IOGCC Acts To Protect States' Rights And Create Regulatory Solutions For O&G States From Alaska to Alabama! (Register for the 2014 Midyear Issues Summit: Biloxi, MS)
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EIA Natural Gas Weekly Update, 4-24-14. Data and highlights of natural gas in the United States. |
Globe & Mail by SHAWN MCCARTHY AND ERIC ATKINS. Oil producers in Canada and the United States could see their plans for aggressive expansion of crude-by-rail short-circuited if American regulators follow Ottawa’s lead and force the industry to retire or retrofit tank cars built before 2011.
ADN Op-Ed by Senator Lisa Murkowski (NGP Photo). What would Alaskans say if a federal agency retroactively vetoed permits for development of Prudhoe Bay, declaring it never should have been allowed on the North Slope?
 U.S. Senator Mark Begich (NGP Photo) has taken a position in support of EPA preemptive action. |
What would we think if a federal agency unilaterally banned development in the non-wilderness portion of ANWR?
And what if a federal agency halted efforts to reopen the Nikiski LNG terminal, without any right of appeal, because a tiny portion of the property was once considered wetlands?
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We note that Senators Murkowski, and Joe Manchin (NGP Photo-R) have joined in a 
bipartisan effort to clarify EPA authority by sponsoring the "Regulatory Fairness Act". In this editorial, Resource Development Council for Alaska Executive Director, Rick Rogers (NGP Photo-L), urges Senator Mark Begich to support the bipartisan effort. -dh
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“I have always been clear about the severity of the EPA’s unwarranted involvement in the proposed Pebble Mine project, especially this early in the process,” said Congressman Don Young (NGP Photo). “This expansive, jurisdictional power grab proposed by the EPA severely jeopardizes not only Alaska’s sovereignty, but the rights of states and all private property owners nationwide. (Read more….)
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Alaska Journal of Commerce by Tim Bradner (NGP Photo). Lawmakers approved a plan late April 20 for the state to negotiate a partnership with North Slope producers BP, ConocoPhillips, ExxonMobil and TransCanada Corp., a pipeline company, in the proposed pipeline and liquefied natural gas, or LNG, export project.
Pipelines International. The Alaskan State Legislature has passed a bill for the state of Alaska, USA, to partner with energy companies to develop the $US45–65 billion Alaska LNG Project, which involves a large-diameter natural gas pipeline.
Alaska Dispatch by 
Alex DeMarban. Before a pro-industry audience in the first publicized forum of the U.S. Senate race, Dan Sullivan (NGP Photo-L) and Joe Miller (NGP Photo-Center-R) swatted at one another over the controversial oil tax cut, while Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell (NGP Photo-R) said he once solicited the help of national Republican group…. See KTUU Debate Here, or scroll up one day.
Today's Energy In Depth headlines:
NATIONAL
Study: US manufacturers gaining competitiveness. Associated Press. U.S. manufacturers have grown more competitive over the past decade compared with factories in China, Brazil and most of the world's other major economies. So says a new private study, which found that rising wages and higher energy costs have diminished China's long-standing edge over the United States. So has a boom in U.S. shale gas production. It's reduced U.S. natural gas prices and slowed the cost of electricity. (CLICK BELOW TO READ MORE….)
We're No. 2! US a 'Rising' Manufacturing Star. NBC News. The biggest factor driving the U.S. rebound, according to BCG: cheap natural gas prices, which have tumbled 50 percent over the last decade as a result of the shale gas revolution. NOTE: Washington Post also reports.
Baker Hughes will reveal its full fracturing mixes. Houston Chronicle. In a statement recently posted on its website, the Houston-based oil field services company said it "believes it is possible to disclose 100 percent of the chemical ingredients we use in hydraulic fracturing fluids without compromising our formulations – a balance that increases public trust while encouraging commercial innovation."
Drilling foes challenge earthquake assurances. Herald-Star. Shawn Bennett, a spokesman for the industry group Energy In Depth, said the threshold Ohio has set is lower than in other places where earthquakes have been detected, such as British Columbia. He said oil and gas drillers are motivated by the bottom line to follow rules, regulations and permit conditions.
Mason Capital buys company suing NY over fracking study. New York Post. If it wins the case, Norse would force the state to release its results soon, and if the study concludes that fracking is safe, it could lead to drilling permits being issued by the end of the year, West said. Norse is teamed in the legal matter with the Koch brothers-funded, Joint Landowners Coalition of New York, which represents thousands of upstate landowners, sources said.
Where the Oil Boom Is Making Airports Zoom. Bloomberg. It wasn’t long ago that North Dakota was considered a flyover state. Now the booming shale-oil business has made the state’s airfields bright spots in an era of flagging small airports. Delta Air Lines and United Continental Holdings have added flights in Williston, Minot, and Dickinson to shuttle workers for the likes of Whiting Oil & Gas and Baker Hughes to the Bakken fields in the western corner of the state.
Noble Energy confident. Houston Chronicle. "Following on our strong 2013, Noble Energy continues to deliver on its growth objectives, with the first quarter laying a good foundation from which to build on for the remainder of the year," Noble Energy's chief executive, Charles Davidson, said in a statement.
INTERNATIONAL
China Shale Boom Seen by Honghua as Pollution Cuts Coal Use. Bloomberg. Honghua Group, a Chinese drilling-equipment maker that gets most of its business from overseas, is seeking to expand at home as the nation works to spark its own shale gas revolution.
Egdon Resources ups its UK shale gas estimates ten-fold. Reuters. Explorer Egdon Resources said an independent report had estimated that its UK shale gas licences hold around 18 trillion cubic feet of gas, enough to supply Britain for more than 6 years and 10 times more than its previous estimate.
Shale gas law draft sent to parliament. Warsaw Business Journal. Poland’s government has sent the new draft law on the extraction of hydrocarbons to parliament. Another draft sent to parliament on Wednesday is the new mining and extraction tax bill.
UK Onshore Operators Group shale gas report raises hopes of 64,000 jobs. The Courier. The UK shale gas industry has the potential to generate investment of £33 billion and deliver tens of thousands of jobs. The figures are contained in a new report commissioned by industry body UK Onshore Operators Group (UKOOG) and based on a top-line estimate from the Institute of Directors suggesting 4,000 horizontal wells could be drilled at locations across the UK by 2032.
Pemex chief touts Mexico's energy reform in Washington visit. Reuters. Pemex Chief Executive Emilio Lozoya spoke in Washington, D.C., at the annual conference of the Export-Import Bank, the official U.S. export credit agency, on a panel discussing the next frontier of investment opportunities.
UK has many steps to take before it is a nation of frackers. Financial Times, LTE. Sir, You describe the inevitable, though not uncontroversial, plans to allow shale gas drillers to access private land (“Freedom to frack plan set to spark UK backlash”, April 22). But dig beneath the surface and there is more to extract.
CALIFORNIA
Study Says Hydraulic Fracturing Ban Ballot Initiative Bad for Jobs, Economy. KEYT. The study by the Los Angeles Economic Development Corporation for the Western States Petroleum Association says the Central Coast oil and gas industry provides hundreds of thousands of jobs which as an economic multiplier that creates more that a billion dollars in labor income every year and pays more than a billion dollars a year in tax revenue.
Why gas prices are spiking. Orange County Register, Editorial. The only thing stopping California from taking advantage of that natural resource is the politically driven opposition of activist groups determined to stop hydraulic fracturing not only in San Joaquin Valley, but throughout the state.
Jerry Brown’s service to the gilded state. Aljazeera America. Among Brown’s other good turns for the oil and gas industry is his support for its explosive practice of hydraulic fracturing. In March, when he delivered a speech to fellow Democrats at the state party’s annual convention, many delegates chanted “Ban fracking!” The California Democratic Party platform calls for a hydraulic fracturing moratorium, but the governor — who has earned the nickname Big Oil Brown — shows no sign of budging from his pro-drilling stance.
California City Becomes First To Vote To Ban Hydraulic Fracturing. Huffington Post. Beverly Hills is set to become California’s first municipality to ban hydraulic fracturing after the city council unanimously voted Tuesday night to ban the controversial practice along with acidization and other extreme well stimulation techniques.
COLORADO
GOP gubernatorial candidates split on health exchange – but agree on most other issues. Denver Business Journal. Colorado’s Republican gubernatorial candidates — at least those willing to debate — all oppose cities’ hydraulic fracturing bans and favor the use of public-private partnerships for road projects, but they hold different opinions about what should be done with the state’s health-benefit exchange.
Plans to Reintroduce Hydraulic Fracturing Wastewater Back to River. KREX. A new partnership between The Clifton Sanitation District and an oil and gas company is being touted as one of the first of its kind in America. The project involves building a new facility adjacent to the current wastewater treatment plant to help clean water produced from drilling. Once the drilled water makes its way through the first facility, it will then be dumped into the sanitation district pools and eventually out to the Colorado River.
Denver political ad buys top $3 million so far. The Colorado Independent. A pro-drilling group, Protect Colorado’s Environment, Energy and Economy, has contracts for more than $519,000 in ads to air in September, October and early November just on KMGH, the only station that has filed early contracts. The group was formed in January and hasn’t had to file disclosures with the Secretary of State yet.
ILLINOIS
Shale development in Illinois said to be at 'grinding halt'. Chicago Sun Times. Last year, Illinois patted itself on the back for enacting legislation to govern hydraulic fracturing that has what Gov. Pat Quinn called the best environmental protections in the nation. Now, some of those involved in the negotiations are fretting that the deal could become the legislative equivalent of a dry well.
NORTH DAKOTA
Bakken Oil Boom now a generational oil play. MTN News. Any thoughts that the pace in the Bakken oil patch has slowed down over the past few years, can be eliminated. "We're breaking records every day," noted Tom Rolfstad, Executive Director of Williston Economic Development. "If you do the simple math, 50,000 wells – 2,100 a year – that's 25 years of drilling," Rolfstad explained.
North Dakota's Big Break. OZY News, Blog. In the past few years, you may have heard plenty about hydraulic fracturing — the name for hydraulic fracturing, the process by which we mine the earth for natural gas resources. It’s not without controversy, to say the least, but one of the biggest arguments in favor of hydraulic fracturing is simple: States where it blows up tend to go boom, moneywise.
NORTHEAST
Cuomo needs to make final decision on hydraulic fracturing. Star Gazette, Op-Ed. The recently announced resignation of New York State Department of Health Commissioner is the latest episode in New York’s unfinished natural gas saga. The power to green-light this transformative economic opportunity ultimately lies in the hands of one man: Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
A drilling tax may not be just a pipedream after all. Daily Local News, Editorial. It’s time to put in place a fair tax on drilling, and the AP notes there’s a growing consensus for that in the GOP caucus. According to the story: “Some Republicans say a majority in both chambers now exists for an extraction tax.”
Appalachian shales continue natural gas boom: analysts, first Q1 reports. Platts. The energy consultants at Arlington, Virginia-based ICF International jacked up their long-term estimates of total production from the Utica and Marcellus shales by 9 Bcf/d through 2035, with the steepest increases in the next decade.
Corbett’s Republican Challenger Says Governor Broke Promise, Lied About It. CBS Pittsburgh. Later that fall, when asked whether a fee was a tax, Corbett said it didn’t matter because, “I intend not to raise taxes. I intend not to raise fees because we’re going to cut them so we can grow the jobs in Pennsylvania.” Guzzardi says it’s not debatable what Corbett did, and voters know it.
Key methane measure is important. Pocono Record, Editorial. Conflicting information over methane emissions from Pennsylvania gas well sites should be of concern to all citizens. Scientists who measured emissions by flying over natural gas drilling sites in southwestern Pennsylvania found methane at levels 100 to 1,000 times higher than regulators from the federal Environmental Protection Agency estimated earlier.
OHIO
Don't snuff out Youngstown's promise as shale industry center. Youngstown Vindicator, LTE. Two stories in The Vindicator unfortunately are providing fodder to fracking critics battling oil and natural gas development. The first involves Ohio’s “probable” finding that fracking “may” have caused very minor earthquakes near an undiscovered fault. The second is the illegal dumping of waste into a Mahoning River tributary.
Geologist: Ohio’s response to earthquakes ‘inadequate’. New Castle News. A Youngstown State University geologist called Ohio’s official response to the 12 earthquakes that occurred last month in Poland Township, Ohio “inadequate.” Dr. Ray Beiersdorfer, who has taught for 21 years at YSU, said in a press conference Wednesday in downtown Youngstown, that the Ohio Department of Natural Resource’s response fails to protect the public.
State government must provide adequate regulation. Toledo Blade, Editorial. It's good that Gov. John Kasich’s administration is strengthening its oversight of oil and natural-gas drilling that uses the common technique called hydraulic fracturing. It would have been better if the state had acted before, not after, geologists for the first time linked HF to earthquakes in Ohio— five minor tremors in Mahoning County last month.
Will shale opponents prevail? Youngstown Vindicator. If a citizen-initiative Youngstown charter amendment to ban hydraulic fracturing isn’t approved in the May 6 primary, it likely never will in its present form. Expected poor voter turnout combined with a rash of earthquakes in Poland Township last month in which the Ohio Department of Natural Resources found a “probable” connection to HF gives the amendment its best opportunity to be passed.
Utica shale gas wells in Ohio dismay EQT. Tribune-Live. EQT Corp. said on Thursday that it has had some disappointing results from wells at the edge of the Utica shale in Ohio and will stop drilling in the formation while it evaluates its prospects. EQT's decision follows Antero Resources Corp.'s reduction 10 days earlier in what it predicts to get from wells in a similar area on the western edge of the play.
TEXAS
State Legislators Looking At Ways To Manage Natural Resources In Eagle Ford Shale Region. Texas Public Radio. As activity and income from the Eagle Ford Shale continues to grow, affected communities are studying how to manage finite resources into the future. Local and state leaders are planning for issues that could not be fully addressed during the boom that hit the area six years ago. South Texas counties successfully weathered transformational changes with the Eagle Ford. It’s no secret that incomes have skyrocketed.
Eagle Ford Shale could last ‘decades?’ Henderson Daily News. Not long ago, many people in South Texas wondered whether the Eagle Ford Shale was real or just a figment of some geologist’s imagination. Now companies are talking about producing oil and gas for the next several decades in the region — but it was hard to see that projection coming, and even harder to figure out exactly what it meant.
Baker Hughes to reveal all hydraulic fracturing chemicals. Houston Chronicle/Fuel Fix. Baker Hughes says it’s ready to divulge all the chemicals it uses in hydraulic fracturing, revelations that other big industry players have limited by asserting the potions they use to get at trapped oil and gas are trade secrets. In a statement recently posted on its website, the Houston-based oil field services firm says it “believes it is possible to disclose 100 percent of the chemical ingredients we use in hydraulic fracturing fluids without compromising our formulations — a balance that increases public trust while encouraging commercial innovation.”
Family Wins $3M in Texas Drilling Case. Newser. A Texas family suing a gas-drilling firm over alleged contamination of their ranch has won $3 million in what their lawyer calls Texas' first hydraulic fracturing related verdict.
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