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100+ Union Members Protest Dela. County Council Mtg re ME Pipes
More than 100 union members packed a Delaware County, PA Council meeting yesterday to send the loud and clear message they are not happy with council members who have asked PA Gov. Tom Wolf to impose a moratorium on all of the Mariner East pipelines that pass through the county. Two weeks ago the council passed a resolution asking Wolf to block all of the pipelines, those already built and those under construction. This is what third world, tinpot dictatorships do–not the U.S.A. Union members were at the meeting to remind council members they vote, in large numbers, and they’re willing to toss them out of office if they continue with this chicanery.
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Rockford Corporation, a subsidiary of Primoris Services Corporation, entered into a consent judgment with the U.S. Dept. of Labor to pay $354,933 in back wages and “damages” to employees over the practice of failing to pay overtime. Those affected include equipment operators, welders, and helpers. Rockford is one of the pipeline construction companies Williams uses to build gathering pipes in Susquehanna County, PA. Rockford works in other geographies too, not just the Marcellus. The investigation into Rockford began with their Marcellus pipeline activities in northeastern PA, then spread nationwide.
We caught a helpful update on PennEnergy Resources from a report on last week’s Hart Energy DUG East Conference in Pittsburgh. PennEnergy CEO Richard Weber told the DUG audience that his company is currently producing an average half a billion cubic feet of natural gas per day, with plans to increase that by 10% this year. One thing holding the company back is the ongoing outage of Energy Transfer’s Revolution Pipeline gathering system.
Nobody seems to have noticed, or if they did notice they’re not reporting, what we consider big news: Yesterday the Pennsylvania State Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee “reported out” (i.e. approved) Senate Bill (SB) 694, the Senate version of House Bill (HB) 247, a bill which allows fully leased parcels that are part of one drilling “unit” to be combined with parcels in a different unit–“cross unit drilling.”
We received some pictures from a loyal MDN subscriber (S.B.) showing progress on clearing a site where a new $5 million office and warehouse facility in Tunkhannock Township (Wyoming County), PA. Ever hear of BKV Operating? No? How about Kalnin Ventures? Or if not Kalnin, how about Banpu, the largest coal producer in Thailand? Like a Russian matryoshka (nesting) doll, BKV Operating is a subsidiary of Kalnin Ventures, and Kalnin is the American agent/partner representing Banpu here in the U.S. Ultimately it is Banpu money that is building this new facility, and major Banpu money being invested in PA Marcellus drilling in northeastern PA.
The Falcon ethane pipeline being built by Shell in western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio is unique in many ways. Falcon is a 97-mile, two-legged pipeline system to carry ethane to the mighty Shell cracker plant now under construction in Beaver County, PA (near Pittsburgh). We spotted an article about the pipeline and its construction. According to a local conservation office in Beaver County, pipeline construction “hasn’t even affected us [wildlife] a bit,” thanks to careful planning by Shell. A pipeline everybody loves? Is that even possible?!
LOLA Energy was birthed near the end of 2015, by former EQT executives using private equity money from Denham Capital (see 
A group of enviro-Nazis has sunk to a new low in their holy mission to block Marcellus Shale drilling. A group of colluding Big Green groups along with sympathetic (and sycophantic) “reporters” (i.e propagandists) from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette are exploiting the pain and suffering of southwestern PA families of children who have cancer in their attempt to stop shale drilling. It’s disgusting and sick.
Energy Transfer continues to squabble with the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) over the fate of the still-closed Revolution Pipeline in western PA. In May the DEP issued an order to Energy Transfer, builder of Revolution, to “identify and restore or mitigate all streams and wetlands that it illegally eliminated or altered during the construction” of the pipeline (see 
Pennsylvania antis from the Philadelphia area who don’t want pipelines running through their neighborhoods (NIMBY types) have beat the drums of war so loud and for so long, they’ve finally begun to intimidate the non-partisan, shouldn’t-be-intimated PA Public Utility Commission (PUC). The PUC last Thursday launched a “major review of its safety regulations for hazardous liquids pipelines” in response to pressure from Mariner East 2 pipeline foes. It’s sad to see a government body cowed by a few loudmouthed troublemakers.
A Pennsylvania landowner thought he could finagle extra payments from XTO Energy after his land was drilled under from a neighboring property. The landowner had signed a lease, and the lease contains language that says if XTO were to drill “on” his property (i.e. install a well pad) the landowner would receive an extra payment. The landowner sued saying “on” also means “under” when XTO drilled under his property. The Superior Court of Pennsylvania disagreed, saying “on” means “on the surface” and “under” does not mean “on”.
Yesterday the Pittsburgh Business Times broke the news that Range Resources, one of the Marcellus/Utica’s biggest drillers (and in fact the very first driller to sink a Marcellus well, back in 2004), has laid off 40 employees–roughly 5% of its workforce. The layoffs are split between the company’s Pennsylvania and Texas operations.
In mid-December there was an explosion at a MarkWest Energy natural gas processing plant in Chartiers (Washington County), PA, injuring four people (see