Marcellus Drilling News

Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Regulation | Statewide NY

Will Fracking in NY Only be Done in Supportive Communities?
April 23, 2012April 23, 2012

$frack here frack now$ In an interesting development in the long fight to allow shale gas drilling in New York State, two key state senators are signaling a compromise may come in the form of, “if you want it, you can get it” with respect to fracking. That is, communities that support fracking will likely be the ones who will get it, at least at first, and maybe they will be the only ones to get it.

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Accidents | Coterra Energy (Cabot O&G) | Energy Companies | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Susquehanna County

Third Set of EPA Water Tests in Dimock, PA Come Back Clean
April 23, 2012April 23, 2012

The latest (and third) round of water testing done by the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of water wells around Dimock, PA shows (surprise!) no chemical contamination from hydraulic fracturing. All of the 16 water wells show no fracking fluids. One of the wells shows a high level of arsenic, a chemical not used by Cabot Oil & Gas during hydraulic fracturing. Arsenic is a naturally occurring chemical.

Here’s the statement by the EPA upon releasing the latest round of testing last Friday:

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Broome County | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | New York | Regulation

Binghamton Fracking Ban Heading to Court
April 23, 2012April 23, 2012

Last December, at the eleventh hour shortly before Binghamton Mayor Matt Ryan knew he would lose his all-Democrat city council and hence an opportunity to stick it to the drilling industry, Ryan forced through a vote on a measure to ban fracking within the city limits for a period of two years (see this MDN story). There’s just one problem with the ban as enacted—it isn’t legal, at least according to attorneys Robert Wedlake and Kenneth Kamlet, who have sent a letter to the city demanding they either follow the law or they’re going to court.

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Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA

Judge Tells PA Drillers They Can’t Join Act 13 Lawsuit
April 23, 2012April 23, 2012

At the end of March, seven Pennsylvania municipalities along with the Delaware Riverkeeper Network and a handful of individuals filed a lawsuit against the state of Pennsylvania over a newly enacted Marcellus drilling law called Act 13 (see this MDN story). The lawsuit specifically targets a measure in the new law that supersedes local zoning of oil and gas drilling with state-mandated rules. The Pennsylvania Independent Oil and Gas Association, the Marcellus Shale Coalition and some state lawmakers filed to join the lawsuit on the side of the state, to help defend the new legislation (see this MDN story).

On Friday, the judge in the case denied the application to join the lawsuit:

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Best of the Rest

Marcellus & Utica Shale Story Links: Mon, Apr 23, 2012
April 23, 2012April 23, 2012

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

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Regulation | Statewide NY

NY Update: New Rules Won’t Be Done Before Fall
April 20, 2012April 20, 2012

Is it any surprise that eager beaver, go-get-em NY Department of Environmental Conservation Commissioner Joe Martens now says that his department’s review of comments on proposed new fracking rules won’t be done before end of summer, “perhaps”? No, not a surprise at all. This is typical Martens delay tactic behavior.

Martens, speaking in Albany on Thursday, told business leaders of this arbitrary new delay. Can anyone say “productivity challenged”?

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Anadarko | Energy Companies | Ohio | Statewide OH

Anadarko Utica Shale Update: Strong Initial Results
April 20, 2012April 20, 2012

Anadarko provided an update on its Utica Shale drilling program yesterday, saying that although it’s still very early, the “strong initial results are encouraging.” To date Anadarko has drilled and is producing from three wells in the Utica Shale. Anadarko has 390,000 leased acres in the Utica, most of it in eastern Ohio. In addition to the update, they included a map showing where they have leased acreage, where the three wells are they have drilled, and where they plan to concentrate their drilling activity (map embedded below).

From the Anadarko press release:

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | New York | Regulation | Statewide NY

Timeline for New York Drilling Ban Court Case
April 20, 2012April 20, 2012

Tom West, an attorney handling a combined appeal of two New York cases where local judges upheld drilling bans passed by local townships, laid out a timeline for when the combined case will be heard and decided at an Albany conference yesterday. The two original cases are from Dryden, in Tompkins County, and Middlefield, in Otsego County.

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Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA

PA Medical Society Admits Act 13 Won’t “Gag” Doctors
April 20, 2012April 20, 2012

Yet another straw man argument from anti-drillers has been knocked down in Pennsylvania. Anti-drillers were trying to fabricate a tale that under Pennsylvania’s new drilling law, Act 13, doctors and health care workers would be “gagged” and prevented from talking about the chemicals used in fracking with their patients should those patients somehow be exposed to said chemicals. It’s been a running headline for over a month.

On Wednesday, the Pennsylvania Medical Society said the matter had been cleared up:

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Air Quality | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Regulation

Initial Reaction to EPA’s New Air Pollution Fracking Rules
April 20, 2012April 20, 2012

The initial response to the EPA’s new 588 pages of rules governing hydraulic fracturing for oil and gas well drilling (see this MDN story) was lukewarm from both pro- and anti-drillers—at least in the Pittsburgh area.

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Statewide NY

NY Post Picks Up on Anti-Fracking Preservation League
April 20, 2012April 20, 2012

At the end of March, MDN told you about the latest anti-fracking group to come along, The Preservation League of New York State (see this MDN story). The editorial page of the New York Post has now picked up on the same story:

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Beaver County | Chesapeake Energy | Energy Companies | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania

Chesapeake Ignores Stop-Work Order in Beaver County, PA
April 20, 2012April 20, 2012

Chesapeake Energy seems to be in hurry-up-and-drill mode on land in Beaver County, PA in order to secure the land before the lease expires next week. They started drilling without first receiving a permit and are ignoring a stop-work order from the local township. Chesapeake claims the local ordinance states they only have to apply for a conditional-use permit—not receive it—in order to start drilling. The township says the opposite is true.

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Economic Impact | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues

Canadian Company Buys Youngstown, OH Short Line RR
April 20, 2012April 20, 2012

One of the more interesting (and MDN believes underreported) stories about the economic renaissance occurring because of hydraulic fracturing in shale deposits is the revival of short line railroads. The latest case:

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Best of the Rest

Marcellus & Utica Shale Story Links: Fri, Apr 20, 2012
April 20, 2012April 20, 2012

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: Fri, Apr 20, 2012”
Chesapeake Energy | Energy Companies

Is Chesapeake the New Enron? Or Unfairly Targeted?
April 19, 2012April 19, 2012

Take a few days off, and the news comes fast and furious. Big, complex stories are not what blog sites like MDN are usually geared for, but we have a big, complex story to deal with: Chesapeake Energy. In case you’ve missed it in the business pages, a new “controversy” has erupted over Chesapeake’s financial situation. They carry a heavy debt load, and with the commodity price of natural gas at 10-year lows, Chesapeake CEO Aubrey McClendon is doing new deals (it seems) almost weekly in a bid to keep the money coming in to the company to fund continuing exploration and production.

Some of the Chesapeake deals are of the joint venture nature as in “give us money and you’ll get part of the profits from this set of wells in this particular shale play,” and other deals sell off company assets outright, like the announcement on Monday that Chesapeake is spinning off its Oilfield Services, Inc. division into a separate company and will float an initial public offering (IPO) hoping to raise more than $850 million in cash (see this Chesapeake press release).

The Oilfield Services IPO seemed to be the straw that broke the financial analyst camel’s back. A very intense scrutiny began. Leading industry publication NGI’s Shale Daily (an advertiser on MDN) ran a story looking at the deal. Part of that story contains an analysis that shows Chesapeake’s long-term debt load is more than Exxon Mobil’s long-term debt, and Exxon is 32 times bigger in market capitalization than Chesapeake:

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Air Quality | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Regulation

EPA Issues New Air Pollution Standards for Fracking
April 19, 2012April 19, 2012

In response to a court order, the federal Environmental Protection agency has issued a set of new rules (i.e. laws) that will govern air pollution standards at oil and gas drilling sites throughout the country, in particular at wells sites that use hydraulic fracturing. A copy of the 588 pages of new rules is embedded below. A five-page summary of which new rules will apply to gas drillers is also embedded below.

The EPA is trying to sell this as a cost savings for drillers—that they will capture more of the natural gas that currently escapes into the atmosphere—meaning they can sell that gas and profit from it, making the cost to implement the new rules revenue neutral. Of course the opposite is true—as with all things government, the new rules will cost drillers, and by extension landowners, more money to implement. And it gives EPA more control over fracking—something they’ve lusted after for years. Fracking comes under the purview of the individual states. The states alone have the right to regulate oil and gas drilling within their borders. But the federal government, like moths drawn to a flame, can’t help themselves. They want to regulate it.

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