Dominion Energy | Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Pipelines | Westmoreland County
Dominion’s SWPA JP-40 Pipeline Replacement Project Set to Begin
We recently became aware of a small (very small) Dominion pipeline project in western PA while covering the news of another smallish Dominion pipeline (see PA DEP OKs Dominion Pipeline to Feed PA NatGas to OH Power Plant). The PA Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) recently issued a 401 certificate for the JP-40 Pipeline Replacement Project located in Salem, Hempfield, and Penn Townships, Westmoreland County.
Read More “Dominion’s SWPA JP-40 Pipeline Replacement Project Set to Begin”
A leftist anti-fossil group calling itself Protect PT, in Penn Township (Westmoreland County), PA, backed with money from Big Green groups, continues to sue in an effort to block shale drilling in the township. And they keep losing their lawsuits. In November the group lost an appeal of a lower court ruling which challenges a Penn Township ordinance allowing Apex Energy and Huntley & Huntley (now Olympus Energy) to drill and operate wells (see 
We’re always delighted to discover a new (for us) company involved in the supply chain–providing goods and/or services to the shale industry, including the downstream petrochemicals industry. Elliott Group is one of those companies not previously on our radar. Elliott’s U.S. headquarters is located in Westmoreland County, near Pittsburgh. The company designs, manufactures, and services turbomachinery, including centrifugal and axial compressors, steam turbines, and power recovery expanders. Elliott broke ground yesterday on a new facility in Jeannette where they will test their recently acquired product line of cryogenic pumps and expanders–equipment used in LNG plants.
In a speech delivered October 31 to the P4 Climate Action Summit in downtown Pittsburgh, Mayor Bill Peduto declared his hatred for the petrochemical industry. He doesn’t want any more Shell crackers junking up his regional backyard. The highly negative reaction to Peduto’s idiotic (and pandering) remarks was swift. What petchem company wants to build in a region where the mayor of its largest city is trash talking the industry? In a bid to counter Peduto’s economically damaging remarks, some 20 county officials from Allegheny, Beaver, Butler, Fayette, Greene, Lawrence, Mercer, Washington and Westmoreland counties issued a joint statement on Wednesday to show their support for the petrochemical and shale industries in the region.
A leftist anti-fossil group calling itself Protect PT, in Penn Township (Westmoreland County), PA, backed with big money from Big Green groups, continues to sue in an effort to block shale drilling in the township. And they keep losing their lawsuits. Protect PT has launched multiple challenges to a local Penn Township ordinance which allows Apex Energy and Huntley & Huntley to drill and operate wells.
A paid political activist who is not a doctor but works for the so-called Physicians for Social Responsibility (left wing group), told a hearing in Murrysville (Westmoreland County), PA on Wednesday that she could not prove fracking leads to negative health affects on those living near the activity, but in the very next breath she essentially said it does, saying there’s a “strong correlation” between fracking an ill health. Her proof? A list of Big Green-paid for “health studies” (propaganda campaigns).
We love happy endings, and this story has one. Despite claims by anti-fossil fuelers that the Tenaska Westmoreland Generating Station in southwestern PA would spread disease and death if it got built, it’s been up and running since last December–producing power and generating money for both its builders and the community–and everyone is just fine. Cue the Pete Seeger song “Where Have All the Flowers Gone?” and replace “Flowers” with “Antis”…
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.
In May MDN told you about a Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision that allows shale drilling to happen *anywhere* in a township, so long as such drilling satisfies standards to protect public health, safety and welfare (see 
The smear job Pittsburgh Post-Gazette propagandists Don Hopey and David Templeton began last week continues this week–an attempt to connect drill cuttings (leftover rock and dirt from drilling a hole in the ground) to “toxic” chemicals coming from a landfill in Westmoreland County where the drill cuttings are less than half of the dumped waste. The effluent–runoff from the landfill–is piped to a nearby sewage treatment facility in Belle Vernon for processing and discharge into the Mon River.
Last November the judges in Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court issued a ruling in favor of Penn Township (Westmoreland County) granting “special exception” permits to Apex Energy, allowing them to drill four shale wells (see 
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has just upheld a lower court opinion that allows shale drilling to happen *anywhere* in a township, so long as such drilling satisfies standards to protect public health, safety and welfare. This is the end of the road for a lawsuit funded by Big Green that began in 2015 in Westmoreland County, PA.
The Pennsylvania Dept. of Conservation and Natural Resources (DCNR) is grabbing more money that we think belongs to private landowners. This time from leasing land underneath the Youghiogheny River and Little Pine Creek. DCNR has leased 124.2 acres for a signing bonus of $496,800 (or $4,000 per acre). Plus the state’s customary royalty rate of 20% on anything produced. And no, the state does not allow post-production deductions–they get their full 20% royalty.