Using FOIA, Antis Discover 2 Minor Infractions by Rover in WV
Anti-fossil fuel activists attempting to stop the unstoppable Rover Pipeline are doing their best to smear and prejudice people against the project. Rover has had its share of problems. We’ve chronicled those problems–like leaking 2 million gallons of drilling mud in Ohio when performing underground horizontal directional drilling (see Rover Pipeline Accident Spills ~2M Gal. Drilling Mud in OH Swamp). The company also had problems with water filling up trenches dug for the pipeline when severe rain hit (see OEPA & Rover at Odds Over Storm Water Runoff, “Fine” Now $714K). Rover also had problems in West Virginia. The WV Dept. of Environmental Protection to stop work in two of four counties after storm water runoff/erosion issues there (see WV DEP Orders Rover to Stop Pipe Construction in 2 of 4 Counties). The stop work order was lifted after a few weeks. Antis, using the Freedom of Information Act, have “discovered” that Rover was cited for similar issues in two other counties. However, WVDEP and Rover worked it out and resolved those issues…
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The West Virginia Public Service Commission will host a public hearing tomorrow on a proposed power plant in Brooke County, WV. The 750-megawatt Marcellus-fired electric plant will be built by Energy Solutions Consortium–the father and son team of Andrew and Matthew Dorn (based in Buffalo, NY). The Dorns are currently building another gas-fired plant–in Marshall County (see 
The West Virginia Legislature has appointed a new Joint Committee on Natural Gas Development, composed of Senators and Delegates, to put their collective heads together to see how they can encourage more oil and gas development in the Mountain State. The committee will meet tomorrow for the first time. The effort is being supported by the West Virginia Oil and Natural Gas Association (WVONGA). In general, it certainly seems like a good idea–WV needs more drilling. However, WVONGA plans to use the committee as a platform to push its “modernized mineral efficiency laws”–i.e. forced pooling lite. As we reported last week, WVONGA is making an all-out push for new forced pooling laws in 2018 (see 
Carbon Natural Gas Company, through its affiliate Carbon Appalachian Company, teased in a press release issued yesterday that the company has just completed the acquisition of “natural gas producing properties and related facilities” located “predominantly in the State of West Virginia” for $21.5 million. The release does not identify the seller–but MDN believes we know who it is: Cabot Oil & Gas. We supply our evidence below. Carbon Natural Gas is an independent oil and gas exploration and production company (i.e. “driller”) that owns, operates and develops oil and gas properties in the Appalachian, Illinois and Ventura Basin areas of the U.S. Most of the wells they own and operate are conventional. However, in April the company began dipping its toe into unconventional shale as well (see 
It’s not often these days we come across a story that mentions a new lease signed, and the amount of money paid as a signing bonus. Such is the case in Ohio County, WV. The Wheeling Park High School has just signed a lease with Southwestern Energy for $3,500 per acre for 66 acres–giving the school district $231,000 of newly found revenue, thanks to the Marcellus/Utica industry. No drilling equipment will be placed on or near school property. When the drilling eventually happens UNDER the school, and the wells begin to flow, Wheeling Park High School will then get more revenue–18% royalties on all gas produced…
In January MDN told you that Italian company Pietro Fiorentini had signed paperwork to buy land to build a $9 million factory in Weirton, WV (see 
Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) is not taking a ludicrous, outrageous lawsuit by anti-pipeline residents from West Virginia and Virginia lying down. They are fighting mad as recent court filings show. MVP is a $3.5 billion, 301-mile pipeline that will run from Wetzel County, WV to the Transco Pipeline in Pittsylvania County, VA. A lawsuit was filed in federal court at the end of July to block the MVP project (see 
The West Virginia Oil & Natural Gas Association (WVONGA) plans to push, once again, for what MDN calls forced pooling lite in the next session of the legislature scheduled for early 2018. Forced pooling legislation in West Virginia has been put forward five times in the past seven years–and each time it has failed to win enough votes in the WV legislature. This year, WVONGA changed tactics and renamed forced pooling as co-tenancy and joint development (see 
Of the three Marcellus/Utica producing states–Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia–only WV reports well production on an annual basis. Not frequent enough! In July WV published production numbers for 2016. The exciting news is that on average, initial production (IP) of Marcellus/Utica shale wells surged 20% over 2015. IP is the amount of gas (or oil or NGLs) flowing from a well. However, when you dig into the numbers, you learn that IP rates did not go up universally across the state. Some counties had big increases, other counties went the other way. The same with drillers. Some drillers (like Antero) saw a big bump up in average IP rates. Other’s (like Southwestern Energy) saw a dip in IP rates from 2015 to 2016…
As MDN has previously reported, Mountaineer XPress Pipeline includes 165 miles of new pipeline with approximately 2.7 billion cubic feet (Bcf) per day of transportation capacity from existing and future points of receipt along or near the Columbia pipeline system–most of it located in West Virginia (see 
Yesterday the American Petroleum Institute (API) released a new study showing that the natural gas and oil industry supported 10.3 million U.S. jobs and added $1.3 trillion to the nation’s economy in 2015. The study, “Impacts of the Natural Gas and Oil Industry on the US Economy in 2015” (full copy below) found that jobs supported by the o&g industry increased by half a million since 2011, and showed that all 50 states, whether producing or non-producing, continued to benefit from the o&g industry. The study was conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) and commissioned by API. Yes, it’s an industry-funded study. But hey, if we don’t do the research and toot our own horn, you can be sure anti-fossil fuelers won’t do it for us! This is solid, no-nonsense (and real) economic research. We thought it would be interesting to look at the impact of the o&g industry in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia–the only three states producing Marcellus and Utica Shale gas and oil. Yes, each of those states still has a thriving conventional o&g industry as well and conventional numbers are part of the study–but let’s be honest. The unconventional (shale) sector dwarfs production of the conventional sector. When you look at o&g’s impact in our region, you find that it created 322,600 jobs in PA, 262,800 jobs in OH, and 70,900 jobs in WV. Value added (economic impact) for each state was: $44.4 billion in PA, $37.9 billion in OH, and $8 billion in WV. Add them all together and you get roughly 656,000 jobs and $90 billion of economic contribution in 2015. From one industry–oil and gas. WE LOVE FOSSIL FUELS!…
When a state produces more energy than it consumes, that state is a net energy “supplier” (or exporter). States consume energy in the form of oil, gas, coal and electricity, primarily. They produce energy in the same way. Our favorite government agency, the U.S. Energy Information Administration, recently released State Energy Data System estimates for net energy supply, state by state, from 1960-2015. Their analysis found that currently, for the year 2015, some 12 states produced more primary energy than they consumed, while 38 states and the District of Columbia were net recipients of energy. Among the state producing more than they consume, two of the top five are Marcellus Shale states: Pennsylvania and West Virginia. PA’s net supplier status is due mostly to the rise of the Marcellus. In the case of WV, the state still is a big coal producer, but it is the Marcellus that lifts the state into the column of net energy supplier…
In February the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issued a draft final environmental impact statement (DEIS) for two important pipeline upgrades to carry more Marcellus/Utica gas to southern markets–Mountaineer XPress and Gulf XPress (see 
In June, a group of radical “environmental” organizations filed a lawsuit in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit against the West Virginia Dept. of Environmental Protection–for doing their job (see 
The heads of both WVONGA (West Virginia Oil and Natural Gas Association) and IOGA WV (Independent Oil and Gas Association of West Virginia) teamed up to write a column in the Charleston Gazette-Mail by touting (defending?) Antero Resources’ Clearwater Facility–a $275 million frack wastewater recycling facility due to go online later this year. WVONGA and IOGA WV use the Clearwater Facility as evidence of the industry’s efforts at becoming more “green” (environmentally friendly) year in and year out. They point out that our air is getting cleaner, and our water is getting cleaner too. Last fall Antero responded to so-called environmentalists who were criticizing the facility (see