Energy Transfer: Mariner East Volumes Up in 2Q, Project Done in 4Q
Remember Winter Storm Uri, the big storm that knocked out power and halted the distribution of natural gas in Texas in February? It led to the highest prices for natural gas ever seen–in some cases over $1,000/MMBtu (see Cash NatGas Price in Oklahoma Hits $999/MMBtu; M-U Thru Roof Too). The storm was a disaster for many people, but not for pipeline giant Energy Transfer (ET). During ET’s second quarter update, company officials said Uri netted the company an extra $2.4 billion in revenue. But it’s not Uri nor frankly other regions of the country we’re concerned with when it comes to ET. The main thing we want to know about is the status of finishing up ET’s Mariner East 2 (ME2) pipeline project.
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MDN previously told you about so-called environmentalists filing a lawsuit to block the construction of an LNG unloading facility in Greenpoint, Brooklyn (see 
In something of a strange twist, the Bloomberg News service is sounding the alarm that the world is headed for a shortage of natural gas. Bloomberg hates fossil fuels and anything to do with them. Yet they now sense an impending shortage of natural gas and it’s causing the Bloomies some existential angst. Bloomberg reports natgas prices in Europe have “surged more than 1,000%” since May 2020 with no end in sight. Earth to Bloomberg: Europe has no one to blame but themselves. They don’t want our “fracked gas.” Let them buy Putin’s pipelined gas at extortionist rates.
The latest weekly Enverus U.S. rig count shows total rigs in use recovering to within one rig of a post-pandemic high. For the week ending August 4, the rig count stood at 603, up 4 rigs from last week. The Marcellus play lost one rig from the previous week, while the Utica picked up one rig. Collectively the M-U is currently running 45 rigs, the same level as the previous two weeks.
NATIONAL: Biden administration sets USA clean car goal; US working natural gas volumes in underground storage increase 13 Bcf; Senate Democrats to introduce measure taxing major polluters.
Last December MDN told you that a REV LNG small-scale LNG facility near Towanda (in Wyalusing, Bradford County, PA), had successfully supplied LNG to support the bunkering of a marine vessel at the Port of Hamilton in Ontario (see 
Equitrans Midstream issued its second quarter update earlier this week. Naturally, all eyes were on information and updates related to the company’s 303-mile Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) from West Virginia to Virginia, which is now 92% complete. We have an update on MVP. However, it was a stray comment by Diana Charletta, President and COO, that caught our attention. Equitrans recently conducted an open season related to the Equitrans pipeline, looking to expand capacity along the pipeline to the Midwest and Gulf Coast.
Northeast Pennsylvania high schoolers are getting a look at what a career in the shale energy field looks like. The Susquehanna County Career and Technology Center in Dimock, in cooperation with Cabot Oil & Gas, is hosting its annual week-long Energy and Oilfield Career Experience summer camp. Susquehanna County, the only county where Cabot drills, is the #1 producer of natural gas in PA. Has been for years.
No doubt you’ve heard plenty in mainstream media recently about the $1 trillion so-called infrastructure bill currently being debated in Congress. What the mainstream media won’t tell you is the truth–that this bill is incredibly bad for the country in its current form. The bill includes measures allowing more federal control over state and local building codes to force everyone to adopt Biden’s “appliance electrification” plan by discouraging the use of natural gas in homes and businesses. Yes, Biden plans to phase out your right to burn natural gas in your furnace and in your stove. Welcome to the USSR.
Each quarter the Ohio Dept. of Natural Resources (ODNR) issues an update on Utica (and Marcellus) oil and natural gas production. ODNR no longer issues a summary press release as they once did, which means we don’t automatically notice when quarterly updates appear on their website. ODNR publishes a detailed spreadsheet of all active wells showing oil and gas production by well. We make a copy of that spreadsheet, enhance it to make it more usable, and link to it. We also do our own sorting to show you the top 25 shale gas wells and top 25 shale oil wells. An astute MDN reader inquired about the report for 1Q21, which is now available. We’ve created our own version of their report and have some exciting news to share about 1Q21 results. Oil is back, in a big way, in the northern Utica!