Antero Resources, one of the largest drillers in the Marcellus/Utica, working primarily in West Virginia, has just won a major sales tax case in the WV Supreme Court that affects the entire oil and gas industry, including M-U drillers.
Read More “Antero Resources Wins Important WV Tax Case Affecting All Drillers”
The Enverus U.S. rig count rose by 3 to 382 over the past week. Prior to that, the count rose by 20, 11, 11, and 13 for each of the four weeks prior, respectively. That’s up 58 rigs over the past five weeks! The Marcellus and Utica each remained constant last week (same as the week before), not adding and not dropping. The Marcellus stands at 27 rigs, and the Utica at 6.
Read More “Enverus U.S. Rig Count Up by 3 Last Wk, M-U Holds Steady at 33”
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: South Jersey Gas files petition for Infrastructure Investment Program; Farmers, consumers beware — natural gas foes have vision but no plan; NATIONAL: To achieve a true energy transition, America must discard green scams; Jeff Bezos announces first beneficiaries of his $10 billion climate fund; Why a Biden Administration threatens US energy security; US LPG arrivals to Asia in Dec to be around 2.7 million mt; INTERNATIONAL: Germany’s growing gas demand shows no signs of slowing.
Read More “Other Stories of Interest: Fri, Nov 20, 2020”
The Dept. of Energy’s National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) is actually five laboratories, including locations in Pittsburgh, PA, and Morgantown, WV. The current director is West Virginian Dr. Brian J. Anderson (great guy!). NETL recently published a notice on its website to talk about the “generational opportunity” to leverage the superabundance of natural gas in the Marcellus/Utica. NETL, says Anderson, is on the case and has a new initiative to leverage M-U gas.
Read More “NETL Creates New Initiative to Promote Uses for Marcellus/Utica Gas”
Eastern Shore Natural Gas Company (ESNG), a subsidiary of Chesapeake Utilities Corporation, filed a request with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) in Sept. 2018 to build 19+ miles of new pipeline, called the Del-Mar Energy Pathway Project, in Delaware and Maryland. Last week the Maryland Dept. of the Environment (MDE) approved the project. Now the project must pass by the Board of Public Works (BPW). We give it a 50/50 chance of getting approved by the three libs on the BPW.
Read More “Maryland Dept. of Environment OKs Tiny Pipeline in Eastern Shore”
We have a couple of important updates in the neverending saga of the biggest corruption scandal ever to hit Ohio. In July, then-Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder and four of his associates were indicted for felonies related to an alleged $60 million bribery scandal in passing the hugely unpopular House Bill 6 (see FirstEnergy Involved in Bribery Scheme to Pass $1B Nuke Bailout Law). Ohio’s Attorney General, Dave Yost, has just filed a second lawsuit to stop the collection of money from ratepayers that funds $150 million annual payments to FirstEnergy provided for under HB 6. We also have news about a potential sixth person being investigated for involvement in the scandal.
Read More “OH AG Files 2nd Lawsuit to Block FirstEnergy $150M Nuke Payments”
Monday night the radical Sierra Club hosted a virtual town hall in which people could complain about the Mariner East 2 (ME2) pipeline project. And complain they did. The aim of the virtual complaint session is to try and close down the already up-and-running ME pipelines (plural), and most particularly prevent the final bit of ME2X from getting completed. By airing sob stories, the Clubbers are hoping to bully the state Dept. of Environmental Protection and/or the Governor into blocking further work on the project–a project just a few months from being done.
Read More “Sierra Club Hosts 90-Min Online Mariner East Pipeline Kvetch”
In June, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA), in conjunction with the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA), published final rules to allow specially constructed tanker cars for railroads (DOT-113 tank cars) to ship LNG (see PHMSA and Fed Railroad Admin Publish Final LNG by Rail Regs). The new rules went into effect on August 24. A liberal Democrat Congressman from Rochester, NY, is now, months later, all of a sudden in a panic and asking the PHMSA and FRA to rescind the new rules.
Read More “Rochester, NY Congressman in a Panic Over LNG “Bomb Trains””
One of the things Ernest “Hair” Moniz (former Secretary of Energy under Barack Hussein Obama) did after leaving the government was to found a nonprofit clean energy think tank called The Energy Futures Initiative (EFI). EFI along with Energy and Environmental Economics (E3) has just released a report (below) which says, in part, natural gas will be needed to provide reliable energy supplies in New England, despite the region’s religious quest to “decarbonize.” This will not go down well with Bidenistas, especially if old Joe taps Moniz as his Secretary of Energy (as is being rumored).
Read More “Ernest Moniz: New England’s Zero Emissions Goal Requires NatGas”
NATIONAL: Committee sends FERC nominees Christie, Clements to full Senate; U.S. governors are seeking to control foreign policy via state pipeline permits; Slumping refined-product demand, economics, and fire force refinery closures; Rare-earth elements: a national security crisis; If the weather outlook remains bearish, we could see $2.45 for January gas prices; INTERNATIONAL: Britain will ban gasoline cars in 2030. Why are experts not impressed?
Read More “Other Stories of Interest: Thu, Nov 19, 2020”
We have sad news to report. Yesterday a 50-year-old man was unloading a large excavator off a trailer at natural gas well pad in Lycoming County, PA when the tailgate/ramp he was trying to lower knocked him to the ground and landed on his chest resulting in “traumatic asphyxiation.” We don’t have a lot of details, but we do have some…
Read More “Worker Killed Delivering Equipment to Well Pad in Lycoming County”
Last December MDN told you about a second natural gas-fired power plant planned for Charles City County, Va. (near Richmond) being developed by C4GT (see 2nd Gas-Fired Power Plant, Pipe Coming to Charles City County, VA). It appears the project is in trouble, which means a 24-mile pipeline to feed it is also in trouble. It is because of the pipeline and a regulatory filing that we know about the gas-fired plant’s troubles.
Read More “Va. NatGas Pipeline Project in Trouble, Gas-Fired Plant in Doubt”
On Monday we brought you the news that Gulfport Energy, the third-largest driller in the Ohio Utica Shale, had filed for bankruptcy over the weekend (see Gulfport Energy Files for Pre-arranged Chapter 11 Bankruptcy). The company issued an update yesterday to say federal bankruptcy court has approved its “first day” motions that allow Gulfport to borrow more money, pay certain people, etc.
We have an update (11/19/20) below.
Read More “Gulfport Energy Looks to Cancel Pipeline Contracts via Bankruptcy”
The Pennsylvania Senate previously passed and yesterday “concurred” (signed-off on) Senate Bill 790, sending it to Gov. Tom Wolf for his signature. SB 790 restores sanity to regulations for conventional oil and gas drillers in the Keystone State. Unfortunately, Gov. Wolf has stubbornly said he will veto this common sense bill. Why are we not surprised?
Read More “PA Lawmakers Send Bill Splitting Conventional & Shale Regs to Gov”
Yesterday Rising Phoenix Royalties (RPR) announced it has purchased the future royalty payments from a landowner in the Utica Shale, in Monroe County, OH. This acquisition is RPR’s third Marcellus/Utica transaction this year.
Read More “Rising Phoenix Royalties Buys Royalty Payments from OH Landowner”
An interesting week for permits. Last week Pennsylvania issued just 2 new shale well drilling permits after having issued 3 the week before (lowest numbers we’ve seen). Ohio, which has not issued many permits in recent months, was on fire last week with 17 new shale permits! West Virginia issued just 1 new shale well permit.
Read More “Weekly Shale Drilling Permits for PA, OH, WV: Nov. 9-13”