PA PUC Approves Aqua America Purchase of Peoples Gas for $4.3B
Aqua America, the nation’s second-largest water/wastewater utility company headquartered near Philadelphia, announced in October 2018 it would buy Peoples Gas, the nation’s fifth-largest natural gas utility company headquartered in Pittsburgh, for $4.275 billion (see Aqua America Buys Peoples Gas for $4.3B – Old Pipes, Similar Nature). It took a while, but the last hurdle was cleared yesterday when the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission gave its blessing on the deal.
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We’ve often said if we could have anyone else’s brain who writes about the Marcellus/Utica, it would be Tom Shepstone’s brain. Tom, who has become a good friend over the years, writes the 
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: Tenaska offering scholarships to students from Belle Vernon, Yough; Steel Nation names director of business development; OTHER U.S. REGIONS: Wisconsin regulators approve Superior natural gas plant; Exxon says Mass. AG timed climate suit with NY trial; Harvard students [enviro fascists] threaten to boycott Paul Weiss over Exxon; NATIONAL: U.S. natural gas exports to grow with new LNG capacity start-ups; EIA forecasts slower growth in natural gas-fired generation while renewable energy rises; Trade deal for now unlikely to give U.S. LNG exports a boost; US oil, gas rig count rises by five to 840; Growing gap in U.S. natural gas hub prices blamed on Louisiana pipeline congestion; Energy companies seize the day with bond refinancings; INTERNATIONAL: New Panama Canal fees not seen dampening U.S. LNG exports; Swedes vote climate policy biggest waste of taxpayer money in 2019.
The annual 60-day legislative session in WV is now under way, beginning Jan. 8. The first bill of consequence introduced that would impact/help the oil and gas industry was House Bill (HB) 4001, designed to kick start a regional NGL hub and reassure China it’s OK to invest some of those promised $84 billion in the Mountain State (see 
Yes, 2019 was a tough year here in the Marcellus/Utica shale due to low natural gas prices drillers received for their gas. The U.S. Energy Information Administration says the average spot price for natural gas at the benchmark Henry Hub was $2.57 per million BTUs (MMBtu) in 2019. But the news gets worse. EIA says that in 2020, because of increasing natgas production without a corresponding increase in demand, they predict this year’s average HH price will sink to $2.33/MMBtu. That’s 9% lower this year than last.
Last August MDN told you about a project in Keene, NH to convert an existing (antiquated) propane delivery system for the 1,200 customers in Keene over to cheaper, more abundant natural gas (see 
Yesterday MDN told you that 16 highly partisan, far-left Democrat attorneys general had filed comments opposing President Trump’s plan to allow LNG (liquefied natural gas) to be transported by special rail cars (see 
On Monday EQT, the nation’s largest natural gas producer (based in Pittsburgh) filed an update with the SEC to say it would write down the value (called an impairment) for some of it’s Marcellus/Utica assets–to the tune of $1.8 billion (see 
A slight tweak and correction to a story we ran last week in which we speculated that the first four mini-trains at Kinder Morgan’s Elba Island LNG export facility are now up and running (see 
In December, Blackstone Infrastructure Partners, a major energy investment firm, announced it had cut a deal to buy the remaining shares of stock it doesn’t already own in Tallgrass Energy for $3 billion, with a plan to take the company private (see 
Last April President Trump issued an Executive Order directing the Secretary of Transportation to write a new rule allowing specially constructed tanker cars for railroads (DOT-113 tank cars) to ship LNG, i.e., liquefied natural gas (see