Energy Services | Equitrans/EQT Midstream | Industrywide Issues | Pipelines | Regulation | Statewide WV | West Virginia
Clock Ticking to Pass Manchin’s Deal with Devil to Complete MVP
U.S. Senator Joe Manchin, from West Virginia, traded away the future of the country by supporting the misnamed Inflation Reduction Act (the remnants of the Green New Deal) in return for finishing the 303-mile Mountain Valley Pipeline along with a few other concessions for the oil and gas industry (see Joe Manchin Cuts MVP “Deal” in Return for Selling Out Country). Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi promised a vote on a “permitting reform” bill for Manchin in return for his IRA sellout. The permitting reform measure is supposed to get voted on by the end of September. Will it?
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In June, MDN brought you the news that Tug Hill was shopping its THQ Appalachia division (Tug Hill’s West Virginia assets) for $5 billion (see 
Last week the three states with active Marcellus/Utica drilling, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia, issued a collective 19 new drilling permits, down from 30 the week before. The top receiver of permits in PA was EQT (i.e. Rice Drilling), with five permits issued for the same well pad in Greene County. Range Resources and Inflection Energy each received two new permits.
In September 2021, the Weirton (WV) Zoning Board of Appeals rejected a request by Southwestern Energy to build a well pad inside city limits (see 
After the shocking news that U.S. Senator Joe Manchin had sold out his state and the entire country by agreeing to support the misnamed Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) bill, the details began to come out about just how bad this bill really is for the oil and gas industry. First and foremost, it slaps a new tax on oil and gas activities (see 
Antero Resources is one of the largest drillers in the Marcellus/Utica (with major assets in West Virginia). The company is the fifth largest natgas producer in the country and the second largest LNG exporter. It’s also one of our favorite Marcellus/Utica drillers. As good and careful as companies like Antero are when hiring, sometimes there’s a rotten apple found in the barrel. Such was the case with a former employee who headed up the company’s operations in WV–where most of its drilling happens. The former employee took bribes and kickbacks from a vendor over a period of years (2012-2015), steering contracts to that vendor. The vendor’s performance was not as good as other competitors. At the end of years of litigation, Antero has finally been awarded compensation from a jury, and a bit extra from a judge, to make up for the actions of their rogue employee.
We’ve heard from a few MDN subscribers who think we’re being too hard on Joe Manchin and his sellout of the country in return for finishing the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) project. We don’t think so. The one thing everyone agrees on, those who support Manchin and the many of us who do not: It’s time to finish MVP…now.
Apparently, Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf told a fib on Feb. 1 of this year when he said PA had received an initial $25 million cash infusion from the federal government’s new (so-called) infrastructure law for use in plugging orphaned and abandoned oil and gas wells (see 
The 303-mile Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) project from Wetzel County, WV, to Pittsylvania County, VA, announced in 2014, was supposed to be completed in 2018 and cost $3.5 billion. The project builder, Equitrans Midstream, now says MVP, which is 94% complete, should be done by the end of 2023 at a staggering cost of $6.6 billion. What happened between 2014 and today is that Big Green groups, many of which use foreign funding (from countries like Russia), have repeatedly challenged the project. Complicit and colluding judges have placed roadblocks in the way, preventing MVP from finishing. Given the ongoing opposition from the radical left, MVP asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) in June to extend the time to complete the project until October 2026, just in case. On Tuesday, FERC granted MVP’s request.
U.S. Senator Joe Manchin, in an interview with the Associated Press, attempts to come off as the reasonable, middle-of-the-road, aw-shucks guy who sticks up for what he believes is right and the good of West Virginians. Don’t fall for it. He was pressured by the wackadoodle left in the Democrat Party, and he folded like a cheap suit. Manchin deserves to be voted out of office the instant that opportunity arises. We’re talking, of course, of Manchin’s betrayal of fossil energy through his support for one of the most destructive pieces of legislation that has passed since Joe Biden began to occupy the White House–the so-called Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), better known as the Green New Deal (aka Build Back Better). Manchin’s betrayal has profound consequences for fossil energy in this country.
A recent survey commissioned by the Gas and Oil Association of West Virginia Inc. (GO-WV) found that 81% of West Virginians support natural gas and oil drilling in the state. That is a staggering, overwhelming majority! Nearly as many (close to 80%) favor policies that increase domestic oil and gas drilling and the completion of pipeline projects, in order to ease inflation. Some 52% of West Virginians ranked inflation as the most important issue facing the state (the top vote-getter). Although the survey results don’t mention it, we wonder how many West Virginian’s are disappointed with Sen. Manchin for his role in increasing inflation with the recent Big Green bill (aka Inflation Reduction Act) signed into law with the help of Manchin?