PA Anti-Drilling Auditor General Bashes Impact Fee Spending
Since he assumed office in 2013, Auditor General Eugene DePasquale has had a chip on his shoulder when it comes to the Marcellus Shale (see Newly Elected PA Auditor General Targets DEP First Day on Job). He put together a sham report on the DEP, calling attention to “problems” fixed years earlier, before he assumed office (see DEP to DePasquale: Problems Fixed Years Ago, Where Have You Been?). He couldn’t discredit the Marcellus industry via the DEP, so he started on a new track–the millions of dollars raised in a severance tax-like fee called the impact fee (see PA Auditor General to Investigate “Lost” $30M Marcellus Impact Fee). In March 2016 DePasquale announced he will conduct a thorough anal exam, er, a, audit of all Act 13 impact fee money distributed to towns and municipalities (see PA Auditor General Commits to Half-an-Audit of Shale Impact Fee $). At the time we pointed out that 60% of the impact fee revenue raised goes to local towns and municipalities where drilling occurs, but the other 40% goes into the black hole of politicians’ sticky fingers in Harrisburg. If DePasquale doesn’t audit the other 40%, he’s only done half-an-audit. DePasquale has released his biased audit and yep, he didn’t bother to look at the 40% being spent by his cronies in Harrisburg–he only concentrated on the money going to local governments. And even then he didn’t find much, but he’s conflated it into a big press release and his sycophants in the media are regurgitating it with damning headlines…
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We spotted an article on the topic of forced pooling in Pennsylvania. Forced pooling is always an interesting topic for MDN. However, it was not pooling, but the article’s details on three southwestern counties in PA that really caught our attention. According to the author (in quoting two geology experts), Allegheny County (i.e. Pittsburgh), along with nearby Washington and Greene counties are located in the “core of the core” or the very best of the very best parts of the Marcellus Shale play. The article also references research by Range Resources which says Allegheny and Washington counties have the “highest in-place gas reserves not only in the Appalachian Basin but ‘perhaps the world’.” Yikes! That’s pretty enthusiastic language about the gas supplies trapped under Pittsburgh and surrounding areas–and great news for landowners in those counties…
Calling all vendors (i.e. supply chain companies) and workers who want a piece of the action in building the Dominion’s $5 billion, 594-mile Atlantic Coast Pipeline–a natural gas pipeline that will stretch from West Virginia through Virginia and into North Carolina. Dominion is currently holding in-person “construction expos,” as well as hosting an online form for those where those with an interest in selling to or working for the project can register that interest. Yesterday Dominion held a construction expo in Bridgeport, WV. Today they’re holding one in Elkins, WV. And over the next week or so they will hold more construction expos–across Virginia and even in North Carolina. Dominion is looking for suppliers for things like gravel and concrete, vehicles, construction supplies, welding and more. Here’s the low-down on how you can sign up to help build the Atlantic Coast Pipeline…
On Monday MDN reported that the future site for an ethane cracker in Belmont County, OH is now cleared and ready for construction to begin (see 
As we do every month, MDN tracks how many rigs oilfield services company Patterson-UTI Energy reports operating–as a proxy for when/if the drop in rig counts for the Marcellus/Utica will turn around. Patterson operates a number of rigs in the northeast, as well as other areas of the continental United States (and Canada). Month by month Paterson’s rig count has declined over the past year plus–until June (see 
All seven members of the Bowling Green City Council (Wood County) unwisely voted to reject an offer from Spectra Energy’s NEXUS Pipeline to lease 4 acres of city-owned land for the pipeline. Why unwise? Because the project is close to receiving its final federal approval, which will give it the right to use eminent domain to use the land anyway (see 
In June Talen Energy announced that one of its coal-burning electric generating plants, located in Montour County, PA, will get an upgrade to burn natural gas in addition to burning coal (see 
PDC Energy, a driller in the Wattenberg Field in Colorado and the Utica in Ohio, paused their Utica drilling program in 2015 (see 
Contrary to the assurances of charlatans like Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey who tells us new natural gas pipelines are not needed, New England is once again looking down the throat of potential electricity shortages this winter–if we have another winter like that of 2013/2014. ISO New England Inc. (ISONE), the electrical grid operator in the region, issued a statement last week to say they are implementing a 2016-17 Winter Reliability Program to guard against potential electricity shortages because there’s not enough natural gas in the region to power electric plants if much of that gas is also heating homes and businesses on cold days. According to ISONE, “Electricity supplies should [not a reassuring word] be sufficient to meet consumer demand for electricity in New England this winter.” They then go on to say, “but constraints on the region’s natural gas pipelines could pose a challenge to reliable operations.” In other words, if it gets really cold and snowy, we’re screwed. So, to fend off that screwing, ISONE has devised a program to load up on oil, of all things, and LNG, to help produce electricity if natgas runs short. Don’t say we haven’t repeatedly warned New England that without new pipelines they will not only continue to pay 4x what everyone else pays for electricity, at some point there just won’t be enough fuel sources to produce electricity and sooner or later New England will have brownouts and/or rolling blackouts–because THEY’RE FOOLS and continue to reject safe, reliable natural gas pipelines…
And so it begins. So-called “reporters” who are either too stupid or too lazy to examine important issues closely, like the issue of paid, out-of-state protesters who descended on Standing Rock, ND and have engaged in multiple lawless acts, are now beginning to hold up Standing Rock as the model for how to defeat important oil and gas infrastructure projects in the Marcellus/Utica region. The editorial writer(s) at the Delaware County Daily Times has deigned to compare Standing Rock and the temporary block on completing it by the politicized Obama Administration to the Mariner East 2 NGL pipeline slated to be built across Pennsylvania. The writer(s) express their hope to see the lawless criminals from Standing Rock to “pop up here if and when construction on Mariner East 2 begins.” You see why the newspaper industry in this country is crashing and burning? Because of such blatant bias and misstatements of fact (i.e. lies)…
In May, U.S.-based oilfield services company FMC Technologies announced they will merge with their much larger quasi-competitor, France-based Technip, in an all-stock deal that will create a new company called TechnipFMC worth $13 billion (see