Mariner East Defends Itself Before Same Judge Who Once Blocked It
In May of this year, Elizabeth Barnes, an administration law judge for the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (PUC), unilaterally ordered Sunoco Logistics Partners to “cease and desist all current operation, construction, including drilling activities on the Mariner East 1, 2 and Mariner East 2X pipeline” in West Whiteland Township in Chester County, PA (Antis Get Lib Judge to Shut Down All Mariner East Pipes, Dems Rejoice). The judge also shut down all operations of Mariner East 1 across the entire state, ruling that she was “enjoining Respondent from operating Mariner East 1.” It was a breathtaking display of arrogance and seizure of power that does not belong to her. Barnes’ closure of ME1 and ME2 was later overturned by the full PUC (see PA PUC Overrules Lib Judge – Mariner East 1 Returns to Service and PA PUC Allows ME2 Pipeline Work to Restart Near Philly). Last week a ginned up “emergency relief petition” was aired before Barnes. Same deal. Antis want to shut down ALL of the Mariner East projects–permanently. Barnes was the judge hearing the “testimony” of the antis, along with a vigorous defense by Sunoco. Did she learn her lesson the first time?
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Last week the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency held an information session (to give out info) along with a public hearing (to accept comments) on the draft air pollution permit for PTT Global Chemical’s proposed ethane cracker plant complex in Belmont County, OH (see 
Events related (or of interest) to the Marcellus and Utica Shale, primarily pro-drilling events. To have your event included (or if you are aware of a worthy event you believe should be on this page), please send the details and/or a link to have it included to the calendar@marcellusdrilling.com email address.
The “best of the rest”–stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading: New law allows ODNR to plug more wells; Tompkins County Legislature opposes natural gas at Cayuga Power Plant; U.S. shale production set to surge in 2019; Winter demand offsets NGL fractionation capacity constraints; Natural gas prices at multi-year highs, will demand grow further?; Details of the horrible carbon tax bill; Qatar is pulling out of OPEC; RWE to buy more U.S. LNG as Trump promotes gas in Europe; The physics of extracting gas from shale formations; New rules at Panama Canal expected to boost U.S. LNG industry; Magnetic sun storms could hold the secret to natural gas prices; Global natural gas prices tied to sunspot activity.
Well this wasn’t supposed to happen. The Delaware County (PA) Council hired a company in July of this year at a cost of $115,000 to conduct an independent risk assessment study of both the Mariner East 2 (ME2) and Adelphia Gateway pipeline projects (both running through Delaware County), to assess just how much risk each pipeline poses to residents in the county, a heavily populated Philadelphia suburb. A group of antis paid $50,000 to Quest Consultants for the same thing. The antis released their “report” in October (see 
Each year (for the 12th year running) the Canadian-based Fraser Institute surveys petroleum industry executives and managers (256 of them for 2018) asking them their opinions on the barriers to investing in exploration and production in various geographies across the globe. That is, what makes them more likely or less likely to spend money drilling in a particular location? The Global Petroleum Survey (full copy below), tallies the survey responses and ranks each geography from most desirable place to invest, to least desirable. Last year West Virginia was ranked as the fifth most desirable place to invest (see 
The preliminary numbers are in from the West Virginia Department of Tax and Revenue, and the numbers show that severance taxes paid by drillers in Mountain State hit a new high of $138 million, up 4.3% from in 2017. Six Marcellus/Utica shale counties–Doddridge, Wetzel, Ritchie, Tyler, Marshall, and Harrison–received $1 million or more of that back into county coffers. At the county level, the tax revenue goes for vital public services including first responders, community projects and social programs. Here’s a high-level rundown on who got what from this year’s severance tax honeypot.
Two schools in rural Susquehanna County, PA are saving big bucks and helping the environment at the same time–by switching to burning natural gas. One of those schools, Elk Lake, has made millions of dollars in royalties by hosting two shale wells *on school property* (see 
It takes a loooong time for the wheels of justice to turn, but (usually) turn they do. In 2016 Kathleen Kane, former Pennsylvania Attorney General who prosecuted and persecuted others, particularly in the gas drilling industry, was convicted of committing perjury (i.e. lying under oath) about leaking privileged grand jury information in a case unrelated to gas drilling. She was, in October 2016, sentenced to jail (see 
Two weeks ago MDN told you about a class action lawsuit that’s been brewing in West Virginia since 2013, brought by 10,000 WV landowners and royalty rights owners against EQT over the company’s practice of deducting post-production expenses from royalty payments (see 
We pride ourselves on keeping close tabs on the market. Yet somehow the construction of a smallish NGL (natural gas liquids) pipeline gathering system in western PA slipped by us. The pipeline is now built and the builder, Stonehenge Energy Resources, is putting the “finishing touches” on the Stonehenge Laurel – Clarion Pipeline System before it goes live. The pipeline will connect to Laurel Mountain Energy’s wells in Clarion County and collect up the NGLs (things like ethane and propane) from those wells and flow it neighboring Butler County where the NGLs will hitch a ride via Energy Transfer’s Revolution Pipeline system to Washington County, PA where they will get cleaned up and separated.
In early October MDN reported that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit had “vacated” (canceled, overturned) a permit issued by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in West Virginia that would allow Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) to use a more environmentally friendly form of crossing four rivers in the state than is technically allowed under federal Clean Water Act regulations (see