Empire Pipeline LLC, based in New Orleans, Louisiana, NOT to be confused with the National Fuel Gas Company subsidiary Empire Pipeline (in NY and PA), has purchased “an operational and financial interest” in TROO Clean Environmental LLC, based in Belmont County, Ohio. TROO provides recycling of Marcellus/Utica frack wastewater.
Read More “Louisiana’s Empire Pipeline Buys Ohio Frack Water Recycler TROO”
In February, the parent holding company for Marcellus driller Arsenal Resources, Arsenal Energy Holdings LLC, applied for what has to be the fastest “prepackaged bankruptcy” we’ve ever heard of, sailing through the whole process in 10 days flat (see Arsenal Energy Exits Bankruptcy in 10 Days Flat). Less than 10 months later the company headed back into bankruptcy. However, this time it is Arsenal Resources, the driller itself (not the holding company) that filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy (see Arsenal Heads into Chapter 11 Bankruptcy for Second Time). The good news for Arsenal is that a Delaware bankruptcy court judge has approved their plan.
Read More “Arsenal Resources Ch. 11 Bankruptcy Plan Approved by Court”
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: Equitrans hopes fair deal with EQT coming over contract renegotiation; Tom Linzey and his CELDF at war over corporate greed; NATIONAL: Biden willing to cut hundreds of thousands of oil and natural gas jobs; Energy billionaire asks Sen Warren to visit Oklahoma oil fields; Don’t bet on a natural gas price rebound; US oil, gas rig count rises for second straight week; INTERNATIONAL: European LNG imports hit record levels.
Read More “Shale Energy Stories of Interest: Fri, Dec 20, 2019”
In what has become an ongoing pattern, THE Delaware Riverkeeper (aka Maya van Rossum) has lost yet another lawsuit (in federal court) against a pipeline project–in this case the Millennium Pipeline expansion project called the Eastern System Upgrade.
Read More “Fed Court Tosses Dela. Riverkeeper Lawsuit Against Millennium Pipe”
The Ohio Oil and Gas Energy Education Program (OOGEEP), a nonprofit energy education and public outreach organization, recently commissioned a poll of Ohio voters in eight eastern counties–in the Ohio Valley area. The counties surveyed include those with the most active Utica Shale drilling in the state. The poll asked residents’ about their views on shale drilling and its related activities. Some 88% said the natural gas and oil industry is important to their community, and 78% support natural gas and oil development in the Ohio Valley area.
Read More “78% of Southeast Ohio Voters Support Utica Shale Drilling”
Delays in building new pipelines, like the PennEast Pipeline, have real, tangible costs for natural gas customers. In the case of PennEast, natgas customers in southeastern Pennsylvania and New Jersey are paying billions in higher gas costs because PennEast is not yet built. Even worse, there’s a looming shortage coming in New Jersey.
Read More “Lack of PennEast Pipe Costing PA/NJ Ratepayers $ Billions”
Superior Energy Services, based in Houston, Texas, is an oilfield services company with service lines including: rig services, coiled tubing, wireline, pressure control, flowback, fluid management and accommodations. Once upon a time Superior had a meaningful presence in the Marcellus/Utica. Superior just announced it is shedding its onshore shale business lines, separating them out and merging them with another company, Forbes Energy Services. What’s left of Superior will concentrate on offshore and international oil and gas markets.
Read More “Superior Energy Dumps Onshore Shale Biz, Targets Offshore & Intl”
This is so outrageous we don’t even have words for it. New York State’s highest court, with its judges appointed by Gov. Cuomo, ruled in 2014 that local municipal “home rule” laws to block fracking are just fine (see Shale Drilling in NY is Over – High Court Upholds Town Bans). Yet another group of Cuomo appointees–who sit on the New York State Board on Electric Generation Siting and the Environment–have just ruled that a NY town’s recently enacted wind law was passed too late in the process, so its conditions do not apply to the current wind project developer. This is NOT justice. THIS IS WRONG. We have some advice for other Upstate NY towns (important advice) based on this miscarriage of justice.
Please see our update at the bottom about the home rule issue.
Read More “NY’s Uneven Treatment of Wind Energy vs. Natural Gas Fracking”
New York State is experiencing the worst possible nightmare–and we can’t wake up. Following the November 2018 election, Democrats now control not only the governorship, but also both houses of the legislature–for the first time since 1964. Sure we’ve always had a Democrat-controlled Assembly (the lower chamber), but the Senate stayed in Republican hands, providing a check against rampant socialism. That check and balance disappeared beginning this year and the state’s far-left Democrats have used it to great advantage. Many of our Constitutional freedoms have disappeared *this year* in NY State. It’s sad and tragic. Before the Senate changes back to Republican control in the future, the state’s radicalized Democrats want to pass a permanent (instead of the existing temporary) ban on fracking statewide.
Read More “Radical Dems in NY Legislature Aim to Make Frack Ban Permanent”
In a bombshell announcement last week Chevron said it is writing down (reducing the paper value) of all its shale assets by $10-$11 billion in the fourth quarter. “More than half” of the write-down is for its Marcellus/Utica assets (see Chevron Writes Down $5B+ in Marc/Utica Assets, Looks to Sell All). In addition, the company has put all of it’s M-U assets on the market for sale (see Chevron Confirms M-U Assets for Sale, Asks Vendors to Avoid Media). What does a write-down of asset value actually mean? Is it important?
Read More “Is Chevron’s $10B Impairment Write-Down Important…or Not?”
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: PA Sen. John Yudichak named to Senate Environmental Committee; OTHER U.S. REGIONS: Buyer mulling stake covering 4 million mt/y of Driftwood LNG supply; Natural gas companies form PAC to fight CMP’s proposed transmission project; Rising Bakken gas production displacing Western Canadian gas on pipes; NATIONAL: Shale revolution ensuring America’s energy security, says GEI; A decade in which fracking rocked the oil world.
Read More “Shale Energy Stories of Interest: Thu, Dec 19, 2019”
You know when eco-leftists stand up and cheer for proposed new government regulations to “curb methane emissions”–those regulations are precisely what you DON’T want to have enacted. That’s what happened yesterday as the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection’s (DEP) Environmental Quality Board (EQB) approved onerous new regulations that supposedly will capture every last molecule of stray methane that leaks from shale drilling operations. The new regs are unnecessary and will shut down even more shale drilling operations in the state.
Read More “PA DEP Goes WAY Too Far in Approving New Methane Regulations”
For months MDN has brought you bits and pieces of news from individual drillers, detailing plans to cut back on spending for new drilling in the Marcellus/Utica in 2020. It’s not just happening in the M-U–it’s happening across the country. The experts at RBN Energy have a terrific new post that pulls information about major drillers scaling back into one place. They analyze spending by three different groups of drillers: oil-focused, diversified, and gas-focused drillers. In the third category, all but one of the gas-focused drillers have major operations in the M-U. The stats are sobering. As a collective group, M-U gas drillers have pledged to cut their 2020 budgets 25% from the already-lower spending that happened this year. Ouch.
Read More “Big M-U Drillers Slash 2020 Spending a Collective 25%”
Keystone Clearwater Solutions, a company that provides water services for shale drillers in the Marcellus/Utica, is “coming home” in a sense. We told you in November that SC Water, LLC, a Pennsylvania-based natural gas and oil industry investment group, announced it had signed an agreement to buy Keystone Clearwater from American Water for an undisclosed amount (see American Water Selling PA Frack Water Co. Keystone Clearwater). The deal is now done and ownership has transferred.
Read More “Keystone Clearwater “Comes Home” to Former Owner, Sale Complete”
Just yesterday MDN ran a story about a ceremony held by Thailand’s Banpu in opening a new regional office in northeastern Pennsylvania, an indication of their commitment to the PA Marcellus where they’ve (so far) invested $500 million (see Banpu Opens New $5M Marcellus Operations Office in NEPA). And just like that, Banpu bought out all of Devon Energy’s Barnett Shale assets in Texas–spending $770 million to do so. Which points out yes, drillers and investors DO have choices and yes, their money WILL leave Pennsylvania (and Ohio and West Virginia) if the economics make more sense elsewhere.
Read More “Banpu Invests Another $770M in Shale – but Not in PA Marcellus”
Several weeks ago the founder and CEO of Tallgrass Energy, David G. Dehaemers Jr., abruptly quit the company retired (see Tallgrass Energy Founder/CEO/Chairman David Dehaemers Retires). Blackstone Infrastructure Partners, a major Tallgrass investor, wants to buy the company and take it private. That is, a takeover. Dehaemers was not happy but couldn’t prevent it, so he left. With Dehaemers out of the way, Blackstone sealed the deal. [Correction: MDN was contacted by Tallgrass to set the record straight. David Dehaemers telegraphed back in January he would likely not remain with the company after 2019. This was, indeed, a retirement and he was not (as MDN had implied) forced out. We regret the error and send our apologies to Tallgrass.] Yesterday Tallgrass issued a statement to say Blackstone, using its own considerable pile of cash along with money from several others, has signed a deal to buy Tallgrass.
Read More “With Tallgrass Founder/CEO Gone, Blackstone Forces Sale/Merger”