Regulation

Roulette O&G Dinged by PA DEP for Inactive Well in Potter County

Roulette Oil & Gas drilled the Guardian Pad B 6H shale gas well in February 2011 in Hebron Township, Potter County. The well was granted inactive status on September 7, 2012. The inactive status expired on September 7, 2017. At that point, the well should have been plugged but was not. On August 23, 2023,…

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Trump Pulls the Plug on Taxpayer $$ Flowing to Enviro NGOs

Last week, President Trump issued a directive to the heads of Executive Branch agencies to review all funding said agencies provide to NGOs (nongovernmental organizations). The aim is to pull the plug on funding NGOs engaged in actions that actively undermine the security, prosperity, and safety of the American people. There’s a LOT of corruption…

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Anti Groups “Demand” OH Governor Pause Drilling Under State Parks

We’ve made this observation many times over the years, but here we go again. Ever notice how lefty environmentalists “demand” this and “demand” that? They’re a very demanding bunch, which is why nobody pays them any attention (except us). Here’s the latest example. A group of 30 “organizations” (many of them fronts for one or…

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PA Distributes $10M from Energy Transfer Fines to NGOs, Towns

According to an investigative reporter for Penn State, between 2018 and 2023, Pennsylvania fined Energy Transfer and its subsidiary Sunoco at least $42 million in connection to the construction of Mariner East II. Some $10 million of that came from a deal with the PA Attorney General’s office (who happened to be Josh Shapiro at…

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OH Legislators, New Bill, Encourage More Gas-Fired Power Plants

Ohio lawmakers are grappling with how to prepare the state for a surge in new power demand from AI data centers. In January, MDN told you that five Public Utilities Commission of Ohio (PUCO) commissioners will decide some important guidelines about who should pay to build out new electricity sources for data centers—how much current…

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East Coast Manufacturers Forced to Use Less NatGas – Lack of Pipes

Here’s a complicated issue that we will try to break down as simply as possible. The Industrial Energy Consumers of America (IECA) is a trade group representing some of the biggest consumers of energy in the U.S. (i.e., manufacturers). In the past, the IECA has made the strong case that more pipelines are needed, especially…

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NY DEC Approves Iroquois Pipe Expansion…With $1.5M “Contribution”

You can include this in one of the Lesser Miracles. Last Friday, at the direction of New York Governor Kathy Hochul, her Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) approved permits to expand two Hudson Valley compressor stations along the Iroquois gas pipeline. The Iroquois Gas Transmission’s Enhancement by Compression (ExC) project will increase horsepower at three…

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2 Serious Bills in Congress to Overturn Biden Methane Tax

In 2022, after the shocking news that U.S. Senator Joe Manchin (from West Virginia) had sold out his state and the entire country by agreeing to support the misnamed Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) bill, the details began to come out about just how bad the bill really is for the oil and gas industry. First…

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ODNR Uses Drones to Sniff Out Orphaned Oil & Gas Wells in Ohio

The Ohio Department of Natural Resources (ODNR), Division of Oil and Gas Resources Management, is about to fly drones equipped with magnetometers to sniff out orphaned oil and gas wells in Van Wert County. The ODNR previously completed drone flights in Auglaize, Hancock, Mercer, and Wood counties. The ODNR issued a press release to inform…

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WSJ Agrees with MDN on Josh Shapiro’s Blame Shift re Electric Rates

Do the editors of the Wall Street Journal read Marcellus Drilling News? No, we don’t expect they actually do. Although the editorial published by the editors of the WSJ on Feb. 4 looks like it could have been written by your humble MDN editor—because it says all the things we’ve said for months about Pennsylvania…

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DOI Sec. Burgum Signs 6 Orders to Restart Drilling on Fed Lands

These days, we feel like a kid in a candy shop, with the actions being taken by President Trump and his all-star cabinet picks. “Ooooo, I love this chocolate (gobble gobble gobble). Oh! I love this one too! (gobble gobble gobble). And what about this one!!” Pretty soon, the kid gets a stomachache from overeating…

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Energy Sec. Wright’s 1st Order Cancels Net-Zero, Streamlines Permits

As we reported yesterday, Chris Wright, now-former CEO of Liberty Energy (big fracking company), was confirmed on Monday to be the new Secretary of Energy (see Full Senate Confirms Fracker Chris Wright as DOE Secretary 59-38). Yesterday was Wright’s first official day at the agency. Right out of the box, he signed his first Secretarial…

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MVP Asks FERC to Amend Original Southgate Cert – Shorter & Bigger

In 2018, Equitrans Midstream, the builder of the 303-mile Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP), proposed to extend MVP by an extra 75 miles from the current terminus in Pittsylvania County, VA, to Alamance County, NC, to provide natural gas for heating and electric generation. The 75-mile extension is called MVP Southgate. In December 2023, MVP changed…

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New Power Plant/Data Center Proposed in Columbus, OH Suburb

In January, MDN outlined the issues before the Ohio Public Utilities Commission (PUC) in deciding how much money builders of data centers (like Amazon, Google, etc.) must commit if they want to connect to the local grid for power supplies (see 5 PUCO Commissioners to Decide the Future of Data Centers in Ohio). However, a…

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The Ax Swings at Larded-Up EPA, 1100 Employees Put on Notice

The libs and swamp dwellers are apoplectic. The Bidenistas larded up government agencies with thousands of new employees over the past four years. The federal government added approximately 200,000 new employees in the past four years, with the most significant increase occurring in 2023, when the workforce grew by around 85,000 individuals. Donald Trump and…

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