Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Energy Services | Equitrans/EQT Midstream | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pipelines
Big Green Loses Federal Lawsuit to Block MVP from Finishing
In January several Big Green groups, including the odious Sierra Club, asked the Democrat judges on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals to overturn a FERC order from last December that allows the 92% complete Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) to resume certain portions of construction (see Big Green Groups Sue FERC to Block MVP from Finishing). What do you know? The Democrat judges on the D.C. Circuit turned down the request by Big Green.
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There’s nothing like changing the rules of the game after the game is done and over. Sounds like something a petulant child would do, but in this case the petulant child is the Democrat-controlled Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) potentially rewriting rules (after the game was played) in an attempt to shut down a brand new, state-of-the-art, fully functional compressor station that’s delivering 133 MMcf/d (million cubic feet per day) of extra natural gas supply to New England and beyond. Welcome to the dystopian world of Joe Biden and Dick Glick.
Newly appointed Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) Chairman Richard “Dick” Glick continues to wreak havoc on the natural gas pipeline sector. Since he was first appointed by Donald Trump more than three years ago, Democrat Glick has voted against every new pipeline project to come before him. Now he wants to rewrite the rules so future FERC commissioners will be handcuffed, binding them to a policy that requires them to reject new pipeline projects long after Glick has exited stage left.
While the recent spike over the past week in natural gas prices was a fluke, an anomaly due to a rare snow and freezing cold event in the nation’s southwest and Midcontinent regions, the long-term price of natural gas has not moved all that much. The NYMEX futures prices for natgas month by month for the foreseeable future has stayed under or just above the $3/MMBtu mark. Yet we continue to see predictions of alarm that we’re heading for a natgas shortage and with it, a rise in gas prices.
It really is frightening how stupid some of our nation’s leaders really are. They don’t even understand basic economics 101 (they likely never took the class in college). Example: U.S. Sen. Tina Smith from Minnesota (Democrat) who wants federal regulators to investigate the recent spike in natural gas prices, which soared to record levels–into the hundreds of dollars per Mcf. Smith apparently doesn’t understand simple economics and the law of supply and demand.
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: Natural gas is a cornerstone for climate, economic progress; DEP awards $250,000 to Moon Township Sheetz for 4 fast-charging plugs for electric cars; OTHER U.S. REGIONS: Amid Texas freeze, oil producers still shut; governor bans natural gas exports; A dangerous narrative emerges in the wake of Texas power blackouts; NATIONAL: Rep. Haaland’s Interior Secretary confirmation hearing: 6 key questions; The merger wave in the oil patch starts heading midstream; INTERNATIONAL: Is another LNG glut looming?; US LNG exports to China may drop.
Antero Resources, one of the largest drillers in the Marcellus/Utica (working primarily in West Virginia) issued its 4Q and full-year 2020 update yesterday. During 4Q Antero pumped an amazing 3.65 billion cubic feet per day equivalent (Bcfe/d) of natural gas. Antero is the third-largest producer of natural gas in the U.S. The company drills in the wet gas region and reports selling 132,000 barrels per day of NGLs to both Marcus Hook (near Philadelphia) and Hopedale (in Ohio). Antero is the second-largest NGL producer in the U.S.
Last August we told you about the politically-motivated prosecution (by the Chester County, PA District Attorney’s office) of men connected to a security firm providing off-duty constables to protect Mariner East 2 (ME2) pipeline construction sites (see 
Pennsylvania’s Independent Regulatory Review Commission (IRRC) has just thrown up a huge roadblock to Democrat/autocrat PA Gov. Tom Wolf’s attempt to railroad through a proposal to force PA to join the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), a $2.6 billion carbon tax aimed at killing coal and gas-fired power plants. The IRRC told the rule-adopting Environmental Quality Board (EQB) it should delay adoption of the proposed RGGI regulation by one year, from 2022 to 2023.
The Enverus U.S. rig count numbers continued to climb over the past week, even during the extreme cold snap and winter weather that shut down wide swaths of the economy in Texas, Oklahoma, and Louisiana. The rig count grew by four to 461 for the week ending Feb. 17. The Permian, which has added the most rigs in recent months, fell by 3 active rigs last week, but that was made up by several other plays, including the Marcellus which gained one rig in the dry gas region of northeastern PA.
Yesterday the country’s largest natural gas producer, EQT Corporation, released its 4Q and full-year 2020 update, holding a conference call with analysts to discuss the results. The update shows the company produced an average of 4.45 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d) of natural gas in 4Q. Although there was plenty of “free cash flow” for the year, on paper the company lost $967 million in 2020, which is an improvement over the year before when it lost $1.2 billion. Perhaps the biggest news (for us) coming from yesterday’s update is that in 4Q EQT turned its drilling attention to the West Virginia Marcellus. EQT plans to do much more drilling in WV this year too.
Pipeline giant Energy Transfer made quite a splash yesterday during its 4Q and full-year 2020 update by announcing the company has cut a deal to buy Enable Midstream for $7.2 billion. That deal, while important, has nothing to do with the M-U region. We were interested in talk about the company’s Mariner East (ME) pipeline system and Marcus Hook terminal–and there was plenty of talk about those important assets too. Co-CEO Tom Long said he expects the last pieces of ME to finally be done in the second quarter of this year.
What is it with the recalcitrant members of the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC)? As we told you a few weeks ago, the DRBC is being sued by a Wayne County, PA landowner–who stands an excellent chance of winning (see