EmberClear Drops Plan to Build Gas-Fired Elec Plant Near Scranton
Pennsylvania’s largest natural gas-fired electric plant, Invenergy’s 1,480 megawatt, $1 billion project called the Lackawanna Energy Center, has been completely done and fully online since earlier this year (see Huge Marcellus-Fired Power Plant Near Scranton Now 100% Complete). In 2016 EmberClear announced it wanted to build Lackawanna County’s second Marcellus-fired electric plant project, going so far as to get a required air permit. Plans for EmberClear’s Lackawanna project are now dead.
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Nice try, but no cigar for Plainfield Township in Northampton County. The Plainfield Board of Supervisors last week passed a new zoning ordinance that prevents pipelines (and cell phone towers, and solar farms, and wind mills, and and and) from being built near or under the 1.5 miles of the Appalachian Trail as it passes through their township. Thing is, when it comes to pipelines (like PennEast Pipeline) that are federally regulated, Plainfield can’t stop it. Their ordinance isn’t worth the paper it’s written on.
Last week MDN told you that oral arguments would be heard on Thursday at the Pennsylvania Supreme Court in what we believe is one of (perhaps THE) most important shale cases ever in the Keystone State (see 
Two of the eight Pennsylvania House bills that are part of an initiative called Energize PA will be considered and debated before the PA House State Government Committee on September 17. Both bills, House Bill (HB) 1106 and 1107, are aimed at streamlining and speeding up the permitting process at the semi-dysfunctional Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP). Enviro-leftists are screaming–they don’t want the dysfunction to stop. Having shale permits issued more quickly is not in their game plan.
Sunoco is performing “optimization work” at the Marcus Hook export terminal this month. Marcus Hook is where two (soon to be three) Mariner East Pipelines terminate, hauling NGLs (propane, ethane, butane) from western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio all the way to the Philadelphia area. At Marcus Hook the NGLs get separated and most (not all, but most) get loaded onto ships for export to other countries. Sunoco needs to upgrade a few things to export even more. They’re shutting down Marcus Hook this month, and that’s a (temporary) problem for the main shipper sending NGLs to the facility–Range Resources.
This 
According to analysis by S&P Global Platts, new drilling permits for shale wells across Pennsylvania have “plummeted” over the past few months–down 14% in July and down 23% in August from the same months a year ago. But, does comparing two months from this year against last year for the entire state really tell the whole story?
Like it or not, landowners are joined at the hip with the shale drillers who produce the natural gas from their land. When “the price” (which is actually a lot of different prices, depending on geography) of natural gas is high, everyone is in tall cotton. But when the price tanks, as it has over the past few months, every suffers. PA landowners are noticing very thin royalty checks. The big bone of contention is when drillers look to share more of their pain with landowners by claiming post-production deductions.
The Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP), which once supported (in court) Sunoco Logistics Partners method of requesting permits for the Marcus Hook facility (near Philadelphia), has just flip flopped and change sides, now siding against Sunoco and the permits the DEP itself issued for the Marcus Hook facility. DEP is now siding with the radical Clean Air Council demanding that all of the work at the Marcus Hook facility be done under a single emissions permit, not separate permits.
Last October MDN brought to your attention a lawsuit filed by a Washington County, PA couple, Robin and Thomas Pflasterer, against Range Resources (see 
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.
In the American legal system those accused of wrongdoing, including those afraid of being entrapped by so-called law enforcement (like the Chester County, PA District Attorney Tom Hogan) are entitled to legal representation–to protect themselves from the abuses of people like DA Hogan. Yet when they do so, avail themselves of legal representation, Hogan gets bent out of shape. Could it be he *has no case* and wants to bully people into admitting to things they are not guilty of? Or force them to falsely testify to things the prosecutor wants to hear?
Greene County, PA, located in the far southwestern corner of the state, last night unveiled a new marketing/rebranding initiative called “Greene County, a Powerful Place.” Greene is making a play to attract investment from the natural gas industry’s downstream (manufacturing) sector. It is a full-throated endorsement of the Marcellus/Utica shale industry and the petrochemical industry that goes hand-in-hand with shale.