Here’s a strange one we don’t quite understand. Yet. Two weeks ago we brought you the news that a jury in a federal court had decided a group of Utica shale drillers, including Rice Drilling (now EQT), Ascent Resources, XTO, and Gulfport Energy, were not guilty of “unjust enrichment” by drilling into the Point Pleasant…
Read More...Earlier this week, MDN reported on a bill making its way through West Virginia’s legislative sausage-making process (see WV Bill Triples Conventional Well Royalty Payments if Made Late). WV House Bill (HB) 4292 attempts to close a loophole affecting landowners and mineral rights owners with a conventional oil or gas well, some of whom suffer…
Read More...The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette has an excellent article reporting on an effort by Tenaska, one of the largest privately operated companies in the U.S., to build a carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) hub spanning tens of thousands of acres in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia. Landmen are “knocking on doors again” in all three states, looking…
Read More...West Virginia House Bill (HB) 4292 attempts to close a loophole affecting landowners and mineral rights owners with a conventional oil or gas well. Royalties from conventional O&G wells are typically small, as little as $40-$50 per month. Some energy companies (hopefully very few) that own the wells are intentionally late with royalty payments or…
Read More...Peregrine Energy Partners, headquartered in Dallas, Texas, continues a program to buy royalty rights in the Marcellus/Utica and elsewhere. We have chronicled a number of Peregrine’s M-U purchases since 2019 (see our Peregrine stories here). Two years ago, Peregrine acquired one of its largest royalty positions in the Utica, spanning over 340,000 gross acres in…
Read More...Back in the summer of 2020, MDN told you about a lawsuit brought by an Ohio rights owner called TERA, an organization that appears to own the royalty rights for a number of leases with wells in Belmont County, OH, drilled by different producers, suing the producers for drilling into the Point Pleasant shale layer…
Read More...This is one of those little gems we delight in unearthing for MDN readers — especially for our landowner/rights owner readers. Researchers from the University of Rochester and the University of Pittsburgh assembled a dataset of lease deals used in the Pennsylvania Marcellus (some 60,000 of them!) and analyzed the leases for compensation and clauses…
Read More...A lawsuit of interest for all landowners is playing out in West Virginia between a class of landowners and EQT Corporation, the largest natural gas producer in the country. We searched our extensive archives high and low and found no mention of this lawsuit! Somehow, it has escaped our attention — until now. As these…
Read More...In December, Murrysville (PA) Council members will make a decision about leasing land for shale drilling under Duff Park (234 acres) and Murrysville Community Park (305 acres). Murrysville is located in Westmoreland County in the southwestern part of the state. Olympus Energy is interested and has pitched proposals to lease under both parks, using their…
Read More...WhiteHawk Energy, headquartered in Philadelphia with ownership of mineral and royalty interests for 850,000 gross unit acres and over 2,500 producing horizontal shale wells between the Marcellus and the Haynesville, announced yesterday the acquisition of additional Marcellus Shale natural gas mineral and royalty assets for a total purchase price of $54 million. WhiteHawk owns mineral…
Read More...A company called Southern Tier CO2 to Clean Energy Solutions, based in Binghamton, NY (where MDN is located), is sending fliers to landowners in Broome, Tioga, and Chemung counties (along the border with Pennsylvania, where there is no doubt large amounts of Marcellus and Utica gas beneath the ground) inviting landowners to sign up for…
Read More...Once upon a time (roughly 12 years ago), Chesapeake Energy and other shale drillers were leasing property in Columbiana County, OH, in deals that often paid $6,000 per acre for a signing bonus and granted 20% royalties for any oil or gas produced. According to an analysis by the Youngstown Business Journal, those days are…
Read More...An important decision was recently issued in a federal court case (in Ohio) that has the potential to affect landowners and drillers with shale leases throughout the Marcellus/Utica. At least, we believe it has broader implications. The case is known as Grissoms et al. v. Antero Resources Corporation. The case revolves around the issue of…
Read More...Last week, the Pennsylvania Board of Game Commissioners announced it had cut two different deals with Pennsylvania General Energy (PGE). Both deals involve land swaps with the prospect of new shale drilling by PGE on the way in both Lycoming County and Sullivan County. The Game Commission’s remit is “to protect, propagate, manage and preserve…
Read More...In January, Ohio House Bill (HB) 507 became law with the signature of Gov. Mike DeWine (see OH Gov. Signs Bill Expanding Drilling in State Parks, NatGas “Green”). The new law allows shale drilling under (but not on top of) Ohio state-owned land, including state parks. HB 507 encourages (pushes for) more drilling under state-owned…
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