Tiny Group Protests Fracking Under Ohio’s Salt Fork State Park
In early June, shale drillers could, for the first time, begin to apply for permits to drill under (not on top of) Ohio state lands and state parks under newly formulated rules established by the Ohio Oil & Gas Land Management (OGLM) Commission (see Ohio State Lands Now Open for O&G Leasing – Virtual Ribbon-Cutting). In April, before the OGLM rules, Encino Energy made an offer to drill under Salt Fork State Park, located in Guernsey County, in a deal that could have netted the state a staggering $1.8 billion (see Encino Offered OH $1.8B Deal to Drill Under Salt Fork State Park). Ohio rejected the proposal (bad timing). However, Encino (presumably) is still interested, as Salt Fork was one of eight initial properties nominated for drilling deals (see 8 Ohio State Land Locations Nominated for Utica Shale Drilling). On July 1, a tiny “rally” was staged at Salt Fork State Park by protesters who want to block safe drilling under (not on) park-owned land.
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Olympus Energy (formerly Huntley & Huntley) drills in the Greater Pittsburgh region, in Allegheny and Westmoreland counties. In 2021, Olympus applied to build a new well pad in a rural part of Allegheny County, in West Deer Township. So-called “concerned citizens” got amped up to oppose the project. They succeeded when town supervisors rejected the Dionysus well pad (see 
West Virginia’s budget year runs from July 1 in one year to June 30 of the next year. The most recent “2023” fiscal budget year ended on June 30. WV is rolling in the dough. The state ended the 2023 fiscal year with more than $1.8 billion in surplus funds, driven mainly by increased personal income tax and severance tax collections. The severance tax (oil, gas, and coal) accounted for only 15% of total tax collections for the 2023 fiscal year but accounted for 38% of the total $1.8 billion in tax revenue surplus.
The political situation in Pennsylvania is quite fascinating to watch. The PA House has a one-seat Democrat majority, which means all of the committees in the House are now (for the first time in years) run by Democrats. One of them, Rep. Greg Vitali from Delaware County (near Philadelphia), chairs the powerful House Environmental Resources and Energy Committee. Immediately upon seizing power, Vitali tried to ram through a number of radical bills that would greatly harm (or even end) the Marcellus industry in the state. We previously told you members of his own party slapped him down, making him pull back and abandon two bills he really really wanted (see 
The weekly rig count for the U.S. finally, after nine straight weeks in a row, turned around–just a bit. With its venerable rig count, Baker Hughes reported last Friday that overall, the U.S. rig count added six rigs, reversing a downward trend. There were 680 active rigs for the week ending July 7. Both the Marcellus and the Utica maintained the same rig levels for the past four weeks in a row with a cumulative 48 rigs. That number is down from an average of 52 it had been running for the first five months this year. The good news is that we haven’t lost any more rigs.
LNG, or liquefied natural gas, is an important market for Marcellus/Utica drillers. It’s also a big deal worldwide. In 2022, global trade in LNG set a record high, averaging 51.7 billion cubic feet per day (Bcf/d), a 5% increase compared with 2021. At one point in 2022, the U.S. became the largest LNG exporter in the world. But then there was an explosion and fire at the Freeport LNG export terminal in June (see 
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: Tractor-trailer carrying sand overturns in East Finley; OTHER U.S. REGIONS: BH to supply 3 liquefaction trains for Rio Grande LNG project; Two counties in NM account for 29% of Permian crude oil production; Biden’s war on O&G shifts to a Permian Basin lizard; NATIONAL: BP Energy Partners announces sale of Mesa Natural Gas Solutions; Is Biden cracking down on pipeline violators?; The energy transition isn’t; INTERNATIONAL: Australia rejects renaming natural gas to silly “fossil” gas.
MDN is taking a few days post-July 4th to rest and relax and recharge. We hope you had a great 4th holiday! We will be back on July 10th to catch you up on all the news related to the Marcellus and Utica shale region. We had hoped to bring you a permit report today for the week of June 26th through July 2nd, but the Ohio Dept. of Natural Resources (ODNR) has not yet (as of Wednesday, July 5th) updated its weekly report, so we will bring you that report first thing next week. If there is any earth-shattering news related to our region, we’ll break back in with an update. Otherwise, see you on July 10th!
TransCanada Corporation, which renamed itself TC Energy in 2019, made a play for and bought out/merged in U.S.-based Columbia Pipeline Group in 2016 (see 
Pennsylvania’s Democrat Party is hellbent on driving the Marcellus Shale industry out of the state. They have been for years. That’s just a truthful observation and beyond dispute. The latest evidence is the party’s insistence on adding a severance tax on top of the existing impact fee, PA’s version of a severance tax. The Dems in the PA House passed a resolution on Friday by a single vote that directs the Legislative Budget and Finance Committee to “study” Pennsylvania’s revenue from the oil and gas industry, comparing it with the top five states in natural gas production in the U.S.
Superior Pipeline, headquartered in Oklahoma, operates in the following geographic areas: the Texas/Oklahoma panhandle, Central/Western Oklahoma, Southeastern Oklahoma, Southeast Texas, Kansas, and Appalachia, including Pennsylvania and West Virginia. Superior owns and operates natural gas gathering and processing facilities, natural gas treating plants, and over 3,700 miles of pipeline. Unit Corporation, which had owned 50% of Superior, recently finished selling its 50% share to OPTrust and Partners Group. With the sale, the new 100% owners have changed the name of the company from Superior Pipeline to Superior Midstream.
When the Bidenistas act outside of their predictable, normal behavior, it raises a red flag, making us wonder what they are up to. Last week a leftist who works in the Biden Department of Interior told a group of rabid leftists (her philosophical kin) the Biden administration will not, as the group demands, “phase down oil and gas production on federal lands and waters.” Which sent the crazies into orbit. The Interior Bidentista told them the administration has “limited resources” and “competing priorities” that prevent it from, at this time, pursuing a phase-down of all oil and gas drilling on federal lands.
Here’s a scientific FACT: Humans (indeed all animals) are carbon-based life forms. Carbon dioxide is an essential molecule for life on Planet Earth. Without carbon and CO2, life would not exist. Therefore, to call CO2 “pollution” is “outrageous,” according to Liberty Energy CEO Chris Wright. Calling CO2 “pollution” is like calling water and oxygen “pollution.” It’s nonsensical. And yet that is what the left does every day, in a historic act of massive, planet-wide brainwashing.