Marcellus & Utica Shale Story Links: Mon, Sep 10, 2012
The “best of the rest” – stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading:
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22 NY Town Supervisors to Gov. Cuomo: Drill Here, Drill Now
On Wednesday, a group of 22 State of New York town supervisors, mostly from the Southern Tier area of New York, sent a letter to Gov. Andrew Cuomo strongly encouraging him to release the Dept. of Environmental Conservation’s new drilling rules (called the SGEIS) now. A copy of the letter is embedded below. One of the signatories is Town of Binghamton Supervisor Tim Whitesell, current president of the New York State Association of Towns.The supervisors’ message to Cuomo: enough with the delay. Further delays only encourage “disruptive acts” by anti-drillers and serve no purpose. Near the end of the letter, in bold, is this paragraph:
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Interesting News from YOUNG for OH Landowners, Job Seekers
The Youngstown Ohio Utica and Natural Gas Conference and Expo (or the “YOUNG Expo” as it’s called), held yesterday and today at the Covelli Center in Youngstown, OH, has become a major regional event in the Utica Shale. With more than 1,500 people attending yesterday and more than 100 vendors, YOUNG is not only a great place for businesses to connect and job seekers to find work, it’s also a news generator.
The Youngstown Business Journal picked up on the following revelation during a presentation from Nisource that will interest landowners in Mahoning County:
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Crime | Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | New York | Pipelines | Spectra Energy | Statewide NY
2 Protesters Arrested in NYC at Spectra Pipeline Site
Yet another case of unhinged anti-drilling protesters, this one in New York City. For some time, protesters have rallied against a new 20-mile, $1.2 billion natural gas pipeline being built from New Jersey to New York City by Spectra Energy (see this MDN story). It’s the first new natural gas pipeline built to NYC in decades. According to NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg, without new sources of natural gas, New York City residents won’t just pay higher rates for heating and electricity, they’ll run out of it (see this MDN story).
Anti-drilling protesters don’t let reality and common sense get in the way of a good protest, however, so they’ve taken to so-called acts of “civil” disobedience—attempting to block workers in NYC as they try to construct the new pipeline. Yesterday, their antics got two of them arrested.
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Anti-Drilling Protesters Arrested Near Watkins Glen, NY
Anti-drilling protesters in New York are increasingly becoming unhinged. Midstream company Inergy is working on a gas storage project near Watkins Glen in the Finger Lakes region in New York. The $40 million project will create a storage and transfer station for natural gas and liquid petroleum in underground salt caverns near Seneca Lake. Are anti-drillers concerned that the facility will leak gas into the lake? Nope. They just hate fossil fuels period—and they think this facility will encourage more drilling and fracking in New York and Pennsylvania—so they oppose it.
Yesterday a couple of old hippies protesters handcuffed themselves to a fence at the facility. Here’s what happened:
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Local Residents Protest 2 Wastewater Injection Wells in NW PA
A battle is heating up over proposed deep injection wells for Marcellus and Utica Shale wastewater in Pennsylvania, specifically in Warren County (northwestern PA). A small conventional natural gas driller, Lyon Energy, owns about 80 natural gas wells in Warren County, some of which are now past their useful life. These are not Marcellus or Utica wells but wells drilled (and fracked) vertically, conventionally. Lyon, through the corporate name of Bear Properties, applied for a permit with the federal Environmental Protection Agency to turn two of its wells into deep injection wells for wastewater.
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U.S. Sen. Toomey Meets with Wayne County, PA Landowners
U.S. Senator Pat Toomey met with a group of landowners in Wayne County, PA yesterday to hear their concerns and complaints that property owners in Wayne have so far not participated in the rest of Pennsylvania’s Marcellus Shale drilling boom. Why not? Because Wayne County sits in the Delaware River Basin and comes under the regulatory oversight of the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC). Although the DRBC has drawn up guidelines for drilling, so far it has not had the political spine to implement them, creating an ongoing moratorium.
When/if it grows a spine, the DRBC says it will permit up to 300 wells throughout the region—a number of those (the majority?) will be in Wayne County.
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Labor Unions, Dems Praise PA Gov. Corbett for Cracker Plant
In a deeply divided electorate during a hotly-contested election year, is there anything Republicans and Democrats can agree on? Anything that both business and labor can both support? In Pennsylvania, it seems there is. And that issue is the Marcellus and Utica Shale.
Writing in today’s Harrisburg Patriot-News, a labor union leader praises PA Gov. Tom Corbett (a Republican) for his recent state budget and the tax breaks an incentives provided to ensure that Shell builds an ethane cracker plant in the state. Here’s what he says about bipartisan support for Gov. Corbett’s plan:
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New Study: Decline of Coal/Rise of Shale Gas in WV
The West Virginia Center on Budget & Policy has just published a new report in an ongoing series called “The State of Working West Virginia.” This new report is titled “In Depth: The Gas Boom and Coal Bust” (a full copy is embedded below). The 34-page report, as the title indicates, takes a look at the tax and employment impacts of West Virginia’s coal industry which is sinking fast, and the upcoming Marcellus Shale industry which is rising fast.
The authors of the study advocate a new severance tax on shale gas (and coal) as one way to help the state. They also think the minimum wage should be increased from $7.25 per hour to $9.80. While most of the study centers on jobs and the economy of West Virginia, the section most MDN readers will want to read is Section Five, pages 21-27. That’s the section dealing directly with coal and natural gas in the state, including this interesting graph showing an estimate for natural gas production in WV through 2035:
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Marcellus & Utica Shale Story Links: Fri, Sep 7, 2012
The “best of the rest” – stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading:
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New Marcellus/Utica Shale Supply Chain Website Launches
The Youngstown Business Journal and Farris Marketing today launch a new Marcellus and Utica Shale supply chain connection website called ShaleLink.com. The website offers free listings for businesses interested in in selling (or buying) services related to the shale oil and gas industry. But there’s a catch: Your business has to be located in either Ohio or Pennsylvania to be listed for free.Here’s the press release/story from the ShaleLink.com website describing the new service:
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Two Views on Road Use Agreements for Drillers in NY
Some counties in Upstate New York are prepared for potential road damage caused by trucks and heavy equipment when and if shale gas drilling begins. Some of those counties are a lot more welcoming of drillers than others.
Steuben County in New York’s Southern Tier area—one of the five named counties likely to receive permits when drilling begins—is one of the counties ready with a road-use agreement for drillers. Interestingly, Vince Spagnoletti, Public Works Commissioner for Steuben County, says the road use agreement in Steuben originated not because of potential gas drilling but because of potential wind farm development:
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Surprise! EcoNuts Object to Proposed Utica Shale Pipeline
On Tuesday MDN brought you the news of a major new Utica Shale gas pipeline that will be built from Ohio through Michigan and into Canada by DTE Energy, Enbridge Inc. and Spectra Energy Corp (see this MDN story). It didn’t take long for anti-drillers, like EcoWatch, to announce their opposition.
This is what passes for news on MSNBC:
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Allegheny County | Economic Impact | Energy Services | Heckmann | Industrywide Issues | Jobs | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA
Pittsburgh Enviro Services Company Heckmann Merging, Moving
Heckmann Corporation, a publicly traded environmental services company with a major footprint in Pittsburgh and throughout the Marcellus and Utica Shale region, announced on Tuesday they are merging with Power Fuels, a privately held environmental services company based in North Dakota, the largest such firm in the mighty Bakken Shale. The merger puts Heckmann well on the path to their stated goal of becoming the country’s largest environmental services company.
Soon after the announcement, it was disclosed on a conference call to analysts that the new headquarters for Heckmann would be moving from Pittsburgh to Scottsdale, Arizona. That announcement has created a fair amount of angst in Pittsburgh. However, Heckmann says they “anticipate” no layoffs in the Marcellus region:
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Food & Water Watch Targets NY Gov. Cuomo with Ad in NC
The unreasonable, extremist and increasingly shrill organization Food & Water Watch (FWW), headquartered in Washington, D.C. (and attempting to interfere in New York’s debate over fracking) is targeting New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo with a full page advertisement in today’s Charlotte Observer. Wait, what? A full page ad in a North Carolina newspaper? Yep.
Gov. Cuomo will be in Charlotte today to speak to the New York delegation at the Democrat National Convention. He’ll then stick around to witness the sinking of the Titanic acceptance speech of Barack Obama. FWW apparently thinks Andy wants to run for president in 2016 and they want to run a head-fake on him that if he approves fracking in New York, his chances of winning in 2016 will be about the same as Obama’s chances of winning this year—close to nil. They also think Andy’s bound to pick up a copy of the Charlotte Observer while he’s in town, hence the ad.
Here’s a copy of the FWW propaganda ad appearing today:
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Encana Says Investigation Shows No Collusion with Chesapeake
Back in June, Reuters somehow, magically, got ahold of private personal property (emails) from Chesapeake Energy and Encana Corp. Encana is Canada’s largest natural gas company. Reuters attempted to put the two companies on trial in the court of public opinion for “colluding” to keep prices down on leases in Michigan (see this MDN story). MDN still wonders, did Reuters break the law or aid and abet laws being broken in getting those emails?
But no attention is being paid to the mighty Reuters. No, the intended affect was accomplished: a plethora of investigations by various organizations began, not least of which is an ongoing investigation by the Obama Justice Department (see this MDN story). Encana did their own internal investigation by brining in outside help and the results are in from that investigation: Encana says they’re not guilty of colluding with Chesapeake.
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On Wednesday, a group of 22 State of New York town supervisors, mostly from the Southern Tier area of New York, sent a letter to Gov. Andrew Cuomo strongly encouraging him to release the Dept. of Environmental Conservation’s new drilling rules (called the SGEIS) now. A copy of the letter is embedded below. One of the signatories is Town of Binghamton Supervisor Tim Whitesell, current president of the New York State Association of Towns.
The Youngstown Business Journal and Farris Marketing today launch a new Marcellus and Utica Shale supply chain connection website called