Other Energy Stories of Interest: Thu, Mar 15, 2018
The “best of the rest”–stories that caught MDN’s eye that you may be interested in reading: OH residents to get chance to comment PTT cracker air emissions; power gen drivers of East Coast gas demand; OOGA gets a new leader; TransCanada starts up Cameron LNG feeder pipe; Texas drillers expand 14th month in a row; US exported more energy to Mexico than imported – for 3rd year in a row; will Trump’s steel tarrifs threaten US natgas industry?; Staoil changes name; Arctic freeze makes Europe nervous re Russian gas supplies; and more!
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Rover Pipeline is in hot water again. This time it’s not Captain Craig “Ahab” Butler from the Ohio EPA, but the West Virginia Dept. of Environmental Protection. In a letter just released publicly (dated March 5), WVDEP slapped Rover with a “cease-and-desist” order, stopping all construction of Rover in the state, because of inspections in February that found 14 violations of water pollution regulations. The violations occurred in Doddridge, Tyler and Wetzel counties. Violations ran the range of leaving trash behind at construction sites to improper perimeter controls (no erosion devices installed) to failure to clean up the roads they used. In addition to trouble in WV, Rover is also facing new issues in both Ohio and Pennsylvania. In February heavy rains in the region caused “slippage issues” where the pipeline is being installed. Rover filed a report with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) last week to say it has eight crews working to correct slippage issues at six locations along its 51-mile Burgettstown Lateral. Here’s the latest on WV shutting down Rover, and Rover’s work to fix slippage issues…
Last week MDN reported that due to underground horizontal direction drilling (HDD) in Chester County, PA for the Mariner East 2 (ME2) Pipeline project, a third sinkhole had developed. ME2 is being built close to the existing Mariner East 1 (ME1) pipeline. The sinkhole exposed a portion of the ME1 pipeline to the open air, which is why the head of the state Public Utility Commission (PUC) temporarily shut down the propane and ethane flowing through ME1 (see 
Big Green groups opposed to Dominion Energy’s $6.5 billion (up from $5 billion due to delays) Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) from West Virginia through Virginia and into North Carolina are about out of options in their holy mission to stop the project. They’ve tried multiple lawsuits, protests, bullying state environmental agencies–the whole bag of nasty tricks. And yet ACP is now under construction. What’s left to try to stop it? The Southern Environmental Law Center and Appalachian Mountain Advocates, on behalf of a mishmash of second tier radical groups, have filed a “hail Mary” request with the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals to stop construction of ACP until a lawsuit sitting before the Fourth Circuit questioning the validity of the permits granted for the project is played out. In other words, back to the tried-and-true playbook: delay, delay, delay–until eventually you deny…
We bet you didn’t know that a bloated, inefficient government bureaucracy like the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) can cut down on the amount of time it takes them to review permits necessary in the drilling process (like erosion and stream crossing permits)–just by changing the paperwork. That’s the claim the DEP is making. Yesterday the DEP released new paperwork–new forms to fill out–for Chapter 105 General Permit Registrations relating to water obstructions and encroachments. These new forms “will improve the quality of General Permit registration requests, eliminate unnecessary redundancies, and reduce review time frames.” Yeah, and we have a bridge in Brooklyn we’d like to sell ya…
As we reported last week, this week the PA House of Representatives was due to host a hearing on a slate of bills aimed at fixing not only the slowmo way the state Dept. of Environmental Protection approves permits, but also roll back some of the egregious regulatory overreach in PA (see 
Yesterday the Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR), Division of Oil and Gas Resources Management, posted draft rules for changing well spacing for both conventional and Utica Shale wells. The new rules, which the public can comment on now (comments due by April 10th), will establish new minimum distances horizontal shale wells may be drilled from the boundaries of drilling units and new minimum distances from other horizontal wells. In our quick read of the proposed regs, it looks like shale wells must be drilled at least 400 feet from the drilling unit boundary line. There is no required minimum between shale wells drilled on the same pad as part of the same drilling unit. Below are the proposed regs from ODNR…
For some time now, MDN has had its eye on Mexico. Following landmark reforms in 2013 and 2014, Mexico’s oil and gas markets have been freed from strict government control. Mexico is interested in attracting foreign (i.e. U.S.) investment. While renewable energy prospects in Mexico grabbed much of the attention in mainstream media, the core of the energy reform effort lies in the expansion of Mexico’s natural gas market. Not only is power generation heavily focused on increasing capacity through gas-fired combined cycle power plants, but consumption by industrial users is also expected to rise at a steady pace in the coming decades. Mexico is already, and will become even more so, an incredibly important market for U.S. natural gas. NGI (Natural Gas Intelligence) knows just how critical Mexico is becoming to the U.S. and recently launched a new daily news and data service called the 
With much fanfare, yesterday a press event was held in Columbus, OH to make an official announcement of what we already know: that South Korea’s Daelim Chemical, a subsidiary of Daelim Industrial, is now a partner with PTT Global Chemical in the Belmont County ethane cracker project. We previously brought you that news on Feb. 1 (see 
Yesterday our favorite government agency, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), issued our favorite monthly report, the Drilling Productivity Report (DPR). The DPR is the EIA’s best guess, based on expert data crunchers, as to how much each of the U.S.’s seven major shale plays will produce for both oil and natural gas in the coming month. The numbers continue to be mind-blowing–hitting new all-time highs that take your breath away. Last month EIA estimated the Marcellus/Utica (called Appalachia in the report) would produce a new high of 27.15 billion cubic feet (Bcf) per day of natural gas, which would be 321 million cubic feet (MMcf) (nearly 1/3 of a Bcf) higher than the month before. The actual number for February turned out to be 27.56. That is, EIA underestimated the number! This month, which is an estimate for all of March, EIA says M-U natgas production will go up ANOTHER 359 MMcf (over 1/3 of a Bcf)! The Permian, an oil play that produces “associated natural gas” along with oil, is estimated to go up another 233 MMcf/d. Yikes! The new total natgas production from all seven major shale plays is estimated to be 66.119 Bcf/d in March. Last year this time output was 55.2 Bcf/d. Mind blowing!…
Caiman Energy II is an interesting midstream (pipeline & processing plant) company. Caiman is part of a spaghetti mix of intertwined midstream operators in the Marcellus/Utica. Caiman is related to (backed by) Williams, and Caiman is the operator of Blue Racer Midstream. In April 2012, Caiman sold their West Virginia assets (Caiman “I”) to Williams for $2.5 billion. These days, via Blue Racer, Caiman is focused on the Ohio Utica. The news that recently caught our eye is that two of the investors in Caiman Energy II are interested in selling their ownership stake. Not Williams, which remains the primary investor–but EnCap Flatorck Midstream and Oaktree Capital want out…
Last week MDN told you about a couple of rabid antis who climbed trees in Jefferson National Forest and have perched themselves in homemade tree stands in an attempt to block tree cutting for the Mountain Valley Pipeline (see 
We’re in a position we don’t typically find ourselves in–defending a member of liberal Democrat PA Gov. Wolf’s staff. We don’t have much respect for Wolf and his administration, but sometimes there’s an injustice that simply can’t be ignored. We find this injustice particularly loathsome. A Big Green supporter and far-left radical environmentalist who lives in Chester County, PA, Caroline Hughes, filed a complaint with the Pennsylvania State Ethics Commission against PA Gov. Tom Wolf’s deputy chief of staff, Yesenia Bane, late last year (see 
Did you know that once upon a time, around 100 million years ago when dinosaurs roamed the earth, that mom earth had no permanent polar ice caps, and that the amount of greenhouse gas (carbon dioxide, CO2) in the atmosphere was 10 times (i.e. 1000%) higher than it is today? And yet, somehow, life survived. Who knew? Contrary to the scaremongering balderdash being pedaled today, the amount of CO2 we humans pump in the atmosphere today by burning fossil fuels is puny compared to what volcanoes used to pump into the atmosphere eons ago. Humans today are pikers–bush league–compared to the volcanoes of old when it comes to warming up mother earth. That’s what we learned in reading a newly published study on the link between the formation of today’s shale oil and gas deposits and ash from long-ago volcanoes. “Nutrient-rich ash from an enormous flare-up of volcanic eruptions toward the end of the dinosaurs’ reign kicked off a chain of events that led to the formation of shale gas and oil fields from Texas to Montana.” So says “Volcanic ash as a driver of enhanced organic carbon burial in the Cretaceous”–a new study just published in the journal Nature…