Chevron & People’s Natural Gas Team Up to Map Out PA’s $60B Future
One of the big announcements coming from Shale Insight 2017 on the first day was the release of a new study tag-team researched by Chevron Appalachia and People’s Natural Gas. As People’s CEO Morgan O’Brien explained it–everyone assumes “someone else” has a master plan, a statewide strategy for how to develop this phenomenal resource. But when you look around you come to the realization that no one has such a plan. So Chevron Appalachia CEO Stacey Olson approached People’s CEO O’Brien and asked for help to research and author a study that would provide such a plan–a plan to unlock what they believe is a $60 BILLION opportunity for Pennsylvania that will create 100,000 new jobs statewide. The result is a study called “Forge the Future: Pennsylvania’s Path To An Advanced, Energy-Enabled Economy” (full copy below), released yesterday. We now have, according to Chevron’s Olson and People’s O’Brien, the road map. What we need is for people in the industry to step up and seize the day and take action to create that amazing future…
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Last week MDN brought you the news that Ohio EPA’s director, Craig Butler, has kind of tipped over into the deep end with his rantings and ravings about Rover Pipeline (see 
Back in March MDN told you about an Ohio landowner with an old oil and gas lease where a conventional (vertical only) well was drilled–and still producing–suing the energy company, telling the company to either explore the shale layer, or severe the lease rights to shale so the landowner can lease it to someone who will go after the shale (see 
In early September, a Broome County, NY judge ruled that the Town of Fenton (Binghamton area) Planning Board did not take a hard enough look at environmental and traffic issues related to their approval of NG Advantage’s plan to construct a facility in the town to compress and load natural gas onto tractor trailers for delivery to regional customers who desperately need the gas–what is called a “virtual pipeline” (see 
Shale Support Holdings, which says it is a leading provider of frac sand and logistical solutions to the oil and gas proppant market (headquartered in Texas, with an operations center in Mississippi), is stepping up its presence in the Marcellus/Utica region with a partnership with Tidewater Logistics. The partnership will increase Shale Support’s operations in Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia. Because Shale Support can ship sand direct from Mississippi, which is much closer than most other alternatives, the price for frac sand will be cheaper for customers. Here’s the good news about a new partnership benefiting Marcellus/Utica drillers…
Eureka Midstream, which was once called Eureka Hunter (a subsidiary of Magnum Hunter Resources) popped back up on the radar screen earlier this month (see 
The “best of the rest” – stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading. In today’s lineup: OH rig count stands at 26; Sabine Pass LNG train 4 ready for service; Zinke says 1/3 of Interior staff disloyal to Trump (and the country); E&P profits shrink in Q1; crude by rail could hamper future pipeline investment; Exxon Mobil replaced by Russia’s Gazprom as world’s biggest energy firm; China continues to invest heavily in LNG; and more!
Some big news that both Cabot Oil & Gas and the two families suing them seem to want to keep quiet: they’ve settled out of court. Brief background for those new to MDN and to the “Dimock” story: There were 14 families along the Carter Road area of Dimock Township, PA (Susquehanna County) that reportedly experienced turbidity in their water from methane migrating, supposedly from Cabot’s drilling operations nearby. The state Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) investigated in 2010 and declared Cabot guilty and imposed stiff fines and requirements, including a requirement to install permanent water treatment systems at each home and even an offer to each of the families to pay twice what their property was worth at the time (see 
Reuters ran a story yesterday quoting an analyst with Tudor Pickering who says he thinks Chesapeake Energy is actively considering a sale of some (most? all?) of its Marcellus and Utica Shale assets, as a way of helping raise $2-$3 billion which the company previously said it would raise from asset sales this year and next. Idle speculation? Perhaps. There’s no doubt Chesapeake has a real jewel in its Utica and Marcellus acreage–built by Aubrey McClendon back in the day. Would Chessy really consider selling it? The Tudor analyst says yes, because these days the company is concentrating on oil drilling and production more than gas. But is that really true?…
Yesterday we brought you the “Top 10” drillers in southwestern Pennsylvania, as ranked by the number of permits issued (see 
Two serial, paid protesters, along with a landowner and her daughter have sued Sunoco Logistics and parent company Energy Transfer for breaching their constitutional rights. You may recall our story about the daughter of a Huntingdon County, PA landowner, radicalized by Big Green groups (as evidenced by her association with well known protesters previously arrested), who took to a tree on her mom’s property in March 2016 in order to illegally stop crews working on tree clearing for the Mariner East 2 pipeline (see 
Last week MDN told you about a visit by Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf to Wyoming and Susquehanna counties in northeastern PA (see 
The good news is that any number of severance tax proposals in Pennsylvania are still “stalled” and going nowhere fast. The bad news is that there still is not a finalized budget. Republicans have no one to blame but themselves. They passed an unbalanced, whopping $32 billion state budget plan months ago–without a way to pay for it all. Which has set up extreme pressure to adopt new taxes, including a severance tax and gross receipts tax. It appears that the GRT is dead, but the severance tax is not yet totally dead. Why? Because House Speaker Mike Turzai continues to hold the line–preventing a floor vote on the severance tax. Pin a medal on that man! Elect him as your next governor! He knows how to lead. However, since the severance tax is not totally dead (yet), we feel it’s necessary to keep talking about it. We’ve heard from some MDN readers who ask, “Why not adopt a small severance tax? It’s not all that bad, is it?” Yes! It is bad! And the Commonwealth Foundation (of PA) tells us why…
Over the past few years MDN has tracked the progress of 4 LNG export plants planned for the eastern shore of Nova Scotia. Two of those projects appear to have life–the Bear Head LNG project (
For years Hollywood celebrities and those who want to be celebrities have lied and spread fake news about fracking. Some of the more colorful attempts have come from the likes of the singularly untalented Julian Lenon and stepmom Yoko Ono “singing” (if that’s what you call it) the song “Don’t Frack My Mother” (see