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Weekly Shale Drilling Permits for PA, OH, WV: Dec 7-11
Last week Pennsylvania issued 21 new shale well drilling permits scattered across both northeast and southwest PA. Ohio issued 5 new shale well permits, all of them to the same company and the same well pad. West Virginia issued 3 new shale well permits, all in different counties.
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MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: Brooke County Board of Education approves lease; OTHER U.S. REGIONS: California’s natural gas bans are drawing fire from black and Latino leaders; NATIONAL: TC Energy to acquire all outstanding common units of TC PipeLines, LP; Another green subsidy bust from Obama/Biden; Gina McCarthy emerges as top choice for climate adviser; U.S. shale should be worried about ‘very aggressive’ policies coming from Washington; INTERNATIONAL: China buying more U.S. LNG to meet winter demand, but still far below phase one targets; As people rush for their Christmas shopping, young say no to fast fashion.
By now it’s a cliche to say that 2020 has been an exceptional year–and not in a good way. For the first time in our memory of writing MDN, we witnessed widespread curtailments or “shut-ins” of wells in the Marcellus/Utica during 2020. That is, drillers voluntarily turned the values off and flowed less gas in a bid to (a) not sell the gas at prices that don’t return a profit, and (b) drive up the price of gas (see 
Yesterday our favorite government agency, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), published our favorite monthly report, the Drilling Productivity Report (DPR). The latest DPR, which shows estimates for oil and gas production from the seven largest shale plays in the U.S., shows a drop in shale gas production across all plays (including the Marcellus/Utica)–except for a slight production increase in the Haynesville–coming next month in January. The M-U is forecast to drop another 154 million cubic feet per day (MMcf/d) from production levels in December.
Each year S&P Global Platts hosts its “Global Energy Outlook Forum” in New York City, an event we always look forward to attending. The Forum assembles some of the best thinkers and industry participants from across all energy sectors to discuss what happened during the previous year, and what’s on the way next year and down the road with respect to energy. All kinds of energy. This year, given COVID-19, there was no Forum. However, Platts did release its 2021 Energy Outlook yesterday.
UGI Corporation, which operates natural gas and electric utilities in Pennsylvania and midstream (pipeline) assets in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia, has just become the newest member of Our Nation’s Energy Future (
The U.S. Forest Service (USFS) issued an environmental impact statement (EIS) on Friday that supports plans for Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) to run through 3.5 miles of woodlands, and under the Appalachian Trail, in the Jefferson National Forest in Monroe County in West Virginia, in and Giles and Montgomery counties in Virginia. This is one of the few items remaining on the MVP checklist before completing the project which is already 92% built and in the ground.
We’re coining a new phrase here on MDN today: Marcellus-to-Marijuana, or M2M. (We’re trying not to giggle as we write this.) A “medical marijuana” facility in Perry County, PA (pot growing plant in MDN vernacular) will receive liquefied natural gas (LNG) beginning next year. There are no in-the-ground pipelines in the area, so the production plant, located in the Perry Innovation Park (near Harrisburg), will begin receiving PA Marcellus gas in the form of LNG next year delivered by tractor-trailers–a “virtual pipeline.”
Energy Transfer’s (ET) Revolution Pipeline runs through Bulter, Beaver, Allegheny, and Washington counties in southwest PA. The 24-inch gathering pipeline shifted and exploded in September 2018, just as it was entering service (see 
There is an ongoing question of whether or not the Ohio Marketable Titles Act (MTA), which impacts Utica shale rights, can be used to return previously severed mineral rights back to a surface landowner, or whether the MTA is superseded by the Ohio Dormant Minerals Act (DMA). In February 2019, Ohio’s Seventh District Court of Appeals said the MTA *does* still apply to mineral rights. The Seventh Circuit then ruled in a second case in April 2019, reaffirming yet again that yes, MTA applies to mineral rights. The Seventh Circuit ruled in a third case in October 2019 to say YES, the MTA still applies. In April, the Ohio Supreme Court agreed to hear and rule on the matter too (see 
In 2018 Kimberly-Clark announced the company would build a Marcellus gas-fired electric plant in Delaware County (near Philadelphia) to power its plant that manufactures Scott 1000 toilet paper (see 