Well Done Foundation Sets Up PA Office for Orphan Well Plugging
One month ago Seneca Resources paid to have a century-old conventional well plugged in McKean County, PA (see Seneca Sponsors Plugging of Century-Old Orphan Well in McKean, PA). It was a well Seneca did not drill and has no responsibility to plug. Yet they did. Kudos to them. The organization that oversaw the plugging operation is the Well Done Foundation (WDF), founded in Montana in 2019. Given the enormity of the issue in PA (over 200,000 orphaned and abandoned wells), the WDF has set up a regional office in State College, PA, and intends to have a big presence and impact in the Keystone State in the coming years.
Read More “Well Done Foundation Sets Up PA Office for Orphan Well Plugging”
As Joe Biden and his inept White House cast about for someone or something to blame for his policies that are causing a spike in energy prices here in the U.S., one of the potential targets is LNG exports. Some lefties in Washington are making noises that if we limit or even cancel LNG exports, that would bring down natural gas prices here at home. According to the Executive Director of the Center for LNG (CLNG), that’s just not true.
Last week Pennsylvania issued 14 permits to drill new shale wells scattered around the state. The permits were issued to Chesapeake Energy, EQT, EXCO Resources, Chief Oil & Gas, and Southwestern Energy. Ohio issued five new permits in two counties, but all of them were issued to Ascent Resources. West Virginia issued just one new permit in a county we don’t often see in the list: Marion. The single WV permit was issued to EQT.
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: Biden taking social services, climate pitch to Pennsylvania; New ‘Joe Biden highway’ in Pa. defaced by vulgar graffiti: ‘We can do better’; Natural gas saves Pa. residents thousands; OTHER U.S. REGIONS: Drilling and completion improvements support Permian Basin hydrocarbon production; NATIONAL: Energy crisis makes multi-year contracts fashionable again; Banks loosen purse strings for shale drillers amid oil rally; Energy crisis 2021: How bad is it, and how long will it last?; Energy crisis threatens return of 1970s inflation; INTERNATIONAL: Study: Fossil fuel plans would far overshoot climate goals.
In September MDN broke the news that Rockdale Marcellus had filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania (see 
The benchmark NYMEX natural gas futures price at the Henry Hub lost ground for the second day yesterday, slipping below $5/MMBtu for the first time in nearly a month. The NYMEX was down 69.80 cents or 12.27% over the last two trading sessions. Ouch. However, we shouldn’t be surprised. And we don’t expect it to stay down long. The main reason for the loss is the weather–as in the forecast says we can expect warmer weather will be with us, at least in the northeast, until early November.
S&P Global Platts and Xpansiv have joined forces to launch a new benchmark for methane performance in natural gas production in the United States. Methane Performance Certificates (MPCs) allow a U.S. shale producer to sell instruments representing zero methane emission natural gas production. Our immediate impression was to think of medieval-era indulgences sold to atone for sins.
Hedging, in the case of natural gas produced by big drillers like EQT Corporation, is when the company presells the production it will make (in the future) under contract at a specific price. Typically companies like EQT will hedge production for up to a year, sometimes more, in advance. It’s a way of protecting revenue from production in case prices sink below a certain level. The problem with hedging is you are locked in when the price goes up and stays up, like the price for natgas has done over the past several months. According to Bloomberg, EQT’s hedges could cost the company “more than $5 billion through the end of next year.” Ouch. CEO Toby Rice openly admits the company guessed wrong on its hedges.
A group of hardened leftist Democrat Pennsylvania legislators, in a coordinated attack with the state’s horrible Attorney General, Josh Shapiro, are making a play to shut down the fully operational Mariner East pipeline system. Two weeks ago Shapiro, who is running for governor next year, indicted Energy Transfer’s Mariner East 2 (ME2) pipeline project with 48 so-called environmental crimes (see