Seneca Resources 100% PA Utica Focused by ‘End of Fiscal Year’
While Buffalo “Marcellus” Bills owner Terry Pegula’s JKLM Energy has been “steadily increasing activity” in Potter County, PA (northcentral PA) grabbing headlines, another company, National Fuel Gas (NFG) subsidiary Seneca Resources, is also active in Potter and several neighboring northcentral PA counties (Cameron, McKean, Elk, and Lycoming). We spotted a pair of stories in a local newspaper recounting Seneca’s activity to date, and outlining plans for the future. One statement in particular stood out for us: Seneca will be “shifting to 100-percent Utica development by the end of this fiscal year.” At first blush, you might think “end of fiscal year” means by Dec. 31, 2017. However, NFG and subsidiary Seneca operate on a strange fiscal year. Fourth quarter 2017 (Oct-Dec) is NFG/Seneca’s first quarter 2018 fiscal period. Since the quote about focusing 100% on PA Utica drilling came at the end of November, we interpret the quote to mean “Seneca will be 100% focused on the PA Utica by September 2018.” At any rate, let’s not get caught up in semantics and timing. The takeaways from the pair of articles below, which appeared about a week apart at end of November/beginning of December, are: (1) Seneca is shifting to 100% Utica drilling; (2) Seneca spent 60% more on drilling in 2017 than 2016; (3) Seneca is currently running either 1 or 2 rigs, depending on which quote from which story you read; and (4) between royalty payments, impact tax payments and money spent with local PA businesses, Seneca has now spent nearly $1 billion on shale drilling–all of it in northcentral PA…
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Eclipse Resources, a Marcellus/Utica pure play driller headquartered in State College, PA, drills almost exclusively in the Ohio Utica. That is, until now! Yesterday Eclipse announced it has purchased 44,500 acres of oil and gas leases and producing wells in Tioga and Potter counties in north central Pennsylvania for $93.7 million–which works out to be ~$1,900/acre (very low cost). The aim of the purchase is to drill in the Pennsylvania Utica Shale. For the past few years MDN has heard about/highlighted stories of drillers going after the Utica Shale in PA–particularly in Tioga County (see 
Terry Pegula is an interesting guy. He’s a billionaire who owns both the Buffalo Sabres (NHL hockey team) and the Buffalo Bills (NFL football team). Pegula is the owner of East Resources, once a big driller (and holder of acreage) in the Marcellus Shale. Pegula sold off East’s Marcellus assets and used the money, in part, to buy the Buffalo Bills in 2014, which gave rise to MDN calling the team “the Marcellus Bills”–since it was Marcellus money that kept the team in Buffalo, instead of moving to another market (see 
When it comes to shale drilling in the northern-tier of Pennsylvania, counties like Susquehanna (#1 producing county in the state), Bradford (#3 producing county) and event Tioga (#7 producing county) may come to mind. But what about the county west of Tioga–Potter County? Potter isn’t even in the top 10 producing counties in the state. But that doesn’t mean there’s not shale drilling activity. In July MDN reported that JKLM Energy (owned by Buffalo Bills owner Terry Pegula) is in the process of drilling a dozen Utica wells in Potter this year (see 
It’s been a while since we’ve updated you on a little-known (but rapidly becoming better known) company called JKLM Energy. In May 2016, the last time we wrote about JKLM, we told you the company had successfully drilled and was flowing gas from Potter County, PA’s first Utica Shale well (see 
From time to time exploration and production companies (aka “drillers” or “producers”) decide to sell leases for acreage they don’t plan to drill on or under. Typically when a new play is discovered there is a bit of a land rush as drillers begin leasing. In the Marcellus, a driller may decide to concentrate on a specific county in the state, as Cabot Oil & Gas did with Susquehanna County in northeastern PA. Cabot happened to hit the jackpot with some of the most productive gas wells on the planet. Other times, when the leasing is done and drilling has begun drillers begin to figure out where they want to spend their money. It takes a lot of money to drill a Marcellus well–on the order of $7 million. Eventually drillers find there are isolated tracts of acreage they’ve leased that don’t fit with their future plans, so they either horse trade and swap, or perhaps put the acreage leases up for public auction. Such is the case with Shell’s SWEPI subsidiary. They recently posted three largish tracts of leased acreage up for auction–two in Tioga County, PA and one in Potter County, PA. Here’s a description of the land SWEPI is trying to dump…
An MDN reader recently alerted us to a little-known fact: JKLM Energy has successfully drilled and is flowing gas from Potter County, PA’s first Utica Shale well. JKLM is owned by Terry Pegula, the guy who sold most of his Marcellus assets and used the money to buy the Buffalo Bills (see 
Pennsylvania State Rep. Martin Causer (R-Turtlepoint) testified before the U.S. House Committee on Agriculture in Washington, DC on Wednesday, April 13. Causer was there to tell the House Agriculture Committee that new pipelines are desperately needed in the farm country he represents. We have a copy of Rep. Causer’s masterful testimony below…
More electricity is disappearing from the electrical grid thanks for Barack H. Obama’s war on coal. AES had considered converting a coal-powered electric plant is operates in Potter County, PA into burning natural gas–indeed had applied for and received permits to do it–but instead they reversed course and have now shuttered the plant they operate in Potter known as the Bear Valley plant…
On Monday MDN told you about an accident in Sweden Township (Potter County), PA where JKLM Energy released soap into a water aquifer while trying to fish out a broken drill bit from a Utica Shale bore hole (see 
PennFuture, the anti-drilling organization that has produced three top lieutenants in the PA Gov. Tom Wolf administration (see Ripping the Face off PennFuture & It’s Former Employees), frequently uses the court system in its attempt to slow or stop the Marcellus industry. One such case was a lawsuit PennFuture filed against Ultra Resources in 2011. Ultra had eight compressor stations scattered across Tioga and Potter counties–all of them many miles apart from each other. PennFuture tried to make the legal argument that all of the compressor stations should be combined together and treated as a single entity for the purposes of the federal Clean Air Act, which would have resulted in either very expensive equipment to reduce each facility’s nitrgen oxide (NOx) output, or perhaps closed some of them down to make the combined total come in under a certain threshold. PennFuture tried to say the eight facilities are “adjacent” for the purpose of the Clean Air Act. Ultra argued adjacent means “next to,” as in sharing a border. It all boils down to what the definition of adjacent means. Earlier this week U.S. District Court for Pennsylvania’s Middle District ruled in favor of Ultra and against PennFuture…