Record Flows to LNG Plants Boost NatGas Price by 7.5% to $4.122
U.S. natural gas futures jumped 7.5% on Monday on record flows to liquefied natural gas (LNG) export plants and forecasts for higher demand over the next two weeks than previously expected. The amount of gas flowing to the eight big U.S. LNG export plants rose to an average of 15.8 Bcf/d so far in March, up from a record 15.6 Bcf/d in February, as new units at Venture Global’s 3.2-Bcf/d Plaquemines LNG export plant under construction in Louisiana entered service. Read More “Record Flows to LNG Plants Boost NatGas Price by 7.5% to $4.122”
OTHER U.S. REGIONS: The predictable outcome of California’s green energy policies is here; Why isn’t NH using US natural gas instead of Canadian?; NATIONAL: US DOE eases LNG bunkering restrictions; Refinery closures, rising consumption will reduce U.S. petroleum inventories; The climate cult turns to acid to save the planet; INTERNATIONAL: Crude futures plunge as OPEC+ revives supply; Trump’s tariffs threat hits Canada’s oil and gas drillers. 
For the fifth week in a row, the Baker Hughes U.S. rig count added rigs—the first time that has happened since May 2022. Last week, the count added a single new rig for a new total of 593. The national count remained in a tight range of 581-589 for much of last year. We’ve officially broken through that range. However, note that the national count is still 6% (36 rigs) below what it was last year at this time. As for the Marcellus/Utica, the rig count was a combined 35 last week, retaining a rig added in West Virginia two weeks ago. It just feels like the sun is shining again! 
The Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) published a notice in the March 1 Pennsylvania Bulletin announcing that the agency has approved an Air Quality Permit for a new cryptocurrency data center in Venango County, PA. Venango is in the northwestern part of the state. The permit was issued to a company we had not previously heard of: Nova Energy LLC. The data center will be located in Frenchcreek Township. 
Wow! Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro is an even bigger bully (and dunce) than we gave him credit for. He’s not only mean and vindictive, he’s energy suicidal. Shapiro is threatening the 12 other states (plus the District of Columbia) that belong to the PJM Interconnection, saying that he may cut them off from 25% of the electricity that powers the electric grid by pulling Pennsylvania out of PJM. PJM is a private organization that manages the grid for Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, and other states. To boost his visibility in a dying political party, Shapiro is playing with fire. 
The Democrat Party keeps digging their hole deeper and deeper. How defending corruption and graft and political payoffs will help their cause is a mystery for us. Our diagnosis is the party has had a collective psychotic break with reality. Two months ago, a video circulated on social media featuring a Biden EPA political appointee talking about “tossing gold bars off the Titanic,” intentionally rushing to get billions of tax dollars recklessly out of the agency before Inauguration Day. The EPA’s new sheriff, Lee Zeldin, located $20 billion of those gold bars sitting at a Citibank bank account (see 
The Reuters news agency, based in the U.K., is typically objective in its news coverage. It tilts to the left a bit, depending on the reporter. But overall we tend to trust most of its coverage. It’s certainly better than Bloomberg by a mile. However, when we saw the opening line of a Reuters article titled “Climate policy requires a more realistic approach,” we were blown away by its brutal honesty. Here’s the very first two sentences of the article: “The pursuit of net zero carbon emissions has been a resounding failure. Despite trillions of dollars spent on renewable energy, hydrocarbons still account for over 80% of the world’s primary energy and a similar share of recent increases in energy consumption, according to The Energy Institute.” Wow! 
For the week of Feb 17 – 23, the number of permits issued in the Marcellus/Utica to drill new shale wells fell back to earth. Three weeks ago, 24 new permits were issued. Two weeks ago, the number increased to 36 new permits. Last week the number deflated, going down to 14. The Keystone State (PA) issued six new permits last week, with all six going to Blackhill Energy for a single pad in Bradford County. 
Earlier this month U.S. District Judge Robert D. Mariani dismissed the Wayne Land and Mineral Group (WLMG) v. Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) lawsuit that argued the DRBC had “taken” the property rights of landowners in eastern Pennsylvania, robbing them of their right to allow shale drilling on and under their land. It’s a sad and bitter end for landowners in PA’s Wayne and Pike counties where there is bountiful Marcellus shale waiting to be extracted. 
Expand Energy, formed by the merger of Chesapeake Energy and Southwestern Energy, is the largest natural gas producer in the U.S. with approximately 1.9 million leased net acres. Expand drills and operates in three distinct regions: Northeast Appalachia (Pennsylvania), Southwest Appalachia (mostly West Virginia, but also Pennsylvania and Ohio), and the Haynesville (Louisiana). The company issued its fourth quarter and full-year update yesterday. In 4Q24, Expand operated an average of twelve rigs to drill 44 wells and turned 41 wells in line, resulting in net production of approximately 6.41 Bcfe per day (91% natural gas). 
In late 2022, MDN told you that Canadian-based Enerplus, with sizable non-operated assets in the northeast Pennsylvania Marcellus, had sold certain Canadian assets so it could concentrate most of its activity on drilling in the North Dakota Bakken (see 
Two weeks ago, MDN brought you the exciting news that President Trump pledged to get the long-dead Pennsylvania Marcellus to New York State Constitution Pipeline built (see 
After the shocking news in 2022 that then-U.S. Senator Joe Manchin (from West Virginia) 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 the bill (now law) really is for the oil and gas industry. First and foremost, it slapped a new methane tax on oil and gas activities (see 
Wow! What a difference 10 years and the election of Donald J. Trump can make. In May 2015, MDN reported that HSBC Bank (otherwise known as The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation) circulated a note to investors telling them they should divest from fossil fuel companies. HSBC said if they didn’t divest from fossil energy, they “may one day be seen to be late movers, on ‘the wrong side of history’”. We told you then that fossil fuel supporters should consider divesting from HSBC (see