Last week Pennsylvania issued a paltry 3 new shale well drilling permits (lowest we’ve seen in months), Ohio issued a single new permit, and West Virginia issued 5 new shale well permits. All 3 PA permits were issued in Greene County. The OH permit was issued in Carroll County (bit of a surprise). And all 5 WV permits were issued in Tyler County.
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Category: Pennsylvania
Anti Groups Ask PA to Reject Shell Cracker Air Permit Modification
Radical anti-fossil fuel groups have not given up hope they can somehow, at the last minute, block the $10 billion Shell ethane cracker plant (about a year from being completed) from ever starting up. Perhaps Biden’s “victory” has given them a little boost of irrational exuberance? In 2015 the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) issued an air permit for the cracker plant. Shell needs to tweak the permit with new information. Antis are asking PA to deny the new tweaks, claiming Shell wants to pollute the region even more. Shell says the tweaks reflect new realities, including LOWER emissions.
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PA DEP Continues to Push Carbon Tax via Public Hearings
Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf and his Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) continue to push a plan that will raise Pennsylvania residents’ electric rates by 50% or more, a carbon tax plan called the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). The DEP will conduct 10 three-hour virtual public hearings between Dec. 8 and 14. There will be no in-person hearings due to concerns over COVID-19.
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PEDF Continues Effort to End Marc. Production on PA State Land
The radicalized Pennsylvania Environmental Defense Foundation (PEDF) never gives up. In June 2017, the PEDF won a case at the PA Supreme Court by the skin of their teeth (see PA Supreme Court Hands Antis Partial Victory re State Land Drilling). The case dealt with the narrow issue of how PA can spend revenue raised from drilling for oil and gas under state-owned land. A divided court ruled that money from royalties (not lease signing bonuses) must be used only for “environmental” purposes.
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Repubs Keep Control of PA Legislature, Block Wolf’s Energy Plan
Although the national election is still undecided (looking like Biden, a complete disaster), in almost every other respect Republicans (i.e. pro-shale candidates) won, big-time. Republicans gained seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, look to be keeping a majority in the U.S. Senate, and picked up seats in many state legislatures. Leftist Democrats poured BIG money into Pennsylvania in an attempt to flip both the PA House and Senate from red to blue. They failed. And that’s very good for shale energy in the state.
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Williams Record M-U Volumes, Early Startup for SET, Leidy South
During the Williams third-quarter 2020 update yesterday, CEO Alan Armstrong shared some very interesting, and relevant (to the Marcellus/Utica) comments. Armstrong said that two important pipeline projects to carry M-U gas to other markets, the Southeastern Trail expansion project and the Leidy South project, are both in the midst of coming online–ahead of schedule.
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Weekly Shale Drilling Permits for PA, OH, WV: Oct. 26-30
Last week Pennsylvania issued 16 new shale well drilling permits, and West Virginia issued 7 new shale well permits. Ohio issued no new shale permits last week.
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PA DEP Massive Shale Permit Fee Affects Drilling, PA Economy
In August Pennsylvania hiked its permit fee to drill a new shale well to be the most expensive of any state in the country, from $5,000 to $12,500 (see Permit Fee to Drill PA Shale Well Officially Went Up 250% on Aug 1). New analysis by the non-partisan think tank Allegheny Institute for Public Policy says the new fee is deterring new drilling and will likely be a drag on PA’s economy.
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Hell Freezes Over – Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Endorses Trump!
We’re speechless (which doesn’t happen often). The liberal, anti-shale Democrats who write and manage the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette have endorsed Donald J. Trump for president! They had plenty of criticism for Trump in their lukewarm “endorsement,” but the fact they did endorse Trump is, well, big news. The Post-Gazette editors, who haven’t endorsed a Republican for president since 1972, say “Mr. Biden is too old for the job, and fragile.” We agree.
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Cabot O&G 3Q: 2.4 Bcf/d, Drilled 13 Wells, Upper Marcellus Coming
Dan Dinges, CEO of Cabot Oil & Gas, said last week: “2020 has proven to be the most challenging year for natural gas prices in the last 25 years, resulting from a multi-year trend of overcapitalization of both oil and natural gas assets across our industry.” Indeed. The company released its third-quarter 2020 update on Friday and reported a net loss of $15 million, compared to net income of $90.4 million in 3Q19. This is the first quarterly net loss for Cabot in recent memory. Still, there was plenty of good news coming from the 3Q update…
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PA DEP Trash Talks ET/Sunoco re Mariner East 2 Problems
The bad blood between Energy Transfer (ET) and the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) continues. ET’s Sunoco Pipeline subsidiary is desperately trying to complete the Mariner East 2X pipeline from eastern Ohio through to Marcus Hook near Philadelphia. A recent drilling mud spill in Marsh Creek State Park prompted the DEP to demand Sunoco change the route for ME2X (which was less than 60 days from being done) to a new route around the State Park (see PA DEP Orders Sunoco to Reroute ME2X Pipeline Around State Park).
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Peregrine Energy Buys Royalty Payments from SWPA, Ohio Landowners
Peregrine Energy Partners, headquartered in Dallas, Texas, continues its program to buy royalty payments from landowners in the Marcellus/Utica region. Yesterday the company announced another round of deals, this time purchased from landowners in Greene County, PA, and Guernsey County, OH.
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Weekly Shale Drilling Permits for PA, OH, WV: Oct. 19-23
For a second week in a row, all three M-U states issued new shale drilling permits last week. Pennsylvania issued 6 new permits, Ohio issued 5 new permits, and West Virginia issued 3 new permits.
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M-U Fracker Explains How Biden Presidency Will End U.S. Oil Boom
If you want to know what a Biden/Harris administration will look like, how it will treat the fossil fuel industry (specifically oil and gas), you can wind the clock back and look at the Obama/Biden administration and get a pretty good idea. Dan Doyle, president of Reliance Well Services, a fracking company based in Pennsylvania, lived through the hell of the Obama years. The Obama administration targeted Dan’s company and Dan personally (IRS, Dept. of Labor, Attorney General). Doyle says Obama “weaponized” the federal government against the shale industry and his company, and Biden will do the same. He reveals just how they operate.
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Sunoco Appeals DEP Order to Reroute ME2 Pipe from Marsh Creek Park
Energy Transfer (Sunoco Pipeline) is pushing back against a demand by the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) that the company’s Mariner East 2X pipeline project be rerouted around Marsh Creek State Park (in Chester County, PA) following a drilling mud spill in August. Sunoco has asked the PA Environmental Hearing Board, a special court created to hear appeals of DEP decisions, to override the DEP’s demand to reroute ME2X.
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Adelphia Gateway Pipeline Gets OK to Begin Some Construction
Adelphia Gateway is a plan to convert an old/existing 84-mile oil pipeline stretching from Northampton County, PA through Bucks, Montgomery, and Chester counties, terminating in Delaware County at Marcus Hook, into a natural gas pipeline–flowing Marcellus gas to southeast PA. Earlier this month the project received permission from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to begin work on converting part of the existing pipeline.
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