The latest edition of the MDN Weekly Digest is now ready. The digest is the meat and “essence” of each story for all posts appearing on the MDN website during the past week, collected in a single PDF document capable of being downloaded and printed. The Weekly Digest is available to paying subscribers only as part of your monthly or annual subscription to MDN.
Read More “MDN Weekly Digest – Mar 16, 2019”
Equitrans Midstream, which used to be called EQT Midstream, yesterday announced they have cut their first big deal since separating from EQT last year. Equitrans is buying a 60% stake in Eureka Midstream, a 190-mile pipeline system in Ohio and West Virginia serving both the Marcellus and Utica, and a 100% stake in the tiny 15-mile Hornet Midstream, a gathering system in WV that connects to Eureka.
Read More “Equitrans Buys 2 Pipeline Systems in Marcellus/Utica for $1B”
Witch hunts take a loooong time when it’s the U.S. government doing the hunting. We told you back in 2015 that the U.S. Dept. of Labor was unfairly targeting the Marcellus industry, looking at every time slip, to see if they could bag companies violating federal overtime regulations–not paying their workers overtime (see Labor Dept. Unfairly Targets Marcellus Industry in SWPA & WV).
Read More “WV Pipeline Co. Clipped for $3.7M for Overtime Violations”
Some Pennsylvania landowners have recently been approached by the companies they’re leased with, asking landowners to sign amended leases to allow cross-unit drilling. We personally know of one case in which a driller requested such an amendment in northeast PA. So it is with great interest we notice a new bill has been introduced in the PA House, specifically to allow cross-unit shale drilling.
Read More “PA Floats Bill to Allow Shale Drilling to Span Multiple Units”
Today is the last day for customers who want to apply to be added to Consolidated Edison’s natural gas delivery system in Westchester County, NY to apply. There’s no guarantee if they do apply they’ll be accepted, but after today new applications to get gas service will automatically go on a waiting list. That is, the moratorium on new customers in Westchester essentially begins NOW, today–thanks to Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s policies in prohibiting new natural gas pipelines.
Read More “Moratorium on New Gas Hookups in Westchester County Begins Today”
In February MDN told you about an important decision by the DC Circuit Court of Appeals that has the potential to override New York State and allow both the Constitution Pipeline and Northern Access Pipeline projects to get built (see Recent Fed Court Decision Gives NY Pipes Hope for Bypassing Cuomo). The Hoopa Valley Tribe v. FERC decision is still causing shock waves–especially among Big Green groups. We have some analysis below of that decision and how states like NY may now behave in light of the decision.
Read More “Analyzing the Court Decision that May Allow Constitution Pipeline”
Here’s a mind-blower: Royal Dutch Shell is the world’s second largest oil producer (by market value). Yet a Shell official recently said his company wants to be “the largest electricity power company in the world in the early 2030s.” Within 15 years Shell wants to be THE world’s #1 electricity producer! And they plan to do it by using natural gas as the fuel to create all that electricity.
Read More “Shell Plans to be World’s Biggest Electric Producer, Using NatGas”
A recent Bloomberg article got it wrong, as they typically do, with this headline: “Biggest Threat to Once-Prized Gas Is Getting Kicked Out of Homes.” Residential natural gas use has been relatively flat, for years. Yet natural gas demand has rocked upward, which begs the question–so who are the new customers using all that gas? MDN friend Jude Clemente has the answer…
Read More “Where Will New NatGas Demand Come From? Hint: Not Residential”
MARCELLUS/UTICA REGION: Women of Influence: Meet Laural Ziemba with Range Resources; Energy theorist touts benefits of fossil fuels; Auditor General DePasquale calls for state action on climate change, brace for new costs; Appalachia leads northeast power generation shift to gas; OTHER U.S. REGIONS: Exxon thinks it can lower its Permian drilling costs to $15 a barrel; NATIONAL: U.S. natural gas production hit a new record high in 2018; US LNG exports up on week to nine cargoes; Lower 48 working natural gas stocks hit a new record for largest weekly net withdrawals in March; Amazon has a cost-cutting plan for the boom-and-bust oil business, as rival tech giants target energy industry; ‘Smart’ rigs to digital retrofits: How oil and gas explorers are getting lean and fit; INTERNATIONAL: Making sense of Cheniere’s $18 billion LNG deal with China; Shipping companies banking on gas carriers as LNG demand grows.
Read More “Energy Stories of Interest: Fri, Mar 15, 2019”
In Nov. 2017 the Ohio Attorney General’s office under then-AG Mike Dewine (RINO swamp dweller, now governor) sued Energy Transfer at the prompting of the Ohio EPA claiming the company’s Rover Pipeline project was guilty of “polluting state waters while constructing a natural gas pipeline across Ohio” (see OH EPA Director Manipulates Atty General to Sue Rover Pipeline). A Stark County judge on Monday threw out the case.
Read More “OH Judge Tosses AG’s Lawsuit Against Rover Pipe Enviro Violations”
A relatively short pipeline project to flow water from the Susquehanna River in Tunkhannock (Wyoming County), PA to a water impoundment about seven miles away is, as of February, under construction.
Read More “Water Pipeline for NEPA Marcellus Drillers Begins Construction”
In December, the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) released a draft of onerous new regulations that focus on reducing volatile organic compound (VOC) emissions and so-called fugitive methane (see Pa. DEP Jumps the Gun with Proposed New Emissions Regs). The new regs will force drillers and pipeline companies to spend big bucks to produce a teeny tiny improvement in emissions. The DEP is back, once again pushing its bad plan.
Read More “PA DEP to Push Onerous New Air Regs at Upcoming Meeting”
A group of Pennsylvania landowners from Lancaster County are begging the U.S. Supreme Court to hear a case in which they say they’ve been screwed over by Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline.
Read More “PA Landowners Beg US Supreme Court to Hear Atlantic Sunrise Case”
According to new data released this week by our favorite government agency, the U.S. Energy Information Administration, Pennsylvania accounted for 25% of new clean-burning natural gas electric power generation added last year.
Read More “PA Residents Saving $1K+ per Year Thx to Shale-Fired Electric”
The National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) with sites in Morgantown, WV and Pittsburgh, PA performs valuable research in shale energy. We’ve highlighted a number of their projects over the years. Here’s another one we just noticed: Using laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) technology, researchers have found a way to rapidly target shale layers with greater accuracy.
Read More “New Way for Marcellus Frackers to Quickly ID Best Places to Drill”
‘Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it.’ – George Santayana. Here’s a bit of history you may not know: In 1212 thousands of Catholic kids from France and Germany took off to “liberate” Jerusalem from Muslims, part of the Crusades. None made it. They either died along the way or were sold into slavery. Is history repeating itself? A group of kids are today “battling” so-called “climate change” (modern day Crusade), and they’re being used by adults to do so.
Read More “Ignorant Kids Exploited by Adults for Climate Change Lawsuits”