New WV Forced Pooling Bill Moves Rapidly, Up for Full Senate Vote
Will this finally be the year that West Virginia has a new forced pooling bill passed into law? Quite possibly, given the supersonic speed with which Senate Bill (SB) 694 was introduced and, without any discussion, passed through the Senate Finance Committee (at the last possible moment), and sent on to the full Senate for a vote. Of course, the bill still has to go to the WV House. SB 694 is complicated, but this time the bill appears to have widespread support, not only from drillers but from royalty owners too.
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A second bill related to mineral and landowner rights holders rocketed through the West Virginia Senate, passing the full Senate by 29-5 vote on Wednesday. Senate Bill (SB) 650 tweaks a previously passed bill signed into law in 2018 concerning co-tenancy (see 
Coterra Energy, the result of Permian oil driller Cimarex Energy buying out and merging with Marcellus driller Cabot Oil & Gas, issued its first fully combined quarterly update yesterday. The two companies merged at the beginning of fourth quarter 2021 (see 
The Washington County, PA Chamber of Commerce held its State of The Economy event yesterday. One of the speakers, Denise Brinley (former executive director of Pennsylvania’s Office of Energy) said that southwestern Pennsylvania and the Pittsburgh region is a prime prospect to take advantage of establishing a $2 billion hydrogen hub. Western PA is in the “bullseye” of why funding was included in the recent federal infrastructure bill to establish four such hubs nationally, according to Brinley.
Because of the cold weather in the northeast and in other parts of the country in the first part of February, natural gas production in the U.S. took a nosedive, declining to roughly 85.8 Bcf/d. With the warmer weather unthawing the freeze-offs that happened, a few days ago production soared over 94.6 Bcf/d–the highest it has been in seven weeks. According to S&P, with the coldest days of winter behind us, all the signs are in place for natgas production to continue growing over the coming weeks and months.
Interstate pipelines are pipelines that cross state boundaries. They are regulated (approved by) the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC). Each year new pipelines are added, or existing pipelines expanded, to flow ever-more natural gas across our great country. Some years those additions of new capacity are higher, and some years lower. We think it’s no coincidence that in 2021, the first full year of Joe Biden’s assault on the oil and gas industry, new pipeline capacity to flow natural gas grew at its lowest rate since the bad Obama years.
OTHER U.S. REGIONS: Cheniere and EOG extend long-term LNG supply deal; Chevron targets 5 U.S. well sites in project to curb emissions; NATIONAL: Standing up to putin means ditching net-zero; N. America’s old pipelines seek new life moving carbon in climate push; US LNG exports down by five from last week; INTERNATIONAL: Well-known former Marcellus exec now working in war zone in Ukraine.
Range Resources, the very first company to sink a Marcellus well back in 2004, issued its fourth quarter and full-year 2021 update yesterday. The update includes a preview of what’s ahead for 2022. Among the blockbuster news is that after five years, Range, which has long specialized in drilling “wet gas” wells in southeastern Pennsylvania, is returning to northeastern PA this year to drill some dry gas wells. Why? The economics are there, says Dennis Degner, Range’s COO and top driller.
Pipeline and midstream giant Williams issued its quarterly and full-year update earlier this week. The company, which owns and operates the massive Transco pipeline system, reported new all-time highs for both gathering volumes (13.9 Bcf/d), and transmission volumes (23.8 Bcf/d). CEO Alan Armstrong said on a call with analysts, “We really continue to fire on all cylinders.” Indeed they do.
The West Virginia Public Energy Authority is a seven-member board that aims to make the best use of WV’s abundant natural energy resources. State code gives the board power to buy, lease, and issue bonds to build electric power plants and natural gas transmission projects. Gov. Jim Justice reactivated the board last summer after it had been dormant for upwards of a decade. The first meeting of the new board was held yesterday. Our sense is that the board is still trying to figure out what the heck it’s supposed to do.
Penn State has launched a new research project to see if it can prove there is a link between water contamination in southwestern Pennsylvania and fracking. We’ve seen this movie before…or have we? In 2018 PA Gov. Tom Wolf, a liberal Democrat who sometimes supports the shale gas industry (as long as he can tax it) caved to demands from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette to launch a “study” in a bid to “prove” cases of rare childhood cancer in southwestern PA can be tied to shale drilling in the region (see 
A Forbes article caught our eye and we had to do a double-take. Two liberals from the Left Coast, professors at the University of Washington, Seattle, wrote an honest and transparent article about how the crisis in Ukraine is making their fellow liberals take an honest, probing look at the policies they advocate for. Renewables, which the two profs support, are not enough to power the world today. Not in the real world of 2022 with Vlad Putin threatening to overrun half of Europe.
All eyes were on Equitrans Midstream as the company released its fourth quarter and full-year 2021 update yesterday. The reason all eyes were on Equitrans is MVP–the Mountain Valley Pipeline project. MVP simply can’t move beyond the leftist Democrat judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. Every time Big Green groups, including the Sierra Club (funded in part with foreign money) challenges permits for MVP, the Democrat judges of the 4th Circuit go along and overturn the permits (see 