Marcellus Drilling News

Ethane | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Processing Plants | Washington County

Thailand & Japan Partner to Build 3rd Big Marcellus Ethane Cracker
September 29, 2014September 29, 2014

Word has leaked out that Thailand’s largest chemical company–Bangkok-based PTT Global Chemical–and Japan’s fifth largest general trading company/conglomerates–Tokyo-based Marubeni Corp.–have formed an alliance and are actively looking to build an ethane cracker plant in the Marcellus/Utica region. The first such ethane cracker was announced by Shell in 2012, to be located in Beaver County, PA. The second was announced last year by Odebrecht, targeted to be built in Parkersburg, WV. We also recently told you about a “baby cracker”–a much smaller version of an ethane cracker coming to Monroe County, OH (see Ohio to Get “Baby” Ethane Cracker Originally Slated for WV). The PTT/Marubeni cracker will be the third big/major cracker plant for the northeast–with the caveat “if built” (which applies to all of these projects). The word on the street is that PTT/Marubeni have been looking for nearly a year…
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Antero Resources | Energy Companies | Gulfport Energy | Hall Drilling | Hess | Monroe County | Ohio | Utica Shale

OH Utica Shale’s Most Productive Wells in 2Q14
September 29, 2014September 29, 2014

Recently released production numbers from the Ohio Dept. of Natural Resources (ODNR) show a bit of a surprise. The single most productive Utica Shale well during second quarter 2014 (April – June) was from one of the smallest drillers. A well drilled by Hall Drilling (headquartered in West Virginia) in Monroe County, OH produced 1.43 billion cubic feet of natural gas during 2Q14. Other top-producing wells were drilled by Gulfport Energy, Antero Resources and Hess. Here’s some numbers…
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Lease & Royalty Payments | Marshall County | Pleasants County | West Virginia | Wetzel County

WV Receives 4 Bids to Drill Under the Ohio River
September 29, 2014September 29, 2014

West Virginia doesn’t let any grass grow under their feet when it comes to the drilling industry. They are pro-drilling, by and large, and when they get an idea, they run with it. Latest example: Barely a month ago WV officials announced they will lease the land under portions of the Ohio River, to allow Marcellus/Utica drilling (see State of WV Looks to Lease Area Under Ohio River for Drilling). Last Friday they opened bids from four different drillers. Here’s what they found…
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Energy Companies | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Range Resources Corp | Regulation | Washington County | Wastewater

Did DEP Mishandle Range Wastewater Impoundment Investigation?
September 29, 2014September 29, 2014

Range Resources has had a long-running dispute with some of the neighbors near some of it’s wastewater impoundments in Washington, PA. Without recounting the details (see MDN’s previous stories here), the entire thing came to a head recently when the PA Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) completed their investigation and fined Range the highest amount any driller has paid so far in the modern shale drilling era (see PA DEP Fines Range Resources $4.15M for Wastewater Impoundments). Part of the deal is that Range is closing those impoundments. There are, of course, legal actions involved, as you might expect. One of the neighbors near the Yeager impoundment sued Range with claims of well water contamination from chemicals leaking from the impoundment. The DEP determined the landowner’s well was not contaminated by the Range impoundment and the landowner challenged that finding in DEP’s version of court, the Environmental Hearing Board. Testimony at the hearing last week from a DEP official about the investigation indicates the DEP “might have used incomplete and inaccurate test information to decide whether chemicals leaking…contaminated a water well and springs”…
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Energy Companies | Stone Energy | Utica Shale

Stone Energy: 1st Utica Well Drilled, 5 Extra Marcellus Wells
September 29, 2014September 29, 2014

Stone Energy, an independent oil and natural gas exploration and production company headquartered in Lafayette, Louisiana with operations both on- and off-shore (and with an active drilling program in the Marcellus and Utica region) released an update today. Stone says they’ve drilled their first Utica well and will test it later this year. They also say they will drill 35 Marcellus wells total this year–up from the originally forecast 30 Marcellus wells…
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Energy Companies | Junex

Canadian Driller Gets Permit for 1st Horizontal Well in Quebec
September 29, 2014September 29, 2014

Devonian layer shale and limestone layers don’t stop at our border with Canada. In fact, some of the Utica Shale lies north of the border, in Quebec. The problem in Canada, as in New York State, is that the government largely prevents active shale drilling. However, a sliver of sanity poked through in Quebec and in July a “junior” oil and gas exploration company, Junex, announced they’ve been granted a permit to drill their first horizontal well in a rural area 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) from the town of Gaspé. The well targets the Forillon Formation–a limestone formation in the Devonian layer (where the Marcellus and Utica are found). Apparently the “junior” Junex thinks they may have a tiger by the tail, because their board has just adopted a shareholder rights plan that puts a speed bump on any attempts at a hostile takeover of the company…
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Commodity Price | Industrywide Issues

Will ‘Dominion South’ Replace ‘Henry Hub’ for Natgas Pricing?
September 29, 2014September 29, 2014

From time to time MDN will cover stories about the price of natural gas because price determines whether or not drillers will bother to sink holes in the ground to extract natgas. One area we’ve not delved into a great deal is the trading of natural gas. We prefer to point you to top notch publications like NGI’s Daily Gas Price Index for stories about the price of natgas. However, there is a story out today from Reuters that talks about a possible change coming in how the price of natgas gets quoted. A really big change…
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Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA | Supply Chain

Rigmaids to the Rescue – Cleaning Up After Dirty Men (and Women)
September 29, 2014September 29, 2014

Let’s be honest, men are sometimes slobs. Men (and women) who work in a dirty profession like operating equipment at a drill pad, can generate a lot of filth. That’s where Pennsylvania company Rigmaids comes in. At every well pad is at least one (usually more) trailers where the men (and women) hang out–wash their hands, track mud, store food in refrigerators that sometimes go bad–the list goes on. Rigmaids will visit the pad site and clean out those filthy trailers and make them sparkle again. For a price…
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About MDN | Calendar

Calendar of Events for Sep 29-Oct 12, 2014 [Free]
September 29, 2014September 29, 2014

Below are upcoming events for this week and next. To see the full list of future events, visit this page: //marcellusdrilling.com/calendar/.

NOTE: To have an item included, please email it to: calendar@marcellusdrilling.com.
Read More “Calendar of Events for Sep 29-Oct 12, 2014 [Free]”
Best of the Rest

Marcellus & Utica Shale Story Links: Mon, Sep 29, 2014
September 29, 2014September 29, 2014

The “best of the rest” – stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading:
Read More “Marcellus & Utica Shale Story Links: Mon, Sep 29, 2014”
Blue Ridge Mtn Res/Magnum Hunter | Energy Companies | Tyler County | Utica Shale | West Virginia

Magnum Hunter Takes the Prize: Top Producing Utica Well
September 26, 2014September 26, 2014

Magnum Hunter has announced they’ve drilled the most southern (geographically) Utica Shale well ever drilled. The surprise is that it’s drilled in Tyler County, WV. The further surprise is that it’s one of the most productive Utica or Marcellus well ever drilled. Is it THE most productive well ever drilled? We don’t know for certain, but we think so. The announcement (below) says Magnum Hunter brought the Stewart Winland 1300U online last weekend and that so far, the “current peak rate” of production has been 46.5 million cubic feet per day (Mmcf/d). Truly astonishing…
Read More “Magnum Hunter Takes the Prize: Top Producing Utica Well”
Blue Ridge Mtn Res/Magnum Hunter | Energy Companies | Energy Services | Eureka Midstream | Industrywide Issues | Ohio | Pipelines | Statewide OH | Statewide WV | Triad Hunter | West Virginia

Magnum Hunter’s Pipeline System Boosts Volumes in OH/WV
September 26, 2014September 26, 2014

A second announcement from Magnum Hunter over the past two days is not nearly as important as the first–but interesting nonetheless. Magnum Hunter announced yesterday that Eureka Hunter–Magnum’s pipeline gathering subsidiary–has bumped up the volume of gas flowing through the system to an average 316,500 million Btus per day, or roughly 307 million cubic feet (Mmcf) per day. Fully one-third of the gas flowing through the system, which is located in West Virginia and Ohio, comes from another Magnum Hunter subsidiary–Triad Hunter. Lot’s of “Hunters” out there. 😉 Here’s the announcement of the increasing volumes flowing through Eureka Hunter’s pipelines these days…
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Meetings

Shale Insight News – Roundup of Who Said What
September 26, 2014September 26, 2014

MDN Editor Jim Willis once again was privileged to attend Shale Insight–THE industry event for the shale industry in the northeast. This year was the first time Shale Insight was held in Pittsburgh. For the first three years of its existence Shale Insight has been held in Philadelphia. Starting this year the event will rotate between Pittsburgh and Philly every other year. This year’s event saw such luminary speakers as Stephen Moore, chief economist from the Heritage Foundation, Dana Perino, former White House press secretary and current host of Fox’s The Five, Randy Cleveland, president of XTO Energy, David Porges, CEO of EQT, Frank Semple, CEO of MarkWest Energy, Bill Richardson, former energy secretary at the DOE and former governor of New Mexico, Tom Ridge, former governor of PA and former secretary of Homeland Security, and a rousing “fire ’em up” address by Sean Hannity, national radio talk show host and Fox News host. The conference ended on a high note with an address by PA Gov. Tom Corbett–in the re-election fight of his life. Corbett is strongly pro-gas, unlike his opponent Tom Wolf. The conference also ran lots of panels on interesting topics like the environment, Act 13 and its implications, drilling and completions–the list goes on. Jim will share his notes in the coming days. For now, below is a roundup of excellent coverage from others who were there…
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Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA | Taxation

Former Gov. Tom Ridge Predicts PA Will Get Severance Tax
September 26, 2014September 26, 2014

Although we have a run-down on the news coming from the Shale Insight conference in today’s lineup (see Shale Insight News – Roundup of Who Said What), there is one bit of news that to us, towers above the rest. Former PA Gov. Tom Ridge was always a bit squishy back in the day–not truly a conservative. But an OK guy and an able governor. He’s a very important figure in Pennsylvania politics, even today. Ridge was, as you may recall, the very first Secretary of Homeland Security under George W. Bush following the 9/11 Islamic terrorist attack on this country. At yesterday’s closing session, Ridge said he believes Pennsylvania will adopt a severance tax, which is a very bad sign in our opinion…
Read More “Former Gov. Tom Ridge Predicts PA Will Get Severance Tax”
Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Public Opinion | Statewide PA

MSC Launches Major PR Campaign to Change Public View of Fracking
September 26, 2014September 26, 2014

Channeling in our inner Martha Stewart: “Fracking is a good thing.” One of the announcements made at this year’s Shale Insight event was from the host Marcellus Shale Coalition. They have just launched a major public relations campaign to change the word “fracking” from having negative connotations to having positive vibes. The campaign is called Fracking: Rock Solid for PA and sports three commercials that will be aired in media markets across the state. The advertisements will encourage people to type in the web address rocksolidfacts.com, a vanity URL that then forwards them to the MSC’s United Shale Associations website at this address: //unitedshaleadvocates.com/rocksolidfacts/. On that page visitors can watch a 3-minute video that shares the real facts about fracking in Pennsylvania…
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Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | MarkWest Energy | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Washington County

Fines Total $151K for 2 Incidents at MarkWest Chartiers, PA Plant
September 26, 2014September 26, 2014

MarkWest continues to feel the effects of problems they’ve experienced at the company’s Houston Gas Processing Plant in Chartiers Township (Washington County), PA. MarkWest had expanded the plant–doubling its operations. When new equipment went online in July, things didn’t go as planned and there was emergency flaring–burning of gas–at the plant (see Smoke at MarkWest Chartiers, PA Gas Processing Plant). It wasn’t long before the PA Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) started handing out violation notices (see MarkWest Served Violation Notice for Chartiers Processing Plant). The company had a previous $71,000 fine for improper flaring at the plant stemming from incidents in April of this year. With the July incident, another $80,000 fine was assessed, totaling $151,000 in fines for the plant in the past six months…
Read More “Fines Total $151K for 2 Incidents at MarkWest Chartiers, PA Plant”