Marcellus Drilling News

NY to Release New Fracking Regulations by Labor Day

August 8, 2012August 8, 2012

stop press A major announcement is on the way in New York State about fracking and and the now four year-old moratorium on horizontal drilling: The fracking ban is about to end. According to a commentary published in the Albany Times Union last Saturday, top officials from the Cuomo administration are briefing “selected environmental groups” about his plan to allow fracking in New York State—a plan which he’ll release before Labor Day.

Here’s what’s being reported:

Industrywide Issues | Landfills | New York | Steuben County

Steuben County, NY Landfill Ready to Accept Shale Cuttings

August 8, 2012August 8, 2012

The Steuben County landfill in Bath, NY is now approved and ready to accept “shale cuttings,” or leftover soil and rock that comes from shale gas drilling. They join neighboring Chemung County that has accepted shale cuttings for over a year now, and Allegany County.

Although they don’t expect to receive much in the way of cuttings this year from Pennsylvania drillers because of a slowdown in drilling, Steuben officials want to be ready “just in case” Marcellus drilling in New York ramps up.

Chesapeake Energy | Energy Companies

Chesapeake Stock Jumps After McClendon Earnings Call

August 8, 2012August 8, 2012

Investors were positively giddy after Chesapeake Energy’s CEO, Aubrey McClendon, said on an earnings call yesterday that the company plans to sell three Permian Basin packages in the third quarter, which he expects to bring in another $7 billion. McClendon’s new expected total haul from asset sales for 2012 is $13-$14 billion. That sent stocks more than 10% higher (up $1.67 to $19.37), making corporate raider Carl Icahn a whole lot richer. Oh sorry! Forgot. We don’t call him a corporate raider nowadays, we euphemistically call him an “activist investor.” Yeah, got my PC hat on now. Won’t slip up again.

But is it all peaches and cream now for Chesapeake?

Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues

Why Has Fracking Become a Political Issue?

August 8, 2012August 8, 2012

An excellent article in Industrial Heating magazine tackles the issue of hydraulic fracturing and the pot shots being taken by anti-drillers, based not on science, but on scare tactics. The author says the fracking issue has largely become political (where have you heard that before?!). Here is a paragraph from the article that could have been written by MDN:

Devon Reports Disappointing Results in 2 NW OH Utica Wells

August 8, 2012August 8, 2012

Devon Energy reports “not encouraging” results from two wells in Ohio’s Utica Shale, one in Ashland County, the other in neighboring Medina County—both in the northwestern corner of the Utica Shale in Ohio. Although Devon is not saying whether or not they will drill more wells in that area, they have indicated they will drill more wells to the east.

Energy Companies | Gulfport Energy | Utica Shale

Gulfport Energy 2Q12 Update: First Utica Well Comes Online

August 8, 2012August 8, 2012

Gulfport Energy Corporation has released their second quarter earnings and operations update. Gulfport is a Utica Shale driller (among other basins across the U.S. and Canada). In the news for Gulfport for 2Q12: They drilled four new Utica Shale wells, three of which were completed and waiting to go online. Their first horizontal well in the Utica, drilled in February of this year, came online and at its peak was producing 17.1 million cubic feet of gas per day (Mmcf/d), along with 432 barrels of condensate per day and 1,881 barrels of natural gas liquids per day.

The relevant sections of the update dealing with Utica Shale operations:

Energy Companies | Gastar Exploration | Marshall County | West Virginia

Gastar 2Q12 Update: Production Up 87% Mostly from WV Marcellus

August 8, 2012August 8, 2012

Gastar Exploration released their second quarter earnings and operations update yesterday. They report production increased 87% from second quarter 2011—to 34.8 MMcfe per day. Most of the increase comes from drilling in the Marcellus Shale in Marshall County, WV. Gastar says it would have been even better were it not for problems with processing capacity and pipeline issues.

Here are the relevant sections from the Gastar update dealing with the Marcellus Shale:

Energy Companies | Epsilon Energy

Epsilon Energy 2Q12 Update: Scaling Back in the Marcellus

August 8, 2012August 8, 2012

Canadian independent driller Epsilon Energy has released its 2Q12 update. Epsilon focuses on the Pennsylvania Marcellus Shale, the Bakken Shale and Midale Dolomite in Saskatchewan, and the Brown Dense Limestone in Mississippi. Epsilon significantly scaled back its drilling activity in the Marcellus during the second quarter because of low natural gas prices. Instead, they are concentrating on oil drilling in the Bakken Shale region of Canada.

Epsilon also owns a 35% interest in the Auburn gas gathering system, located in the PA Marcellus. Relevant sections of the update pertaining to the Marcellus:

Access Midstream Partners | Energy Companies | Energy Services

Access Midstream 2Q12 Update: Pipeline Throughput up 33.5%

August 8, 2012August 8, 2012

The quarterly reports keep coming in. This one is from Access Midstream Partners, the newly named and former Chesapeake Midstream Partners. Access is a large pipeline company with major operations in the Marcellus Shale. The Marcellus, in fact, is largely responsible for an increase of 33.5% in throughput, or the amount of gas handled each day, by Access for the second quarter (over the second quarter of last year). Access reports hooking up 179 new wells to its gathering systems in 2Q12.

Here is the quarterly update press release:

Energy Companies | Range Resources Corp

Podcast: Robert Mangino Talks with Range’s Matt Pitzarella

August 8, 2012August 8, 2012

Pittsburgh KDKA 1020 Radio’s Robert Mangino talks with Matt Pitzarella of Range Resources and Gene Barr, president of the Pennsylvania Chamber of Business and Industry. Robert Mangino hosts a Marcellus Shale hour on his radio talk show each Tuesday at 7 pm.

Listen to the latest show below:

About MDN | Maryland | Statewide MD

Washington Post Catches Up to MDN

August 8, 2012August 8, 2012

May we toot our own horn? Today the Washington Post printed a story about newly discovered shale basins in the State of Maryland (see this Washington Post story).

If you read MDN, you would have read about it 10 days ago (see this MDN story).

We don’t always break the news, but we usually report it quite early. And we report only what’s important and relevant for those of you interested in the Marcellus and Utica Shale region. Thanks for reading MDN!

Best of the Rest

Marcellus & Utica Shale Story Links: Wed, Aug 8, 2012

August 8, 2012August 8, 2012

The “best of the rest” – stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading:

Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Research | Wastewater

New Study on Water Pollution Risk from Marcellus Drilling

August 7, 2012August 7, 2012

probability A new paper is about to be published in a scientific journal that will no doubt get misrepresented and widely reported in the mainstream press about assessing the risks of Marcellus Shale drilling. The paper is titled “Water Pollution Risk Associated with Natural Gas Extraction from the Marcellus Shale,” written by a graduate student and his professor at SUNY Stony Brook. The published paper will appear in the August issue of the journal Risk Analysis, a publication of the Society for Risk Analysis (a preview copy of the full article is embedded below).

The paper looks at the theoretical probabilities of fracking fluids finding their way into the natural environment and polluting (contaminating) fresh water supplies. MDN will discuss what this paper does, and does not, say.

Earthquakes | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues

Bloomberg (Once Again) Says Fracking Causes Earthquakes

August 7, 2012August 7, 2012

Bloomberg Businessweek is highlighting the publication of a new paper that looks at earthquake activity around injection wells in Texas and concludes that fracking causes earthquakes. The article starts this way:

About MDN

Marcellus and Utica Shale Databook 2012 – Vol. 2 Just Released [Free]

August 7, 2012August 7, 2012

Hey, MDN is covering our own press release! We’re very excited to announce the release of Volume 2 of the Marcellus and Utica Shale Databook 2012. Read all about it below.

Chesapeake Energy | Energy Companies

Chesapeake Energy 2Q12 Update: 3.1M Acres in Marcellus/Utica

August 7, 2012August 7, 2012

Chesapeake Energy, the second largest producer of natural gas in the U.S., released its second quarter earnings and operational update yesterday. Because of recent sales of their midstream division and other asset sales, second quarter profits for the company went up—rather dramatically. They reported a profit of $972 million, or $1.29 a share, up from $510 million a year earlier. That includes $584 million in an after-tax gain from the recent sale of Chesapeake Midstream Partners and $490 million in gains related to hedging. If you exclude the asset sales, adjusted earnings were $3 million, or 6 cents a share. Revenue increased 2.1% to $3.39 billion.

Chesapeake reports their lease holdings in the Utica Shale are now 1.3 million acres—the largest position of any driller. As of June 30, they’ve drilled 87 wells in the Utica. Chesapeake is also the largest lease holder in the Marcellus, with a whopping 1.8 million acres. They currently have 10 rigs operating in the “dry gas” portion of the Marcellus.