American Energy Partners Inc. | Belmont County | Energy Companies | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Ohio | Wastewater
Austin Master Services CEO Pays $25,000 Bond to Stay Out of Jail
Last week, MDN exclusively brought you the news that the CEO of American Environmental Services, which owns Austin Master Services (AMS), had filed a brief with Belmont County Court to either forgive or reduce a $1.2 million bond needed to keep the CEO, Brad Domitrovitsch, out of jail (see Austin Master Serv. CEO Asks Court to Block Jail Time, $1.2M Bond). The judge in the case reconsidered and reduced the bond from $1.2 million down to $25,000. Quite the reduction in Domitrovitsch’s “stay out of jail” card.
Read More “Austin Master Services CEO Pays $25,000 Bond to Stay Out of Jail”
PJM Interconnection, the largest U.S. power grid operator, published the results of its latest electricity auction yesterday. PJM serves 65 million people in 13 states plus the District of Columbia (including PA, OH, and WV). The latest auction for delivery of electricity in PJM in 2025/26 produced a wholesale price of $269.92/MW-day. That is a massive 933% increase from the $28.92/MW per day cost for delivery in 2024/2025. Of great interest to us is the overall mix of how PJM’s electricity gets generated. The auction (for 2025/26) shows a diverse mix of resources, including 48% produced by gas, 21% by nuclear, 18% by coal, 1% by solar, 1% by wind, 4% by hydro, 5% by demand response and 2% from other resources. We hear the constant drumbeat by mainstream media pushing renewable energy, yet solar and wind are producing a minuscule 2% of PJM’s electricity. How does that square? We are fed whoppers every day from mainstream news about the so-called ascendance of renewable energy.
PJM, the grid manager for Pennsylvania, twelve other states, and the District of Columbia, is worried about future energy needs. As existing power plants come offline and lawmakers seek to replace them with woefully inadequate alternatives, PJM estimates electricity shortages as early as 2027. PA Gov. Josh Shapiro isn’t helping matters with his disastrous energy proposals (see 
NATIONAL: US natgas prices jump 4% on forecast for record heat; Debunking claims that Biden has replenished the SPR; Climate law’s CCS windfall is almost 2 years old – not working; Shale costs forecast to fall 10% this year.
This is a case of everybody pointing at somebody else. Natural gas with contaminants (dirty gas) flowed through pipelines to Fairmont State University (in Marion County, WV), which “significantly damaged boilers, gas lines, valved and regulators and other structures and equipment on the college campus” in September 2021. The university sued the local utility company providing the gas, Hope Gas. In return, Hope said that *if* the gas was not clean, it was not their fault. They got the gas from Eastern Gas Transmission and Storage (EGTS), formerly owned by Dominion Energy but now owned by Berkshire Hathaway Energy.
You really can’t make this stuff up. A big picture is splashed across the pages of the Baltimore Sun website showing anti-fossil fuel nutters protesting “burning oil and gas indoors” (i.e., protesting the continued use of fossil fuels in stoves and furnaces). They were there to lobby the state Public Service Commission to disallow spending on new natural gas pipelines of any kind (local delivery, statewide transportation, etc.). Two of the protesters were dressed up as characters from The Flintstones. Both costumes were made from plastics — from oil and gas. That is, they were there protesting fossil fuels and WERE TOO STUPID to know they were wearing fossil fuels! Hilarious!!
Oglethorpe Power is investing more than $2.3 billion in two new natural gas-fired power plants to supply its 38 member cooperatives with an additional 1,400 megawatts of electricity to meet escalating demand across residential, commercial, and industrial sectors. We think some, perhaps most of the gas that will feed these two new plants will come from the Marcellus/Utica.
In September 2019, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) gave its blessing to Eagle LNG to build a small LNG export facility project at a site on the St. Johns River in Jacksonville, Florida (see 
Lansing (Michigan) Board of Water and Light (BWL) is committed to the false premise that humans are catastrophically warming the planet. BWL has a clean energy plan that includes building solar, wind, and battery storage. However, solar and wind — even with battery storage — are intermittent and unreliable. That’s just a fact. In order to use MORE solar and wind, BWL needs to install a small (very small) natural gas-fired peaker plant that will turn on during periods of high demand, periods when solar and wind and battery backup can’t meet the demand. In other words, natgas will make using more renewable power possible. And still, antis who irrationally hate fossil fuels are protesting the peaker.
As you may have noticed, a number of our posts today are stories about gas-fired power plants, which are vitally important (very big) customers for shale gas. According to an analysis by Reuters, natural gas use by power generators has expanded by around 3.5% a year over the past three years and is by far the largest single source of gas used in the U.S. However, natural gas consumption by the other major sectors, including industry, households, and commercial, is falling each year. The fall in usage by industry, etc., is more than the growth in powergen.
Last week, CNX Resources issued its second quarter 2024 update. The company lost $18.3 million in 2Q24, compared with making a profit of $475 million in 2Q23. This is quite a whack due to the low price of natural gas. Production was 134.0 Bcfe (billion cubic feet equivalent) in 2Q24 — which works out to 1.47 Bcfe/d — down from 134.2 Bcfe last year (statistically the same). On the bright side, management was excited about the early results of two deep Utica gas wells that were brought online last quarter.
The Virginia Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) slapped the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) project (which is now online) with a fine of $30,500 for violations of erosion and sediment control rules that happened during the second quarter. It is the fourth consecutive quarter in which MVP was fined by the DEQ for violations. In total, MVP has been fined nearly $100,000 by the DEQ over the past one year. Which is pretty much a nothingburger.
The Algonquin Gas Transmission pipeline (owned by Enbridge) transports up to 3.09 Bcf/d through 1,131 miles of pipeline. Algonquin connects to Texas Eastern Transmission (TETCO), Millennium Pipeline, and Maritimes & Northeast Pipeline and supplies New England with critically needed natural gas supplies for power generation and consumer use. Much of the gas flowing through it comes from the Marcellus/Utica. Algonquin needs to install a backup “meter and regulator” station in Lincoln, Mass., to keep the gas flowing in the region. The city of Cambridge owns a piece of land that it uses as a “buffer” for the city-owned reservoir in the area. Algonquin needs to cut some of the trees on that land in order to get its equipment through for the meter and regulator station, which will be constructed on land owned by Algonquin. Enter several nutjobs who are trying to block work at the site.