PA Republicans Introduce 4 Royalty Bills, Mea Culpa?
A new PA law was supposed to give leased landowners whose property has had drilling more protections with respect to royalties, but instead ended up harming some landowners who are not leased by allowing forced pooling of their land–weakening their bargaining position (see PA Gov Corbett Signs Back-Door Forced Pooling Bill into Law). PA landowners in general and the National Association of Royalty Owners (NARO), PA chapter in particular were not pleased with the new law. Perhaps in an attempt to get back into the good graces of PA landowners, several Republican state lawmakers whose districts are in the Marcellus Shale have introduced a plethora of new bills to protect royalty interests of landowners.
A group of four House Republicans, led by Rep. Garth Everett (R-Lycoming County), recently introduced House Bill 1684, which seeks to clarify state law regarding the minimum royalty payment for landowners so that the deduction of post-production costs from unconventional wells may not result in royalty payments less than the guaranteed minimum. On the Senate side, Sen. Gene Yaw, whose district covers many of the northeastern PA drilling counties, introduced a series of three companion bills to HB 1684. It seems the Republicans can’t do enough now to help out leased landowners…
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This is not the kind of story we enjoy sharing with you. Hilcorp, a major driller in the Utica and Marcellus Shale, has decided to take what we consider “the low road” and is using a 1961 Pennsylvania law to sue a landowner to allow them to drill under their property. It’s called “forced pooling,” “compulsory integration,” and a variety of other terms. MDN does not support it. Our argument is simple: My neighbor should not have the right to tell me I can’t drill on and under my land, and I should not have the right to force it on my neighbor if they don’t want it. We believe it’s the only defensible position in the drilling debate.
Cabot Oil & Gas, one of our favorite Marcellus drillers, continues to amaze and astound just about everyone. Last Friday (a week ago) the company issued a new “guidance” or “this is our best, educated guess” as to how much natural gas production the company will end up producing for 2013, and how much they believe it will grow in 2014. Given Cabot is already the number one natural gas producer in PA and the first member of what MDN calls the “billion cubic feet per day” club (see 
Those crazy, anti-drilling kids at Duke University are at it again. They released a “study” in a “peer-reviewed” journal yesterday (a study funded in part by the anti-drilling Park Foundation) that took samples from a creek downstream from a wastewater treatment plant that 
Problem: How can Philadelphia benefit from cheap, abundant Marcellus Shale natural gas being produced in such large quantities in Pennsylvania that the state can’t use it all and is now a net exporter? Yes, as Drexel president John Fry said at Shale Insight last week, Philly can provide education and research to assist the shale revolution (see