MPLX 2Q – Harmon II Processing Plant Coming Online in 1H24
In late 2015, MPLX (i.e., Marathon Petroleum) bought out and merged in the Utica Shale’s premier midstream company, MarkWest Energy, for $15 billion (see MarkWest Energy Investors/Unitholders Approve Merger with Marathon). The “new” MarkWest, aka MPLX, plays on a much larger stage now, including ownership and operation of major assets in the Permian Basin and in the Bakken Shale, in addition to the Utica/Marcellus. However, most of MPLX’s activity (and revenue) comes from the M-U. Yesterday MPLX issued its second quarter 2023 update.
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In 2021 as he was running for the office of Governor in Virginia, Glenn Youngkin pledged if he won, he would remove the state from the onerous carbon tax on coal- and gas-fired power plants called the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI). Following his recent review of a new regulation to remove the state from RGGI, Youngkin is on the cusp of keeping his promise this year (see 
On Friday, the Biden Administration proposed a new rule to amend the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) regulations. The White House’s Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) proposed changes to NEPA that it says would speed up permitting for clean energy and other projects on federal land. Unfortunately, it does just the opposite. The new rule will slow down urgently needed development under the guise of “environmental justice.” This is an ongoing attempt by the Bidenistas to take a wrecking ball to the good work done during the Trump Administration to make it easier to build major infrastructure projects.
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: Why Pa. should lead on liquefied natural gas exports; NATIONAL: Biden climate czar John Kerry attacks American farmers; INTERNATIONAL: Europe’s manufacturers are struggling to shift away from gas; Traders pay $200,000 a day for LNG tankers; Big spending on oil and gas exploration has yet to pay off.
In July, the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) announced that it had appointed a 17-member committee to figure out how to dole out $5 million to fund local community projects located near the Shell cracker plant in Beaver County, PA, following a $10 million fine against the plant for violating air emissions standards (see 
Permitting in Pennsylvania, especially those overseen by the Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP), has been broken for years. A Chapter 102 Erosion and Sedimentation permit sometimes takes two, three, even six to eight months for approval–instead of the law-mandated 14 days. It got so bad that in the fall of 2019, PA State Sen. Gene Yaw introduced a bill to allow third-party reviews of these permits (see 
Eversource wants to build the Western Massachusetts Natural Gas Reliability Project in Springfield, Massachusetts, to prevent winter gas outages. The purpose of the tiny 5.3-mile pipeline is to function as a backup–to prevent natural gas from being turned off for 58,000 Eversource customers (200,000 people) in the region. The existing pipeline in that area is 70 years old with no backup. If the existing, old pipeline has an issue and the gas gets turned off, that’s 200,000 people with no natural gas in the dead of a New England winter. Yet the radicalized Massachusetts Energy Secretary Rebecca Tepper (far-left Democrat) has told Eversource its draft environmental impact report for the tiny pipeline isn’t good enough for her. She wants Eversource to cut down more trees to create a supplemental report to answer her nit-picky questions.
The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) is reporting feed gas (natural gas) delivered to LNG export facilities for the first six months of this year hit a new all-time average high of 12.8 Bcf/d (billion cubic feet per day). We hit that high after the Freeport LNG facility finally came back online following a June 2022 explosion, knocking it offline for more than nine months (see 
In May, the Bidenistas at the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released a hellscape of new regulations (681 pages) aimed at forcing coal- and natural gas-fired power plants to close (see 
We spotted an in-depth article by RBN Energy about mineral rights, royalties, and working interests. Private investors and companies have sprung up to buy such rights. RBN says competition to buy these rights has heated up in recent years. The article gives us a better understanding of the scope, size, and inner workings of the royalty and rights marketplace.
Last week CNX Resources issued its second quarter 2023 update. In stark contrast to other big Marcellus/Utica drillers, which lost money in 2Q, CNX generated $475 million of net income (nearly half a billion dollars!)–versus generating $33 million in profit for the same quarter last year. Derivatives seemed to make the difference. In 2Q22, CNX lost $653 million on derivatives (hedges), but in 2Q23, the company profited $542 million in derivatives. Production fell 6% in 2Q23, down to 134.2 Bcfe (or 1.47 Bcfe/d), versus 142.3 Bcfe (1.56 Bcfe/d) in 1Q22.
For the third week in a row and the 12th time in the last 13 weeks, the U.S. active rig count lost rigs. Last week the number decreased by five rigs after falling six rigs the week before (see 
This is a cautionary tale of choosing your joint venture partner carefully. The Pennsylvania Superior Court threw out a $2.4 million arbitration award against Marcellus driller PennEnergy in a business dispute in a precedential ruling last week. The Superior Court judges overruled an award by an arbitrator. PennEnergy maintained the case should never have been in arbitration in the first place. The intended recipient of the award, MDS Energy, says the Superiors weren’t so superior after all and got it wrong. The case is complicated…
The West Virginia State Legislature passed House Bill (HB) 2581 on the last day of the annual WV legislative session in April 2021. HB 2581 required the State Tax Commissioner to develop a revised methodology to value oil and natural gas properties for the purpose of assessing property taxes. The State Tax Department submitted an emergency rule in the summer of 2021 that was, quite frankly, a mess. In March 2022, the legislature passed, and Gov. Jim Justice signed into law, House Bill (HB) 4336, aimed at fixing the mess created by HB 2581 (see