Range’s Incoming CEO Committed to Marcellus Region, No Mergers
Last Friday, we brought you the big news that Jeff Ventura, the long-time CEO of Range Resources (and the first guy to drill a Marcellus well, ever), is retiring in June (see Range CEO Jeff Ventura Retiring, COO Dennis Degner to Replace Him). Dennis Degner, Range’s current top driller, has been tapped to replace him. Degner gave an interview with the Pittsburgh Business Times on Friday. He had some interesting things to say.
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On March 14, eight business groups across five states (including PA and WV) sent a letter to the federal EPA urging the EPA to expedite approvals for well permits for carbon sequestration, including allowing primacy for states. Businesses and consortia are actively pursuing significant investments in projects related to the so-called energy transition. Carbon Capture and Sequestration (CCS) is an important piece of the “transition,” both for capturing direct emissions and enabling clean hydrogen production from promised regional hydrogen hubs. CCS investments can accelerate a region’s energy transition and grow jobs. But the feds are dragging their feet. States want to take control of approving CCS projects for themselves, to speed things along–to become the primary regulatory authority. But the dysfunctional EPA is not responding. Hence the letter.
While we don’t track rig counts each week, given the volatile up-and-down nature of rig counts, the count from last week warrants comment. Oil rigs fell by one last week to 589, while gas rigs rose by nine to 162. Total rig count is up 13.7% over the same time last year–a good indicator that more drilling is happening. In our region, the Marcellus play gained five rigs from the previous week, while the Utica lost four rigs from the previous week.
BlackRock, the largest investment bank in the world with some $10 trillion in assets under management, is hurting. BlackRock CEO Larry Fink insists that public companies adopt ESG (environment, social, governance) policies that include reducing CO2 emissions. Fink’s demands are tantamount to divesting (or refusing to invest in) any company that produces or heavily uses oil and natural gas. Yet in the company’s latest annual letter to investors, Fink says the oil and gas industry is essential in meeting global energy needs, despite the increasing shift towards renewable energy sources. He says BlackRock loves investing in O&G. He is categorically lying to avoid more action by states in dropping BlackRock funds.
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: Pennsylvania could benefit greatly from hydrogen hubs; OTHER U.S. REGIONS: CA seeks EPA authorization to ban gas and diesel vehicle sales; NJ seeks more offshore wind contracts as opponents push for halt; NATIONAL: Bank turmoil fuels largest weekly loss since April 2020; Greenhouse gases and the refining industry; Biden administration policies hurting energy development across U.S.; INTERNATIONAL: LNG plant cancellation could kill premier’s shale gas ambitions.
National Grid is desperately trying not to run out of natural gas for its customers in Brooklyn and Queens (on Long Island). For several years the company has fought a battle to run a tiny pipeline to its Greenpoint, Brooklyn facility to provide extra natural gas. National Grid has a backup plan in case it can’t complete the pipeline project–add two extra LNG vaporizers to the Greenpoint facility to turn trucked LNG back into gas that can flow through the system. A so-called independent consultant reviewed the plan and filed a report last November with the state Public Utility Commission saying National Grid’s vaporizers aren’t needed (see 
Last September, Spanish oil and gas drilling giant Repsol, which owns the St. John, New Brunswick (Canada) LNG facility, filed an application with the Canada Energy Regulator (CER) to export up to 300 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d) of natural gas from the St. John facility (see 
GAIL (formerly known as Gas Authority of India Limited), is a huge natural gas and petrochemical company located in India. The country of India owns and operates GAIL. It is the largest natural gas utility company in the country. Earlier today, GAIL signed an agreement with Shell for Shell to source and supply ethane that GAIL can import and use to replace natural gas and naphtha as feedstock for its petrochemical plants. Last month GAIL invited companies to bid on providing it with a very large ethane carrier (VLEC) for 20 years starting mid-2026 so it can import ethane from the U.S.
We’re always a sucker for a good price prediction. Everybody and his brother (and sister) loves to predict where the price of the NYMEX Henry Hub will go in the next few months, or even for the next few years. Ratings agency giant Fitch, which owns the Fitch Solutions subsidiary, is the latest organization out with a prediction of where natgas prices will end up in 2023. Fitch says the NYMEX average for this year will be $3.60/MMBtu. Which is interesting, given for the past couple of months the price can’t get much above $2.50. Fitch must think the price will go quite a bit higher at some point this year in order to average out at $3.60 by year’s end.
Unfortunately, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) seems to have been co-opted by the Bidenistas. It used to be the EIA was independent no matter if Democrats or Republicans controlled the White House. Even when Obama occupied the White House, EIA remained independent. No longer. It’s evident in the EIA’s Annual Energy Outlook 2023, released yesterday, that things have changed at the EIA. Last year EIA showed a chart called U.S. energy consumption by fuel source, 2010-2050 (see 
New shale permits issued for Mar. 6-12 in the Marcellus/Utica increased by one from the prior week. There were 30 new permits issued in total last week, including 21 new permits for Pennsylvania, 5 new permits for Ohio, and 4 new permits issued in West Virginia. Last week the top receiver of new permits was EQT with 7 new permits–all of them (interestingly) issued in Lycoming County, PA. The second highest number of permits went to Repsol, with 6 permits in Bradford County, PA. Chesapeake Energy came in third with 5 permits for Bradford County, PA.
