Penn State: PA Oil & Gas Drilling Contaminates 0% of Water Wells
Researchers from Pennsylvania State University, using a new testing protocol that uses existing, affordable water chemistry tests, have tested 20,751 water well samples from wells located near high levels of both conventional and shale oil and gas drilling in PA. The tests show whether or not existing/naturally occurring methane is in the water well, or whether methane from nearby drilling is present in the water. Know what they found? Out of 20,751 samples, they found 17 wells (0.08%, less than one-tenth of a single percent) showed “possible signs of methane contamination.” Statistically speaking, it’s zero.
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New Fortress Energy is in the process of building the first (of two or more) LNG liquefying plants in Wyalusing, PA–nowhere near a shoreline. The company will truck (eventually rail) the LNG to a port located on the Delaware River along the New Jersey shoreline for export to Puerto Rico and other destinations. As we reported in July, work is now underway to clear the site before actual construction of buildings begins (see 
In what we would say is an unusual, very public rebuke of New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, the former chairperson of the Massachusetts Dept. of Public Utilities says that Cuomo is to blame for a near-emergency situation in New England during the winter of 2017/2018 when the region was within two days of a massive blackout due to lack of electricity. The lack of electricity is because New England doesn’t have enough natural gas to feed power plants during critical load periods.
In June MDN told you that the Cambridge (Massachusetts) Retirement System is not happy with their investment in EQT shares of stock, so they’re suing the company (see 
Back in January Tallgrass Energy, builder and operator of the mighty Rockies Express (REX) pipeline which is a critical link that flows Marcellus/Utica gas to Midwestern markets, dropped the bombshell announcement that investment firm Blackstone was buying a “controlling” interest in the company (see 
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: UGI opens CNG fueling station in Wilkes-Barre; West Virginia must embrace potential in petrochemicals; OTHER U.S. REGIONS: Sabine Pass LNG berth expansion gets positive FERC environmental review; NATIONAL: Bernie Sanders wants to prosecute oil and natural gas companies, but doesn’t know what laws they violated; Toll of Trump’s trade war starting to show in oil industry; INTERNATIONAL: U.S. glut in natural-gas supply goes global; Mexico reaches deal in natural gas pipelines controversy.
EQT’s new CEO Toby Rice made the rounds and conducted four town hall-style meetings with landowners (see 
The Mariner East pipeline projects (plural) are an important part of the shale energy story in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia. As is the Marcus Hook Industrial Complex (what we call the Marcus Hook refinery). Currently between Mariner East 1 and 2, somewhere around 170,000 barrels of NGLs (mostly ethane and propane) flow to Marcus Hook and most of that gets exported to other countries. Mariner East 2X is currently under construction and due to come online next year, increasing that number significantly. For many Marcellus/Utica drillers, selling NGLs is the difference between being profitable and not profitable.
The Independent Oil & Gas Association of West Virginia (IOGAWV) is already hard at work on legislative priorities for next/upcoming session of the WV legislature–which actually does not begin until Jan. 8, 2020. In WV the full legislature only meets for 60 days each year (other states can learn a lesson). IOGAWV is planning both a defensive (protect what we have) and offensive (new initiatives) strategy for next year. What’s on the list?
In May 2016, U.S.-based oilfield services company FMC Technologies announced they would merge with their much larger quasi-competitor, France-based Technip, in an all-stock deal to create a new company called TechnipFMC (see