’s B15 Well Connect Pipeline construction project located in Beaver County, PA. According to the consent order and agreement (COA), “sections of the pipeline project were not temporarily stabilized, areas of the site showed accelerated erosion and sedimentation, waterbars were not installed properly or not installed in the approved locations, and erosion and sedimentation best management practices (BMP) were inoperable or ineffective.”
The so-called Pennsylvania Environmental Defense Foundation (PEDF) lost a big court case in Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth Court last Friday, but you won’t have heard about it because no one in mainstream media is talking about it or reporting on it. We couldn’t even find a whisper about the defeat from PA Environmental Digest or StateImpact Pennsylvania. Huh. One would almost think there’s some sort of collusion going on. A wall of censorship and silence. Don’t worry, we’ll tell you about it…