Statewide PA

Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA

Is PA’s Act 13 Law on Last Legs with Passage of PA Budget?
July 14, 2014July 14, 2014

It’s early days yet–but here’s a developing and potentially disturbing story for drillers (and landowners, and supply chain companies) in Pennsylvania. As MDN reported, last week PA Gov. Tom Corbett signed a $29.1 billion budget bill (see PA Budget Signed by Gov. Corbett – No Severance Tax This Year). The good news is there will be no jobs-and-drilling killing severance tax–this year. The bad news is that regulations that should have been standalone–to separate conventional and unconventional drilling–were slipped into the budget bill. Why is that bad? Because, as StateImpact Pennsylvania is reporting, it may lead to the total gutting of the Act 13 law…
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Baker Hughes Announces 2Q14 Well Count – What is a Well Count?
July 14, 2014July 14, 2014

No doubt you’ve heard of the Baker Hughes rig count–the number of drilling rigs currently in use to drill oil and gas wells. Baker Hughes has provided that data for, like, forever! Used to be you could lay a ruler down and determine whether supplies of natural gas would increase or decrease based on the number of drilling rigs in use. That went out the door a few years ago with shale wells. Production numbers are no longer closely tied to the rig count. So Baker Hughes invented a new metric to help: well counts. They reported last week that well counts are up 5% in the second quarter of 2014 over 2013. Wait, what’s a well count? And why is it important?…
Read More “Baker Hughes Announces 2Q14 Well Count – What is a Well Count?”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA

Anti-Drilling Group Sues PA over Budget and $ from State Leases
July 14, 2014July 14, 2014

The litigious anti-drilling group Pennsylvania Environmental Defense Foundation (PEDF) waited all of about two hours after PA Gov. Tom Corbett signed the 2014 PA budget before filing a lawsuit to prevent the use of money from leasing more state forestland and parks for drilling under (not on). Gov. Corbett originally requested $75 million in new revenue from the effort. As we pointed out, that $75M represents exactly 0.00255 of the budget (see PA Dems: No Leg to Stand on Criticizing $75M Forest Drilling Plan). In other words, a rounding error. Never mind that Ed “fast Eddie” Rendell sold $444 million worth of leases that drill on as well as under, when he was governor. House and Senate Republicans upped the number to $95M and Corbett signed the budget, so the PEDF is trying to make legal mischief, once again…
Read More “Anti-Drilling Group Sues PA over Budget and $ from State Leases”
Industrywide Issues | Ohio | Pennsylvania | Pipelines | Regulation | Statewide OH | Statewide PA

Commerce Dept Slaps Foreign Countries for Steel Pipe Dumping
July 14, 2014July 14, 2014

MDN has kept an eye on the developing story of foreign countries–particular South Korea–“dumping” cheap steel pipes in the U.S., pipes used in the shale drilling industry (see US Senators Join Chorus: “Illegal” Steel Pipe Dumping by S Korea and “Dumping” Leads to 177 Jobs Lost at PA Marcellus Pipeline Plant). Seems that the Obama Commerce Department agrees and has taken decisive action to put an end to it. Last Friday the Commerce Department slapped a stiff tariff (i.e. tax) on tubular goods (steel pipes) coming in to the U.S. from South Korea and eight other countries…
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Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA | Taxation

PA Budget Signed by Gov. Corbett – No Severance Tax This Year
July 11, 2014July 11, 2014

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett, a Republican, signed a Republican-passed budget for the state yesterday. The budget, thankfully, does not include a Marcellus Shale severance tax. It does, however, include new regulations that separate drilling standards between conventional (vertical only) and unconventional (shale) drilling. MDN has long chronicled the battle by PA’s Democrats to transfer wealth from the drilling industry to PA schools, and in the process kill the goose laying the golden eggs in PA (see PPG Op-Ed: Don’t Kill the Marcellus Goose Laying the Golden Eggs). In signing the budget, Corbett axed a bunch of money from the legislature’s budget, which has led to a Republican civil war in Harrisburg…
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Industrywide Issues | Lease & Royalty Payments | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA

Court: PA’s Landlord & Tenant Act Doesn’t Apply to Oil/Gas Leases
July 11, 2014July 11, 2014

A Pennsylvania landowner signed an oil and gas lease on 98 acres and later sold part of that acreage to someone else. The someone else promptly filed a “quiet title action” making the argument that the lease is invalid because of the Landlord and Tenant Act of 1951. The quiet title action put a cloud on the title to the property and the whole thing ended up in court. PA Superior Court recently ruled that “no,” the lease is not invalid and not under the purview of the Landlord and Tenant Act. Our friends at top law firm Babst Calland break it down for us…
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Housing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA | Taxation

PA’s Act 13 Impact Fees Help Fund Affordable Housing
July 9, 2014July 9, 2014

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett’s office announced yesterday that since 2011, the PA Housing Affordability and Rehabilitation Enhancement Program (PHARE) has invested $49.8 million from natural gas and federal funding sources has been invested in housing initiatives by the Corbett administration to address housing needs created by the growing natural gas industry presence in Pennsylvania. Much of that money has come from Act 13 impact fees…
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Earthquakes | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA

PA DEP Considers New Rules to Prevent Earthquakes from Fracking
July 8, 2014July 8, 2014

The Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) has launched a “massive data mining project” to consider drafting new rules around induced seismicity–or the possibility that in rare circumstances fracking itself may cause low-level earthquakes. What seems to have caught the attention of the DEP is the assumption by their counterparts in Ohio, the Ohio Dept. of Natural Resources (ODNR), that a series of low-level earthquakes near the OH/PA border were in fact due to fracking operations being conducted by Hilcorp (see ODNR Says Youngstown Earthquakes “Probably” Caused by Fracking)…
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Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Pipelines | Statewide PA | Sunoco Logistics

Branding Squabble Among Sunoco Siblings over Mariner East Project
July 7, 2014July 7, 2014

For MDN, an interesting story in the Philadelphia Inquirer tackles the tricky issue of branding and the very visible brand of Sunoco. It seems Sunoco that sells you your gasoline at filling stations across the country is often confused with Sunoco Logistics, the company that builds pipelines, like the Mariner East pipeline. Mariner East would repurpose a pipeline that crosses the state of Pennsylvania from west to southeast and would deliver natural gas liquids, including propane, to the Marcus Hook refinery near Philadelphia. Mariner East has faced still opposition (see More Pushback from PA Residents on Proposed Mariner East Pipeline). Anti-drillers are trying to tarnish the Sunoco name and that has Sunoco the filling station company concerned…
Read More “Branding Squabble Among Sunoco Siblings over Mariner East Project”
Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA | Taxation

PA Rep’s Economic Illiteracy On Display re Severance Tax
July 3, 2014July 3, 2014

We have to wonder, is PA State Rep. Rosita C. Youngblood (Democrat from Philadelphia) actually brain dead? At a minimum she’s an economic ignoramus, understanding 0% about economics and business and what it takes to make a successful business. Youngblood had the temerity (stupidity?) to write an editorial for the Philadelphia Weekly Press in which she says casinos in the state are taxed 55% of all money that passes through their hands, and therefore a measly 5% (or even 10%) severance tax on shale drilling is peanuts. Uh, Ms. Youngblood, have you ever heard of the concept of risk in business? Or profit?… Read More “PA Rep’s Economic Illiteracy On Display re Severance Tax”
Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA

Federal Court Dismisses Doctor Lawsuit re Act 13 “Gag Rule”
July 2, 2014July 2, 2014

The lawsuit brought by seven selfish towns against Pennsylvania’s Act 13 drilling law has had more twists and turns than a back road in the Pocono Mountains. The litigious towns, plus a doctor, sued over various provisions in the Act 13 law. The towns didn’t like being told they couldn’t zone drilling out of existence within their borders, and the doctor didn’t like being told he couldn’t blab drillers’ trade secrets all over the place. So it went to PA’s Supreme Court and they ruled in favor of the towns, but sent parts of the lawsuit back to a lower court, including the doctor’s portion (see Act 13 Goes Back to Lower Court, Disturbing Comments from Judge). A second lawsuit was filed by a different doctor along the same lines (so-called “gag rule”)…
Read More “Federal Court Dismisses Doctor Lawsuit re Act 13 “Gag Rule””
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Research | Statewide PA

Yet Another “Natgas Worse than Coal” Study from Tony Ingraffea
July 2, 2014July 2, 2014

Our old friend Tony “shut all fracking down” Ingraffea, who happens to (still) hold a job teaching at Cornell University, is back with yet another “research study” that (surprise!) bashes fracking. Or more properly shale drilling. This time around Tony, who has a lucrative side job by gallivanting from anti-drilling meeting to anti-drilling meeting to spread the word that fracking is evil (see Cornell Hydraulic Fracturing Expert Headlines First Meeting of New York Residents Against Drilling (NYRAD) in Vestal, NY), says shale wells have a higher rate of failure in the cement casings in Pennsylvania and he can prove it. How?…
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Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA | Taxation

PA Budget Passes House & Senate with No Severance Tax
July 1, 2014July 1, 2014

Hats off to the Republican-controlled House and Senate in Pennsylvania. They passed a budget on time, before the midnight deadline last evening, and that budget contains just one new tax. Fortunately, it’s not a Marcellus Shale severance tax. So, kudos! However, the budget was not signed by PA Gov. Tom Corbett, also a Republican. He didn’t sign not because it because it didn’t include certain pension reforms he wants. One thing that the Democrats really wanted and the Republicans were only too happy to grant them: A new $2 per pack tax on cigarettes sold in Philadelphia, which is supposed to raise $80 million for Philly schools. Wait til they figure out everyone is fleeing to the suburbs to buy cheap cigs and the new tax fails!…
Read More “PA Budget Passes House & Senate with No Severance Tax”
Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Roads | Statewide PA | Supply Chain

Another Supply Chain Success Story: Flagger Force
July 1, 2014July 1, 2014

The ingenuity of small business people never ceases to amaze us–especially that of small businesses finding ways to serve, and profit from, the Marcellus and Utica Shale drilling industry. In business circles it’s called the “supply chain”–those companies who find ways of profiting from drilling. The latest company to do so is Flagger Force–a company based in Lancaster County, PA that sends out flaggers (to control traffic) in many surround states beside Pennsylvania. Flagger Force is also a major vendor for drillers in PA…
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Blue Ridge Mtn Res/Magnum Hunter | Energy Companies | Energy Services | GreenHunter Resources | Industrywide Issues | Ohio | Pennsylvania | Pipelines | Statewide OH | Statewide PA | Statewide WV | West Virginia

3 New (Short) Pipelines from GreenHunter in Tri-state Area
June 30, 2014June 30, 2014

GreenHunter Resources, a subsidiary of Magnum Hunter Resources, is making small moves to compete with MarkWest Energy and Williams. Today, GreenHunter announced they are building (in a partnership with Major Pipeline LLC) three new, short pipelines. The three pipelines represent a total of 34 miles of new pipeline, when added together. One pipeline each will be dedicated to brine/wastewater, fresh water, and condensate. Two of the pipelines will originate in southwestern PA and one in WV. All of them will connect with one of GreenHunter’s barge terminals on the Ohio River. Also in the mix is a condensate “splitter”…
Read More “3 New (Short) Pipelines from GreenHunter in Tri-state Area”
Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA

Another PA Senate Bill Seeks to Help Conventional O&G Drillers
June 30, 2014June 30, 2014

MDN recently reported on legislation making headway in Pennsylvania that would split regulations between conventional and unconventional oil and gas operators in the state (see PA Legislation to Split Conventional/Unconventional Regs Advances). A second PA Senate bill, SB1310, is also making its way through the legislative process. MDN views 1310 as a “helper bill” for SB1378. SB1310 would create a new group called the Pennsylvania Grade Crude Development Advisory Council that would be composed of 17 members (yes, it already sounds bloated) to “assist” the PA Secretary of the Dept. of Environment Protection. Assist the secretary with what?…
Read More “Another PA Senate Bill Seeks to Help Conventional O&G Drillers”