U.S. LNG Exports Hit New Record-High in First Half of 2021
On Tuesday the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported that due to rising spot demand in both the winter and summer months from Asia and Europe, and lower natural gas prices here in the U.S. versus the price elsewhere, LNG exports in the U.S. hit record hights for the first half of this year. That’s good news for Marcellus/Utica drillers and landowners. LNG exports jumped to an average of 9.6 billion cubic feet per day (Bcf/d) between January and June 2021, up by 42% compared with the first half of 2020.
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Yesterday pipeline giant Williams released its 2020 Sustainability Report, which is another name for ESG (environmental, social, and governance). The company says it will be net carbon zero by 2050, but in the meantime, they will meet other important targets long before that date. While it would be easy to dismiss this report as yet another 126-page manifesto in gobbledegook aimed at placating the global warming gods, when we began to dig into the report we found some interesting bits of information and statistics.
Every now and again we’ll pick up and run a press release from a company looking to sell something to the M-U energy space. This is one of those times. We spotted a release from a company that has launched an online platform used by natural gas buyers to manage their purchases (i.e. trades). Mickey is an online commodities trading platform that connects buyers and sellers of natural gas (in addition to other commodities). Mickey’s platform enables domestic natural gas buyers to source supplies from small-to-medium-sized producers in the U.S. The platform currently offers energy supply sourcing in New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania–with plans to expand over time.
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: Equinor grows Marcellus output and NA natural gas fetches 53% price improvement; Ohio oil and gas industry continues to recover from pandemic; NATIONAL: Oil price increases as healthy demand decreases supply; Haaland accused of defying judge on oil leasing; The insult of favoring OPEC’s leaders over America’s energy workers; Natural gas-powered Class 8 trucks make sales gains in 2021; INTERNATIONAL: German emissions from electricity rose 25% in first half of 2021.
Range Resources, the very first company to sink a Marcellus Shale well (back in 2004), reported on second quarter results earlier this week. Range produced an average of 2.10 billion cubic feet equivalent per day (Bcfe/d) in 2Q, of which 31% was “liquids” or NGLs, like ethane and propane. In fact, Range’s NGL production was in the limelight, earning the company its highest price for NGLs ($27.92 per barrel) since 2014. However, even with the boost in NGL prices, the company still lost $156 million for the quarter, which is down slightly from losing $168 million in 2Q20. The company reports generating “significant” free cash flow.
In June MDN brought you the news that three Democrat judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit overturned a Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approval for a long-completed and flowing natural gas pipeline in the St. Louis area that flows Marcellus/Utica gas to residents, businesses, and electric generating plants throughout the region (see 
In May MDN brought you the news that Ohio mineral rights owner Gateway Royalty was sounding the alarm over a new bill quickly advancing in the Ohio legislature. House Bill (HB) 152 would use forced pooling if 65% of a proposed unit’s landowners are leased (too low a bar) and also would force the landowner to accept a 12.5% royalty and force them to accept post-production deductions with royalties in some cases potentially going down to nothing (see 
Expectations coming from Wall Street are that pure-play drillers, like many in the Marcellus/Utica, will show a turnaround in their financials for the second quarter of 2021. According to S&P, investors took drillers at their word last year that they won’t “drill baby drill” the way they have in years gone by. The stock prices of nearly all major M-U drillers have soared over the past 12 months as a result. The biggest turnaround has been Antero Resources. Its stock price is up nearly 400% over the past 12 months! Range Resources’ stock price is up 140%.
Only Pennsylvania issued new permits over the past week to drill shale wells. Both Ohio and West Virginia issued no new permits. New permits for PA were issued for Southwestern Energy (4 new permits), Laurel Mountain Production (3 new permits), and 1 new permit each for Cabot Oil & Gas, CNX Resources, and EQT (aka Rice Drilling).
In June the Ohio Oil & Gas Association (OOGA) held its 74th Annual Winter Meeting in Columbus. Yeah, you read that right. The Winter Meeting was moved to June this year due to COVID. As with previous annual OOGA meetings, one of the speakers was Martin Shumway, technical director at Locus Bio-Energy Solutions. Shumway shared details from the latest DeBrosse Memorial Report (full copy below). What does the report show for 2020? Ohio oil and natural gas production both experienced steep declines last year. Oil production was down 16% from 2019, and natural gas production was down 10% from 2019. Even though the production news for 2020 is negative, this report is jam-packed with terrific, very useful information about Ohio’s shale industry.
In June MDN brought you the news that Enbridge’s Texas Eastern Transmission (TETCO) pipeline is being flow-restricted by the Pipeline and Hazardous Material Safety Administration (PHMSA). Some 40% of the Marcellus/Utica molecules that flow through TETCO’s pipeline to destinations in the southeastern U.S. have disappeared and were predicted to stay that way until the end of September (see 
Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) had laid 31 miles of pipeline and had cut trees for 222 miles along the 600-mile route before Dominion Energy, the builder, decided last summer it no longer wanted to be in the interstate pipeline business, canceling ACP (see 
Yesterday PA Gov. Tom Wolf grabbed some headlines by having his Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) announce they will “soon” begin to require *all* landfills in the state to test leachate (water with nasty stuff in it that comes from landfills) for radioactivity. The Wolf DEP press release takes great pains to point out the new testing includes landfills “that accept unconventional oil and gas waste.” Which is the purpose of the announcement. To plant the seed that maybe, just maybe, drill cuttings are causing folks to glow in the dark. Radiation poisoning. Yet buried in the press release is this statement about a previous study of leachate from PA landfills with and without drill cuttings…