95% of All West Virginia Oil & Gas Comes from Fracked Wells
Charlie Burd, executive director of the Gas & Oil Association of West Virginia, gave an update on the state’s oil and gas industry to the members of the West Virginia Legislature’s Joint Standing Committee on Energy on Tuesday. Burd (a Democrat) sang the praises of hydraulic fracturing. In 2020, more than 95% of the 2.5 trillion cubic feet of natural gas produced in West Virginia came from horizontal drilling, according to Burd. We discovered some interesting statistics from Burd on the state’s oil and gas industry…
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Small investors have a golden opportunity. Oil and gas companies (drillers in particular) are more profitable than ever, yet many large investors are avoiding and will not invest in them. Why? Because they’re idiots? Well, yes, that’s one reason. But the root cause is they have been cowed by loud-mouthed environmental extremists. Threatened by them. Oil and gas companies are still here, still providing a critical service to the world, and still need investors. That’s a great opportunity for small investors–like you.
Joe Biden is completely inept. Everyone can see it, whether they publicly admit it or not. He’s blown it. For any given decision he’s made, he’s made the wrong decision 100% of the time. Yesterday we told you about Biden’s preference for OPEC oil over American oil (see 
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: Commissioners approve natural gas pipeline extension; NATIONAL: USA consumers to pay more for energy this winter; Totalitarianism ascends as civil society withers on the vine; The U.S. shale industry desperately needs to drill; INTERNATIONAL: IEA says anti-gas climate policies didn’t cause Europe’s gas crisis; Putin: US partly to blame for European gas shortages.
EQT CEO Toby Rice laid the blame for the developing world energy crisis, particularly Europe’s lack of access to natural gas, at the feet of radical environmentalists. If not for the radicals and their constant frivolous lawsuits blocking pipelines and LNG export facilities, such infrastructure would already have been built and would be providing abundant, cheap, clean-burning Marcellus/Utica natural gas to other regions of the U.S. and to Europe.
In recent weeks we’ve been asked the same question by MDN subscribers several times: “With the price of natural gas through the roof, why aren’t Marcellus/Utica drillers drilling more?” In a word, it’s because of hedging. Most drillers have hedged, or pre-sold under contract, most of the output they plan to produce for the balance of this year–at prices MUCH lower than those we’re seeing right now. There is no incentive to drill more. “Fine, but couldn’t they just drill more and sell the new output that’s not hedged at the higher spot prices we see now?” They could, except to drill more means they need more capital (money) to do the drilling, violating their announced budgets (their “guidance”) and violating the expectations of touchy investors and stockholders. Public companies are boxed in. Their hands are tied.
Remember back in May 2019 (the good old days, prior to hyperinflation, gasoline prices through the roof, electric and natgas prices through the roof) when Rick Perry (an actual, thinking adult) was Secretary of Energy and he and others at DOE referred to LNG exports as “molecules of U.S. freedom”? The Democrat media (i.e. mainstream media) went berserk. The arrogant “reporters” at the New York Times, Washington Post, Slate, NBC, CBS, ABC, et al ad nauseum pilloried and guffawed and maligned and ridiculed Perry and DOE for referring to U.S. LNG exports as “freedom gas” and “molecules of freedom” (
Both U.S. President Joe Biden and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson have essentially steered their respective countries off the road and into an energy ditch. Perhaps Johnson can be forgiven for simply following existing policies and kowtowing to European environmental extremists. Biden has no such excuse. Biden inherited a country that was, after more than 50 years, energy independent. In the space of eight months, Biden turned our country into an energy-dependent nation once again–relying on our enemies (Saudi Arabia and Russia) to provide for our energy needs. How sad.
Last week Pennsylvania was back on its game, issuing 22 permits to drill new shale wells. Most of the permits in PA were for three well pads by three different operators: Seneca Resources, Repsol, and EQT. Ohio issued just two new permits to Gulfport Energy for the same well pad in Belmont County. West Virginia issued four new permits, three of them to Southwest Energy and one to Antero Resources.
Well permits, long tracked by MDN, are a leading indicator of drilling activity. In Pennsylvania, four of the state’s five biggest producers–EQT, Chesapeake Energy, Range Resources, and Southwestern Energy–have kept the pace of drilling new wells “subdued” according to an analysis by S&P Global Market Intelligence. The top five producers in PA accounted for only 51% of the permits issued in September, down from 53% in August. Normally, the top five drillers account for roughly two-thirds of permits issued each month.
Last week we told you about the uber-sleazy Attorney General in Pennsylvania, Josh Shapiro, handing down an indictment with 48 counts against Energy Transfer over (mostly) drilling mud spills–accidents that were previously addressed and handled by the state Dept. of Environmental Protection (see 
According to a Bloomberg article, the energy crisis that’s led to electricity shortages and blackouts in Europe and Asia may be heading for the U.S. Utilities in New York and New England are warning customers to expect higher residential heating bills this winter due to surging global natural gas demand and prices. The fact is the U.S. has plenty of natural gas. The problem with high prices and potential outages is lack of pipelines to flow natural gas from where it’s extracted to where it’s used.