Energy Stories of Interest: Wed, Nov 7, 2018
The “best of the rest”–stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading: Pa. House and Senate remain in Republican control despite Democrat gains; New Jersey-based design and engineering firm to open office in Canonsburg; LANTA hopes to add even more compressed natural gas buses to fleet; Cabot and Williams on an education adventure with small schools; Voters reject oil well setbacks as Colorado’s Proposition 112 defeated; Naperville council expected to OK plan for new compressed natural gas filling station on city land; NYMEX December natural gas spikes 28.3 cents to $3.567/MMBtu on forecast for early-season cold snap; US EIA boosts Q4 gas marketed production forecast by 1.83 Bcf/d to 94.32 Bcf/d; US transportation sector used 43.4 billion cubic feet of natural gas for vehicle fuel in 2017; China to boost shale oil, gas production; The world can live without Iranian oil; Oil markets yawn as Iran sanctions come into effect; Oil and gas firms sound alarm as capital once destined for Canada flees to more competitive U.S.; China’s gas pipelines on wheels.
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The deal is done. On Monday, Encino Acquisition Partners completed its purchase of all of Chesapeake Energy’s Ohio Utica Shale assets for $2 billion, originally announced in July (see 
If all goes as planned, this Friday U.S. Well Services (USWS), a company that specializes in fracking shale wells using gas-fired electric (as opposed to diesel) engines, will begin to trade its stock publicly. USWS has operations in the Marcellus/Utica, as well as other plays. Does the company sound familiar? Last week we told you that Pittsburgh-based driller Huntley & Huntley has contracted with USWS to frack the wells it is drilling (see 
Last week National Fuel Gas Company (NFG), which operates drilling subsidiary Seneca Resources and pipeline subsidiary Empire Pipeline, issued its fourth quarter 2018 (everyone else’s 3Q18) update. Via Seneca Resources, NFG drills wells in northcentral and northwestern PA. Via Empire Pipeline, they build and maintain hundreds of miles of pipelines in PA and New York, where the company is headquartered. NFG operates a utility (gas and electric) company in addition to Seneca and Empire. A lot of spinning plates to watch. But they do a great job. Much of the focus of the update was on the upstream–on Seneca Resources. According to CEO Ron Tanski, in 2019 more than half of the company’s capital expenditures will go for Seneca’s drilling program. Seneca has and will continue to operate three drilling rigs, with plans to expand production by 24%.
As of September, the 1,000-megawatt Moxie Freedom Marcellus-fired power plant located near Wilkes-Barre, PA (Luzerne County) is up and running and feeding electricity it produces into the local power grid (see 
A number of times we’ve highlighted a cool training program offered by the The Gas Technology Institute (GTI). The 
PJM is the largest electric grid operator in the U.S. It serves 65 million people in 13 states plus the District of Columbia (including PA, OH, and WV). Last week PJM released a summary of findings for a report that evaluates PJM’s “resiliency”–ability to deliver electricity even under adverse conditions and heavy loads. Know what they found? PJM is reliable and can withstand periods of highly “stressed” conditions, including the phaseout of more coal-fired power plants. PJM, perhaps more than any other grid, relies increasingly on natural gas. The study shows reliance on Marcellus/Utica natgas is solid, contrary to the what scaremongers claim. There is no reason to worry.
The New York Public Service Commission recently approved a petition by Consolidated Edison Company of New York, Inc. (Con Edison) for a $5 million, three-year natural gas demand response pilot program, one of the first demand response projects for natural gas. Demand response (DR) programs, somewhat common in the electricity sector, helps manage utility usage during periods of peak demand. How do they do it? In the case of Con Ed’s now-approved program, the utility will pay its customer to use less natural gas.
Flashback: In May of this year, Energy Transfer CEO Thomas Long said Rover Pipeline would be fully online by June 1st (see 
MPLX, i.e. MarkWest Energy, has been slapped pretty hard by the federal Environmental Protection Agency, Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection, and several other state environmental agencies. Last Thursday the federal EPA serving as lead agency, announced a settlement with MPLX (and its various subsidiaries) to pay nearly $7 million in fines and corrective actions to cut down on air emissions at 21 of its plants in Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Kentucky, Texas and Oklahoma. Of that total, $925,000 is a fine or “penalty” for violating clean air laws at the plants. The rest of the money will be spent on corrective actions to fix things and cut down on air emissions.
The left-most contingent in the Pennsylvania Democrat Party wants to ban all fracking in the state. It’s fringe, but all such oddball movements start out as fringe. Of particular note in this election season is that a group of these ban-fracking nutters have gotten themselves on the ballot in 15 PA House and Senate races around the state. As you might expect, most of the ban-frackers are running in counties in the Philadelphia orbit (Delaware, Chester, Montgomery, Philly itself). There are some from outside (but still close to) Philly, in Northampton and Carbon counties. There are a few in Allegheny County (Pittsburgh area). There’s even one running in Centre County. We have the full list of 15 people that our friends in PA should be sure to NOT vote for in tomorrow’s very important election.
The U.S. Supreme Court is a Supreme Disappointment. Lawyers representing (we’d call it mentally abusing and using) a group of 21 children filed a lawsuit in 2015 that aims to force the end of using all fossil fuels in the United States, to address so called man-made global warming. That case survived numerous challenges and was set to go to trial Oct. 29 in U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon. The Trump Dept. of Justice petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to stop the case from advancing to trial (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.