Drilling Mud Co. Opens in Monroe County, OH, 40 New Jobs
American Mud Works held a ribbon-cutting ceremony last week to officially open up a new regional headquarters in Monroe County, OH. The company specializes in mixing drilling mud–the stuff used to cool drill bits as they chew away at solid rock some 1-2 miles below the surface. They also recycle used drilling mud and wastewater/brine. The company’s main headquarters is in Texas. They’re locating a branch operation in Monroe to service the Utica and Marcellus industries in our region. In the short-term, the new office, due to be fully operational in about four weeks, will staff up by hiring 30-40 people. However, American Mud has bigger goals in view. They aim to add more service lines and expand their operations down the road. The number of employees will likely go much higher as they expand. Let’s welcome American Mud and another 40 jobs to Appalachia!…
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In early 2017, Baker Hughes (prior to GE buying them) spun off its North American shale fracking business (“pressure pumping”) into a new, standalone company called BJ Services (see 
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Below is an audio recording (“podcast”) featuring the Top 5 stories most read over the past week on MDN. Just click on the green button to listen. Below the recording is a list of the Top 5 with links to click to read the full stories (available only for subscribers). This list is meant as a way for folks to quickly catch up on the most essential news of the week–“essential” as determined by MDN’s audience of readers. Enjoy!
The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (PUC) yesterday voted 3-2 to allow construction to resume on the Mariner East 2 and 2x pipelines in West Whiteland Township, Chester County (near Philadelphia), ending a weeks-long stoppage specific only to that area. The shutdown began in May after a PUC administrative law judge’s highly questionable ruling, which affected ME1, ME2 and ME2x (see 
Antero Resources released its second quarter 2018 update yesterday. Antero is one of the largest drillers in the Marcellus/Utica with massive amounts of acreage in West Virginia (and elsewhere). Revenue was up in 2Q18 to $989 million, compared to $790 million in 2Q17. However, profits were down. In 2Q17 Antero lost $5.1 million, while in 2Q18 they lost $136 million. Antero produced a record 2.52 billion cubic feet equivalent per day (Bcfe/d) of natural gas–27% of that was liquids, including oil. In 2Q the company drilled 22 new Marcellus wells and brought 25 Marcellus wells online. They drilled 6 Utica wells and brought 5 Utica wells online. The company is pausing any new OH Utica drilling for the rest of this year in order to concentrate on the liquids-rich Marcellus region. Antero would have drilled and produced more except there is a trucking shortage in WV. Antero uses trucks to get its crude to market, and lack of trucks meant 100,000 barrels of crude are stored and can’t be moved, and that means the company has curtailed production in a number of WV wells. Antero expects the situation to improve by September. During 2Q Antero drilled what is (so far) the longest lateral for a WV shale well–15,100 feet!…
CNX Resources released their second quarter update yesterday. On the financial front the company made $61 million in profit during 2Q18, down from making $170 million in 2Q17. Hey, at least they’re in the black! During Q2 CNX produced and sold 1.3 billion cubic feet equivalent per day (Bcfe/d) of gas, which is up 33% over the same quarter last year. Nice! Much of the increase was due to a huge 277% jump in Utica Shale gas volumes. CNX ran three drilling rigs for most of 2Q, bringing on a fourth rig in late June. The rigs drilled 16 wells in 2Q, including three dry Utica Shale wells in Monroe County, OH; four Marcellus Shale wells in Greene County, PA; six Marcellus Shale wells in Washington County, PA; and three Marcellus Shale wells in Tyler County, WV. However, CNX only brought online three wells during 2Q. Here’s the details…
Gulfport Energy, an independent oil and gas driller with significant acreage positions in the Utica Shale of eastern Ohio and the SCOOP Woodford and SCOOP Springer plays in Oklahoma, issued its second quarter update yesterday. The company made $111 million in profit (net income) in 2Q18, vs. making $106 million in 2Q17. They produced an average of 1.33 billion cubic feet equivalent per day (Bcfe/d) across all of the plays where they are active. Of that, the vast majority of production (73%) came from the Ohio Utica Shale, which was 970 million cubic feet equivalent per day (MMcfe/d). During Q2, Gulfport drilled nine Utica wells, giving it a total of 21 Utica wells drilled so far this year (out of 35 planned for 2018). They operate two rigs in the OH Utica currently. Here’s the complete update from Gulfport…
Yesterday Williams issued its second quarter 2018 update. Williams is one of the biggest midstream (pipeline) companies in the Marcellus/Utica region. They’re also a big player in many other shale plays. The update focused on a number of those other plays and some recently cut deals to expand in other plays. Williams knows how to walk and chew gum at the same time–they have a lot happening. Of course we’re interested in what was said about the Marcellus/Utica region, including the Atlantic Sunrise Pipeline and other projects, like the Northeast Supply Enhancement (NESE) project, that impact our ability to move gas from here to other parts of the country. Below are excerpts lifted from various sources issued by Williams yesterday that focus on our region…
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) continues to play hardball with Energy Transfer over the Rover Pipeline. FERC refuses to allow four Rover laterals–feeder pipelines to shuttle gas from where it’s produced into the main Rover pipeline–to start up (see 
Natural gas produced in the Marcellus region historically has had a hard time fetching prices anywhere close to the benchmark Henry Hub price in southern Louisiana. Why? Because we have so darned much of it! Too much. Not enough ways to get our gas to other markets where it would fetch a higher price. That’s beginning to change. The “differential” (the difference between HH and our prices) is starting to narrow. Marcellus prices are coming much closer to the prices HH gas gets. That’s because of new pipelines coming online to cart our gas to other markets. Our favorite government agency, the U.S. Energy Information Administration, wrote a post yesterday on their Today in Energy website pointing out the decreasing gap in prices between the Marcellus and HH…
The Sierra Club has struck out in its attempt to stop construction of Mountain Valley Pipeline (an EQT Midstream project) in Virginia. Yesterday the U.S. Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the VA State Water Control Board did not err in finding MVP would not unreasonably harm streams and wetlands with its construction activities. This is a MAJOR court victory for MVP and begins to clear away some of the doubt cast by other recent court decisions (see 
For years Energy Solutions Consortium (ESC) has been trying to build several natural gas-fired electric plants in West Virginia, but have been prevented from doing so by Big Coal lawsuits. We recently wrote about this issue, naming names (see 