Marcellus Drilling News

Industrywide Issues | Research

Change Coming This Week in How EIA Reports NatGas Storage Data
November 17, 2015November 17, 2015

It may sound dry as unbuttered toast, but the issue of natural gas storage is a serious business. So serious that the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) tracks natural gas storage each week (see Weekly Natural Gas Storage Report). Natural gas traders, buyers and sellers all watch the numbers closely. As we’ve told you over the years, natural gas is about as pure of a commodity as you can get. It is a classic supply and demand kind of business. The more supply you have (as indicated by how much gas is in storage), without corresponding demand–the lower the price goes. We are, as of right now, hitting record storage levels at this point in the year. That means the price of gas isn’t going higher any time soon. There is an important change coming in the way the EIA reports storage data. Beginning this Thursday, Nov. 19, the EIA will move from reporting storage data in three regions in the U.S. to reporting it in five regions…
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Best of the Rest

Marcellus & Utica Shale Story Links: Tue, Nov 17, 2015
November 17, 2015November 17, 2015

The “best of the rest” – stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading. In today’s lineup: Is Magnum Hunter resource play model still valid; Greenlight Capital’s “best idea” is CONSOL Energy investment; OH Supreme Court hears Dorman Minerals case today; OH lawsuits seek class action against Chesapeake; gas distributors oppose TGP 300 looping project; PGW explores LNG business; antis fight pipeline in Danbury, CT; shale puts a ceiling on oil prices; and more!
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Energy Services | Ethane | Industrywide Issues | Odebrecht | Processing Plants | West Virginia | Wood County

Odebrecht’s WV Ethane Cracker Plant May Not be Dead After All
November 16, 2015November 16, 2015

Wait a minute! We thought the proposed Odebrecht ethane cracker plant near Parkersburg in Wood County, WV was all but dead. Lifeless. In April the company said it was “re-evaluating plans” to build it (see Odebrecht Pushes the Pause Button on WV Ethane Cracker). In June, Odebrecht’s Brazilian CEO was arrested, casting further doubt on the project (see Odebrecht CEO Arrested; What Does it Mean for WV Cracker Plant?). Since that time we’ve seen a bit of cheerleading and some empty platitudes from WV Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin who hasn’t given up on the project (see WV Gov Tomblin Continues to Cheerlead for Wood Co. Cracker Plant). But we didn’t detect a pulse. Both the Shell cracker (in PA) and PTT Global cracker (in OH) have had robust developments that indicate those plants are making serious progress. But nothing for the Odebrecht project all year long–that is, until now…
Read More “Odebrecht’s WV Ethane Cracker Plant May Not be Dead After All”
Industrywide Issues | Jobs | Sand/Proppant

Some Shale Drillers Shutting Down from Thanksgiving to New Year
November 16, 2015November 16, 2015

It looks like there’s a slowdown coming for many drillers in the Utica/Marcellus. Strike that–more like a stoppage, we’ve already seen a slowdown. The stoppage for some (not all) drillers will happen between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day when some drillers, according to two different proppant companies, will stop drilling, giving their workers a forced “holiday” at the worst time of the year–the holidays. Both Fairmont Santrol, a frac sand provider headquartered in Chesterland, OH, and Carbo Ceramics, which manufactures and sells ceramic beads as an alternative to frac sand (headquartered in Houston, TX) recently indicated drillers will put on the breaks in the fourth quarter. They should know–they’re the ones who get the orders months in advance. Here’s what they said…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Energy Companies | Indiana County | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Pennsylvania General Energy | Regulation | Wastewater

Anti Group CELDF Won’t Help Grant Twp Pay $1M Judgement
November 16, 2015November 16, 2015

Question: How will Grant Township (Indiana County, PA), a town with 741 people in it, pay a lawsuit it may lose awarding Pennsylvania General Energy (PGE) $1 million? Going by the law of averages, less than half of the 741 people actually pay taxes (the other half are welfare slugs). So the question is, how can something like 200 families come up with enough money to pay such a large lawsuit? Answer: they can’t. The town goes bankrupt. That is the very real situation facing the residents of Grant Township. You may recall we’ve written about this before. Grant tried to block PGE from building a wastewater injection well in the township by passing an illegal law stirred up and proposed by the odious Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund, or CELDF (see Fed Judge Overturns Grant Twp, PA Ban on Injection Wells). The town has now tried to reorganize in order to avoid the judge’s ruling (see Grant Twp, PA Reorganizes to Avoid a Court-Ordered Injection Well). PGE has sued the town claiming (truthfully) they’ve suffered at least $1 million in damages. That case goes to trial in March. If the town loses, the town pays. The cowardly CELDF has admitted they won’t contribute a penny toward the $1 million fine if the case goes against the town. Nice friends the people of Grant have made in the CELDF, wouldn’t you say?…
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Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA | Taxation

PA LibDems Turn On/Attack Wolf Over No Severance Tax Budget
November 16, 2015November 16, 2015

Must be Pennsylvania’s liberal Democrats, like those in the Harrisburg Patriot-News news room, thought Tom Wolf was the Second Coming of Barack Hussein Obama. They actually thought that Wolf could jam huge tax increases, including a Marcellus Shale severance tax, down the throats of PA Republicans in the state legislature. Somehow (thank the Good Lord) Republicans grew a spine and resisted the withering pressure and harassment of Dems and their media organs, including the Patriot-News. So we thought is noteworthy (and funny) when the editorial board at the Patriot-News essentially turned on one of their own, Tom Wolf, and threw him and his budget deal with Republicans under the bus…
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Industrywide Issues | Lease & Royalty Payments | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA

PA Superior Court Rules on 2nd Important Surface/Mineral Rights Case
November 16, 2015November 16, 2015

We have a second important Pennsylvania Superior Court case decision to bring you in less than a month. Last month we told you about Wright v. Misty Mountain Farm LLC, a case with implications for all land and mineral rights owners in PA (see PA Superior Court Rules on Important Surface/Mineral Rights Case). Another case decided Nov. 6, Northern Forests II, Inc. v. Keta Realty Company, also has big implications for rights owners. In the Northern Forests case (full copy below), the surface rights owner (Northern Forests) claimed they should also own the subsurface rights due to a legal principal called adverse possession. In reviewing the case, a PA trial court found the original case from 1989 awarding Northern Forests the mineral rights, was in error–the rights revert back to the original rights owners. PA Superior Court agreed and upheld the decision. Here’s the low down from legal beagles at McGuireWoods, the attorneys for Keta Realty, the winner in the case…
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Energy Companies | Hess

Hess COO Sells $540K of Company Stock
November 16, 2015November 16, 2015

From time to time we tell you about so-called “insider selling” or “insider buying”–by which we mean someone in top management or on the board of directors is buying or selling stock in the company for which they work. We’ve just had another instance. In September, first a Hess board member John H. Mullin III purchased $381,430 worth of company stock (see Hess Board Member Buys 7K Shares, Now Owns $3.2M in Hess Stock), then Hess CEO John Hess bought a whopping $7.5 million worth of company stock (see Hess CEO John Hess Buys 144K Shares of Co. Stock for $7.5M). Now we get word that Hess COO Greg Hill has just sold $540,180 worth of stock…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | New York | Pipelines | Westchester County

Radical Bishop Finds Religion in Protesting Algonquin Pipeline
November 16, 2015November 16, 2015

It grieves us when we see someone misuse religion as an excuse to promote–or oppose–a purely political ideology. Such is the case with a retired Episcopal bishop from Westchester County, NY who claims a higher power blesses his opposition to expanding a natural gas pipeline that will bring carbon-lowering, clean burning natural gas to millions of people in the northeast. The bishop is really nothing more than just another 60s hippie radical trading on the good name of the church. Bishop George Packard, previously arrested for being an Occupy Wall Street anti-capitalist protester, was recently arrested for illegally blocking access to a construction site where Spectra Energy workers are working on the Algonquin Incremental Market (AIM) project to expand capacity of the Algonquin Gas Transmission natural gas pipeline to flow more Marcellus/Utica gas to northeast markets. Apparently Bishop Packard feels that God would have him block cheap, clean burning gas, lowering the bills for millions of people and making their lives here on earth a little better. What explains this apparent defection from loving God to loving political ideology instead?…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | CNG/LNG | Industrywide Issues | New York | Regulation | Statewide NY

The Incredibly (Stupid) Hulk Praises Cuomo for Port Ambrose Veto
November 16, 2015November 16, 2015

Last Friday MDN told you that New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo had once again bowed to political pressure from his lunatic left and vetoed a proposed off-shore LNG import facility called Port Ambrose (see NY Gov. Cuomo Vetoes Port Ambrose LNG Import Terminal). Not having much to do between Avengers movies, Mark Ruffalo (who plays Bruce Banner/Incredible Hulk) occupies his time by making the rounds at small anti-fracking protest rallies where adoring fans as vapid as he is engage in sickening hero worship–believing a professional liar (i.e. actor) actually knows something about fracking and should be believed. Hearing of Cuomo’s veto of the Port Ambrose project–a project that would have imported non-fracked gas from Trinidad, potentially displacing fracked Marcellus gas–Ruffalo issued the following statement from his Americans Against Fracking organization praising Cuomo…
Read More “The Incredibly (Stupid) Hulk Praises Cuomo for Port Ambrose Veto”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Ohio | Statewide OH

Here Comes Another “National Day of Action” Against Fracking
November 16, 2015November 16, 2015

Get ready. Here it comes! Throngs of anti-drillers rising up to show their opposition to clean-burning natural gas. Break out the tie dye psychedelic shirts and hippie beads. It’s time to protest, maaan. Dig it! It’s like, whoa, tomorrow is “Freedom From Toxic Fracking Waste and Earthquakes: A National Day of Action.” Here’s our prediction: There will be two or three protest locations with about dozen people each–most of them hippie has-beens. Nobody outside of Democrat media will even notice the so-called protests. Below is the call to protest, naming the nutter groups behind it (the usual suspects)…
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Alternative Energy | Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues

Hydropower Not “Green Enough” for Wacko Environmentalists
November 16, 2015November 16, 2015

Apparently wacko environmentalists don’t oppose just fossil fuels (including natural gas) because fossil fuels will “suppress” the growth of so-called renewables. Sometimes wacko environmentalists oppose their own precious renewable sources of energy. Self-loathing? Perhaps. Get this: Some enviros in New England are opposing hydropower that comes from Canada into New England because it comes via high-power transmission lines that don’t look pretty, and because (yes) it may mean other “favored” forms of so-called renewables, like ugly wind farms and unreliable solar, won’t develop as quickly. Hydro will stunt their growth. It’s silly and it’s sad–kind of like parents who favor one child over another. We bring you the story below for two reasons: (1) To point out the irrational, unreasoning and childish behavior of these so-called green supporters, and (2) to illustrate the folly of choosing which forms of energy people should/should not have the right to use. These wacko environmentalists think they’re smarter than you and know which forms of energy you should allow in your life…
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Best of the Rest

Marcellus & Utica Shale Story Links: Mon, Nov 16, 2015
November 16, 2015November 16, 2015

The “best of the rest” – stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading. In today’s lineup: Magnum Hunter considers bankruptcy; NRDC gang & fight against Exxon; Wolf’s “half a loaf” budget; Williamsport housing shortage from gas boom; Chesapeake drills a Rogersville test well; natgas bends carbon emissions curve; worst winter natgas prices since 2012; and more!
Read More “Marcellus & Utica Shale Story Links: Mon, Nov 16, 2015”
CNG/LNG | Industrywide Issues | New York | Regulation | Statewide NY

NY Gov. Cuomo Vetoes Port Ambrose LNG Import Terminal
November 13, 2015November 13, 2015

A rather abrupt end for an issue that was just getting started. Liberty Natural Gas filed a plan back in 2010, prior to the Marcellus Shale revolution, to construct an off-shore LNG import (not export) facility off the coast of New York and New Jersey–in the ocean. A floating LNG facility called the Port Ambrose project. A pipeline would run from the off-shore terminal to Jones Beach, NY and from there would connect to a Transco pipeline lateral. The U.S. Coast Guard recently gave their blessing to the project (see Coast Guard Approves Port Ambrose LNG Import Terminal Near NYC/NJ). Liberty has tried to sell the project to New York and New Jersey anti-drilling nutters by saying the gas would come from Trinidad and wouldn’t be that nasty, fracked gas loaded with radon (see Liberty Says “Non-Fracked” Trinidad Gas Better than Marcellus Gas). Needless to say that was a whopping error on Liberty’s part–to smear the entire drilling industry in a vain attempt to garner favor with Kool Aid drinking global warmers, just to make a buck. Liberty’s “it’s not fracked gas” rationale didn’t stop the antis–they were just beginning to organize with protests and rallies–their version of a tailgate party at an NFL game. And now New York Gov. Cuomo has gone and ruined it for them. Cuomo, with the stroke of a pen, has vetoed the project. It’s dead. Done. Finished. Won’t happen…
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Commodity Price | Economic Impact | Industrywide Issues

Exceptionalism: Why the Marcellus Stands Alone Among Shale Plays
November 13, 2015November 13, 2015

In a recent analysis of the shale oil and natural gas industry in the U.S., Reuters analyst John Kemp says that there are big differences in shale oil and shale gas when it comes to price. He posits that oil output will be “less resilient” than gas when it comes to maintaining profitability with lower prices. Kemp offers the following comments and rationale for why and how the Marcellus (and Utica) has changed the natural gas industry–what he called “Marcellus Exceptionalism”…
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Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Pipelines | Regulation | Statewide PA | Sunoco Logistics

Sunoco LP Fined $59K for Fixing Pipe Running Thru 7 Swamps
November 13, 2015November 13, 2015

Talk about damned if you do, damned if you don’t… Sunoco Logistics Partners needed to do maintenance (i.e. fix things) along the Mariner East 1 pipeline–an 80 year-old petroleum pipeline repurposed to flow natural gas liquids (NGLs). Some of the places where they need to fix it, the pipeline runs underground beneath a number of swamps–smelly, stagnant water where mosquitoes with West Nile virus breed. Today swamps are called “wetlands.” Go figure. Because Sunoco didn’t get a “Mother May I?” permit from the PA Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) before fixing the pipeline in seven swamps, the DEP has fined the company $59,000. No doubt if Sunoco had waited for permits issued in triplicate and didn’t fix the pipeline, something would have spilled and there would have been an even bigger fine (and lawsuit) for that! A real no-win situation…
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