Monday, December 31, 2018

Energy Transfer Says Mariner East 2 Pipeline Is in Service

Energy Transfer LP said on Dec. 29  its Mariner East 2 natural gas liquids (NGLs) pipeline is in service, available for both interstate and intrastate service. The 350-mile NGL pipeline transports domestically produced ethane, propane and butane east from processing plants in Ohio across West Virginia and Pennsylvania to Energy Transfer’s Marcus Hook Industrial Complex in Delaware County, Pa., where the NGLs are stored for distribution to local, domestic and waterborne markets.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/energy-transfer-says-mariner-east-2-pipeline-is-in-service/

Why Natural Resource Issues Are So Divisive and What to Do About It

Tom.jpg?resize=75%2C95Tom Shepstone
Shepstone Management Company, Inc.

 

A remarkable, baring of the soul, article from the former head of the Colorado Oil and Gas Association offers several lessons on natural resource issues.

One of our readers and supporters from Western Pennsylvania sent me a remarkable article the other day. It’s titled “Down the Fracking Hole” and is authored by Tisha Schuller,  founder and principal of Adamantine Energy who serves as Strategic Advisor to Stanford University’s Natural Gas Initiative. She is also the former the president and CEO of the Colorado Oil and Gas Association and has written a new book you can read about and buy here. The article bares Schuller’s soul on dealing with fractivist types and offers some great insights for all of us.

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It’s a rather lengthy article, but well worth reading in total. Schuller talks about the difficulties of having a rational discussion when everyone has preconceived ideas and peer group relationships drive us all into competing tribes. What I found most interesting was her honest assessment of how many things simply don’t work to break down the barriers of communication, yet she ends on a hopeful note for having opened the mind of one person at least. That takes a degree of optimism that not only rings the bell at one of those carnival test of strength attractions but sends the bell itself into orbit.

y entire identity was based on traditional green environmentalism. Back in California, I had protested the early ‘90s “war for oil.” I registered to vote first with the Peace and Freedom Party and then the Green Party. I loved and took solace in nature. I still do.

In Colorado, I matured, got married, had children, and life became more complicated. I eventually worked as a consultant to the oil and gas industry and later ended up representing the industry in various forums and media across Colorado…

I spent years trying to create peace. Most disputes over energy development ended badly, usually in a highly charged stalemate. Much of the conflict was rationalized by each protagonist referring to their own body of scientific work. I came to understand that, in reality, we were each choosing to believe the science that conformed with our own worldview…

People must engage in building relationships built on empathy and trust before scientific explanations will have any effect…

Five years ago, I regularly found myself in contentious town meetings representing the oil and gas industry as the CEO of the Colorado Oil and Gas Association, commonly known as COGA. The trade association represents oil and gas companies and their interests in the political, regulatory, legislative, and media arenas.

I went to COGA from my pleasantly busy but relatively boring job as a mid-level manager for an environmental consulting firm. I went for the crazy reason that I felt called to do so. I got to know oil and gas workers as my clients while permitting facilities and conducting environmental trainings. I thought I could help tamp down the conflict that was building over fracking throughout much of the West. That proved to be optimistic…

For me, going to work for COGA was a way of acknowledging my own consumption and our societal dependence on oil and gas. Further, as an environmentalist, I was excited about the potential for natural gas to be a meaningful part of curbing greenhouse gas emissions by displacing coal. Going to COGA was a strange compromise between joining the perceived “enemy” of my tribe and acknowledging that our tribe needed them.

Before I took the job, my husband and I discussed the risks and the implications in detail. We were both clear that if I ever felt I was compromising my values, I was prepared to leave. By my second year on the job, the fracking controversy was raging, and I regularly sat in community meetings explaining—or even debating—the merits and safety of oil and gas development. Communities had heard of fracking and were often certain that it would poison their groundwater. A furious debate ensued over which chemicals were added to the fracking fluids that were used a mile or so underground to create microcracks in rocks to release oil and gas. Many of the people who came to community meetings had never encountered oil and gas development directly before. And they were alarmed.

My hippy roots and background in environmental science and geology were not building the communication bridges I had naively anticipated. I was unnerved by the anger and fear I met in meeting after meeting, fueled by scary and misleading information, but also representing very real issues and concerns. I would metaphorically wave my research references as I presented to an agitated audience squirming in their seats. One by one, they would give public comment and ask angry questions referencing their own sources of frightening information about fracking.

I spent five years in that role, first focused on educating the public about fracking, and later, based on my trail of failures, convincing the industry that an education campaign alone would never work to build public confidence. Even the most thoughtful educational forum created a firestorm of anger and distrust…

We all seek harmony between our beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors. When we see evidence that creates a conflict with what we already believe, we preserve our values. For example, when I read a newspaper article about fracking that I feel unfairly and unconsciously casts an oil and gas company in a bad light, I immediately seek harmony by dismissing the fairness and underlying intention of the story.

Similarly, when I present myself in a community meeting as an environmentalist and mother who is explaining the science of fracking, it can create its own cognitive dissonance. An attendee may in fact feel that she is the environmentalist and mother, and she does not believe that fracking is safe. The automatic response is to find a reason to dismiss me and my underlying intentions, usually by saying that I’m a shill for the industry…

To prevent the emotional discomfort of cognitive dissonance, we surround ourselves with like-minded people. The informational echo chambers allow us to experience more day-to-day harmony. By feeding ourselves news and intellectual conversations that reinforce our beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors, we create a cycle that further exacerbates the certainty of our own perspective.

This makes the exploration of scientific information quite challenging, especially amidst our polarized national politics. Loud, soundbite-spewing voices are needlessly dividing conversations about our environmental, natural, and economic resources. With this backdrop, intelligent conversations about tradeoffs of energy development become nearly impossible…

I decided that COGA would create a voluntary baseline groundwater-sampling program. This was no simple feat. Under our voluntary program, whenever a company drilled a new well, it would take a groundwater sample from a nearby source before drilling, then take another sample one year later. It took months of work, but I ultimately got approval from my board. I then worked the phones for many more months until we had more than 98 percent of oil and gas operators in the state participating in the program.

The voluntary baseline sampling program was a clear success. It demonstrated that operators were willing to be proactive to assuage public concerns. A year later, the program would be codified as a state regulation with official COGA support. Today, tens of thousands of water sampling data are publicly available. The new mountain of data took the question of whether oil and gas development was systematically contaminating groundwater off the table. It was not.

The program, however, did nothing to resolve the conflicts around oil and gas development in Colorado. Public concern about oil and gas development quickly morphed into new issues. Initially, I was surprised. Each time one topic was resolved by a study or a new regulation, the next surfaced seemingly instantaneously. Now I understand the dynamic more clearly: Communities were concerned about fracking in their hearts and their guts, so they would find no shortage of new issues to worry about.

When I was in my early fact-splaining phase at COGA, a study from Cornell University came out declaring that gas was worse than coal in terms of carbon emissions. This study was a full-force slap in my environmental face. The tenuous ground on which I initially justified my defection to the oil and gas camp was the carbon and air quality benefits of natural gas compared to coal.

A research assistant and I went to work dissecting the study. We quickly ascertained that it was a wild exercise in hyperbole. The assumptions, methodology, and calculations were debunked by another Cornell scientist, a federal laboratory, and various other researchers.

That was 8 years ago, yet I continue to be told in both casual and formal conversations about natural gas that science has demonstrated gas is worse than coal. The long-debunked study is still loosely cited as the source of that information…

It’s hard to say who I continue my work for: the people in the industry who struggle to convey the importance and diligence of their work, or the people in Colorado who think the oil and gas industry is out to poison us all in the name of profits. I’ve gotten long letters from both. The most gratifying so far was a woman in her thirties who is a visible and vocal environmental advocate and opponent of fracking. She read the book I wrote about this topic, Accidentally Adamant. We share love for many things in our community, including my children, even as we have always avoided discussing politics.

She told me that the book put her in a quandary. She believed my explanation of energy requirements, tradeoffs, and the benefits of oil and gas. This alone had undermined a fundamental identity for her, a comfort that her tribe was on the side of righteousness. Not only did she need to look deeper at all her beliefs, she explained, but now she was also uncomfortable that she had been taking her previously held assumptions for granted, on which many tiny decisions are based.

Choosing to be open-minded and flexible, opening yourself to different sources that make you ache with discomfort, and finding commonalities with people you disagree with is not for the faint of heart. But whatever your tribe, whatever your starting place, whatever walls and rationalizations you carry, it is possible to move onto the uncertain ground of honest listening and learning that can result in lasting and meaningful change.

Read the whole thing but the message is that no amount of education by the best techs, or PR fluff approved by corporate counsel, ever substitutes for simply listening to the other side and hearing them out with an open mind. In fact, it’s been my experience that the changeable minds (as opposed to those of true believer types) have been fed a lot of malarkey financed by wealthy special interests who our opponents aren’t even aware are involved. The only way to break through that is to listen and patiently explain our own view while honestly respecting their’s and hearing them out.

Likewise, no amount of emotional ranting or use of meaningless slogans (e.g., “water is life” as if pollution was a given) accomplishes a thing in the end. Those with real responsibility seldom take that stuff seriously and the politicians only give it lip service for purposes of feathering their own nests. And, I’m still waiting for the fractivist who gives a damn about property rights or the economic struggles of landowners and rural areas. There’s a whole lot of listening needed in that arena.

Listening doesn’t mean many minds are going to be changed, and perhaps none will be in the moment, but over time things do tend to change and move inexorably toward common sense and the truth. And, yes, I’m absurdly optimistic, too.

The post Why Natural Resource Issues Are So Divisive and What to Do About It appeared first on Natural Gas Now.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/why-natural-resource-issues-are-so-divisive-and-what-to-do-about-it/

Sunday, December 30, 2018

Ring Energy Adds ‘Core-Of-The-Core’ To Permian Central Basin Platform Position

Ring Energy Inc. (AMEX: REI) added to its position in the Permian’s Central Basin Platform (CBP) with a recent “core-of-the-core” bolt-on acquisition in Andrews County, Texas. The acquisition, which Ring said closed on Dec. 26, consists of 4,763 net acres in Andrews County from Tessara Petroleum Resources LLC, a subsidiary of global asset management firm The Carlyle Group LP (NASDAQ: CG). Ring will be the operator with a 100% working interest and 75% net revenue interest in the acquired acreage offsetting existing the company’s position where it has focused on drilling horizontal wells targeting the San Andres Formation. 

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/ring-energy-adds-core-of-the-core-to-permian-central-basin-platform-position/

Where There Are Eagles The Spirit of Liberty to Fight DRBC Tyranny Lives

Tom.jpg?resize=75%2C95Tom Shepstone
Shepstone Management Company, Inc.

 

As 2018 winds down, a case proceeds in Federal court to rescue Upper Delaware landowners from DRBC tryranny and takings. The spirit of the eagle lives!

The American Bald Eagle is the stern symbol of liberty, the spirit of resistance to tyranny. And, there are American Bald Eagles everywhere in the Upper Delaware Valley, where a special brand of tyranny—DRBC tyranny—has been temporarily imposed at the behest of an East Coast gentry class and its all too infamous shills. Those eagles include not only those of the Haliaeetus leucocephalus species, but also those falling into the class of Liber homines; the free men and women determined to fight this DRBC tyranny.

DRBC tyranny has taken two forms. One is the scam the agency has played for the better part of a decade; pretending to be studying and revising regulations that would allow gas drilling in the basin while taking money to do so from the very people fighting to stop gas drilling. The other is the proposed fracking ban, which is the DRBC Plan B in the event the agency ultimately loses the lawsuit filed by the Wayne Land and Mineral Group (WLMG). Both are DRBC exercises in pure Machiavellian stye power designed to quash the rights of landowners.

But, the Upper Delaware citizenry is fighting back, taking a stand for liberty, just like this American Bald Eagle perched on the property of the Sutliff family in Northern Wayne County:

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The citizenry is fighting back through the WLMG lawsuit. Although opponents are quick to suggest it is an industry lawsuit, it is entirely funded by landowners. It is, in fact the people’s lawsuit, the industry having zero reason to be involved given how many opportunities there are to drill elsewhere. Only the people have the incentive to fight back against DRBC tyranny and they are doing it by donating cash and mineral rights to the cause. Their prospects are also good, the case being in a fact-finding stage at the moment.

This is why the DRBC tyrants are focused on the Plan B fracking ban. Will they actually do it? Perhaps, but their case on that score is not only very weak, but also compromised from the outset. It may, in fact, have only been an election year bluff. We’ll see. If a ban is enacted that is also likely to bring in industry money because the DRBC will be in the impossible position of trying to justify not doing a fracking ban in the SRBC region given that it is governed largely by the same people.

That prospect is a huge threat to the industry and would likely necessitate its involvement in fighting a DRBC fracking ban if one should ever be foolishly enacted. A ban, ironically, would supply the missing industry incentive to fight. Don’t imagine the DRBC Commissioners don’t know that.

Meanwhile, the people’s lawsuit, the WLMG lawsuit, will proceed ever so slowly through the courts. The DRBC and the Delaware Riverkeeper a/k/a Povertykeeper, both funded by the gentry class William Penn Foundation, will also continue to fight to deny DRBC landowners the same rights SRBC landowners have. They are snakes biting at the heels of the Upper Delaware citizenry, while the eagles—the citizens funding the lawsuit—keep defending liberty. That’s what the case is all about; the rights of property for equal justice under law. May the eagles soar:

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The post Where There Are Eagles The Spirit of Liberty to Fight DRBC Tyranny Lives appeared first on Natural Gas Now.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/where-there-are-eagles-the-spirit-of-liberty-to-fight-drbc-tyranny-lives/

Saturday, December 29, 2018

GTI Mourns Passing Of Eddie Johnston

GTI announced the death of Edward “Eddie” Johnston, who passed away on Dec.20, 2018, after a valiant year-long battle with a rare form of cancer. As GTI’s senior vice president of research and technology development, Johnston was an accomplished technology executive in the energy industry. He oversaw the company’s wide-ranging research operations and championed many of the company’s successful strategic growth initiatives. He was well-known and highly respected across the company and throughout the industry.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/gti-mourns-passing-of-eddie-johnston/

Natural Gas NOW Picks of the Week – December 29, 2018

Tom-1.jpgTom Shepstone
Shepstone Management Company, Inc.

Natural Gas NOW readers pass along a lot of stuff every week about natural gas, fractivist antics, emissions, renewables, and other news relating to energy. As usual, emphasis is added.

Texans for Natural Gas Celebrate, As Should We All

Texans get it. And, Texans for Natural Gas really get it. They put a holiday celebration piece that should bring cheer to all. Here are some of the 2018 happenings  to which they raised a glass:

  • Two months into 2018 and the United States was breaking production records left and right. Our environment was doing great too! By the beginning of March the United States had already met our 2025 Greenhouse Gas (GHG) reduction goal, thanks to increased natural gas use.
  • With liquefied natural gas (LNG) helpingicon-logo-256x125.png to make America a net exporter of natural gas for the first time in 60 years in January, a study released in April showed the massive economic benefits of increased LNG exports. According to the ICF study, “the cumulative contribution to US economic growth from the addition of more LNG plants will range from $716 billion to $1.267 trillion between 2013 and 2050″ and also projected “2-3.9 million job-years from US LNG plants during that period.”
  • review of the federal data showed that U.S. methane emission levels from associated gas venting and flaring during petroleum production declined 17 percent between 2013 and 2016, even as domestic oil production increased by 19 percent.
  • U.S. oil exports hit a record high in September, supported by the United States becoming the world’s largest oil producer that same month .
  • In October, federal data showed that the United States would account for half of global oil production growth by 2025 . That’s great news for us, but not for OPEC, as the Daily Caller reported that “ooming U.S. oil production is wreaking havoc on the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries’ (OPEC) influence on the international market.

Those Texans know how to have a good time!

What the DRBC Is Learning That Isn’t True

Perusing material for a post the other day, I came across the following slide from a presentation to the DRBC earlier this year by the Philadelphia Water Department:

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Notice the warning at the top about republishing without permission. This is a presentation given by one government entity to another and published on a government website for the whole world to see, but they want my permission to share it? Why?

Perhaps it’s the ridiculous projection that sea levels which have risen 0.64 feet (less than 8 inches over the last six decades) can be expected to rise 4.5 feet by 2080 or so over the next six decades. The DRBC is learning the rate of sea level rise could increase by a factor of seven? Give us all a break! Here’s what highly respected climatologist Judith Curry says, according to this Washington Times piece:

In her latest paper, Ms. Curry found that the current rising sea levels are not abnormal, nor can they be pinned on human-caused climate change, arguing that the oceans have been on a “slow creep” for the last 150 years — before the post-1950 climb in carbon-dioxide emissions.

“There are numerous reasons to think that projections of 21st-century sea level rise from human-caused global warming are too high, and some of the worst-case scenarios strain credulity,” the 80-page report found.

Her Nov. 25 report, “Sea Level and Climate Change,” which has been submitted for publication, also found that sea levels were actually higher in some regions during the Holocene Climate Optimum — about 5,000 to 7,000 years ago.

“After several centuries of sea level decline following the Medieval Warm Period, sea levels began to rise in the mid-19th century,” the report concluded. “Rates of global mean sea level rise between 1920 and 1950 were comparable to recent rates. It is concluded that recent change is within the range of natural sea-level variability over the past several thousand years.”

Can we please stop with the hysterics and just start dealing in facts, such the contributions of natural gas to reducing CO2 emissions? As for the DRBC, no wonder it’s such a disaster itself.

The Dark Side of Blue/Green Sunrise Movement

One of our faithful readers passed along a story about the “Green New Deal” being pushed by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who seemingly hasn’t a clue about much of anything. The Atlantic has a story about how the new House of Representatives hopes to co-opt her idea and probably turn into a corporatist green energy scam with eventual trillions headed into the pockets of big-time Democrat donors with “clean energy” hedge-funds. Cortez is not mentioned, for obvious good reasons, but something called the “Sunrise Movement” is and they’re not happy:

“It’s a big disappointment,” says Stephen O’Hanlon, a spokesman for the Sunrise Movement, a Millennial-led organization that championed the Green New Deal plan. “The select committee on a Green New Deal was put together based on a hard look at what the science demands, and we were hopeful that Nancy Pelosi—who says she wants to take serious action on climate change—would be willing to come to the table for it.”

I’ve never heard of the “Sunrise Movement” and that’s always a sign that something is most likely an astroturfed enterprise of some sort. I did an internet search and easily found there was a web page. As soon as I went there I was slammed with a recurring donation request, which, of course, I declined. I was then asked for a one-time donation.This is no organic movement. It is, rather, one sleek money-raising propaganda machine designed to appeal to college students with mush for brains.

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Having learned over the years the best way to determine what or who an organization really is, is to start to make a donation and see where it goes, I initiated one. That took me here, where I learned the “Sunrise Movement” is actually Act Blue Civics, a multimillion dollar leftist funding apparatus. As usual nothing is as it’s made to seem. It’s all a coordinated effort to set the stage for yet another raid on the public treasury and the wallets of ratepayers to support economic and environmental foolishness intended to line the pockets of the ruling class.

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The post Natural Gas NOW Picks of the Week – December 29, 2018 appeared first on Natural Gas Now.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/natural-gas-now-picks-of-the-week-december-29-2018/

Friday, December 28, 2018

US Drillers Add Oil Rigs For Second Week In A Row

U.S. energy firms added oil rigs for a second week in a row even as oil prices fell to 18-month lows and headed for losses of more than 20% this year.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/us-drillers-add-oil-rigs-for-second-week-in-a-row/

Don’t Talk to Me About Forest Protection Unless You’re Serious About It

Tom.jpg?resize=75%2C95Tom Shepstone
Shepstone Management Company, Inc.

 

An EPA report on biofuels reveals the falsity of fracking bans based on such factors as forest protection, which is enhanced by natural gas development.

Several years ago I attended a meeting at which National Park Service representatives were present and made what I thought was an obvious point. It was that if one was serious about forest protection or saving open space in general, then there was no better approach than to encourage natural gas development. The reason? Nothing else disturbs so little with so much economic impact.

Natural gas development, which typically disturbs but a tiny portion of the land, gives farmers and forest landowners an economic return—the ability to earn a living from and pay the taxes on—the land so that they could maintain it as farmland, woodland and open space. I carefully explained these fundamental facts and the NPS folks gave me that deer in the headlights stare that showed how little they grasped of land economics. I might as well have lectured the infants in the maternity ward of our hospital. Sadly, it’s not uncommon, but a recent EPA study on biofuels may help.

The study, entitled “Biofuels and the Environment: Second Triennial Report to Congress,” has been long overdue and was apparently avoided for the longest time because nobody in Washington wanted to face the truth about the biofuels/ethanal boondoggle so loved by both political parties and so hated but most of the rest of us. The Washington Times notes the following, in fact:

In their new, 145-page report, “Biofuels and the Environment: The Second Triennial Report to Congress,” the EPA repeatedly acknowledges that the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) — the federal law that requires the blending of ethanol with gasoline supplies each year — has done harm to water, soil and air quality.

The National Wildlife Federation (NWF) indicates the June report documents millions of acres of wildlife habitat lost to ethanol crop production and increased nutrient pollution in waterways and air emissions. They also say the report supports their belief that the unintended consequences of replacing gas with ethanol are making things much worse.

The RFS is having negative consequences to a wide variety of environmental indicators, according to David DeGennaro, a policy expert at NWF. “The report is a red flag warning that we need to reconsider the mandate’s scope and its focus on first-generation fuels made from food crops,” he said.

The report includes several findings, including the following tidbit:

Although the use of agricultural land has intensified, cropland extensification and deforestation has continued. Cropland expansion that results in forest loss is a particularly acute driver of environmental impacts.

So, biofuels, one of the renewables alternatives suggested by fractivists, are causing deforestation with acute environmental impacts. Natural gas development is not; for two reasons.

First, it’s occurring in regions like my own Wayne County, Pennsylvania where forest cover has dramatically increased (by roughly 15%) over the last half-century—a point the NPS reps and the politically craven DRBC folks simply refuse to address. The following chart compares forest land in 1959 with 2008:

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Wayne County forest land grew by over 44,000 acres or 15% from 1959 to 2008, from 56% of total land use to 65%.

Secondly, natural gas development and the pipeline network designed to gather and deliver it requires only a very small acreage, as little as 10-15 acres to grab the gas from underneath more than 2,200 acres with existing technology that allows laterals as long as two miles, and its getting better all the time. Again, nothing else delivers so much for so little disturbance and most of it occurs on already disturbed land. Biofuels development, by contrast, uses every bit of the acreage involved and, as we know from EPA, often occurs on land deforested for the purpose of growing the crops.

Yet, here’s what we read from the DRBC with respect to fracking in the Delaware River Basin:

Approximately 70 percent of the basin area underlain by the Marcellus and Utica shales (largely in the drainage area of Special Protection Waters) is forested. The average total disturbance associated with a single well pad, including associated access roads and utility corridors, is estimated at 7.7 acres. Off-site facilities such as gathering lines involve additional disturbances. These landscape changes will reduce forested areas and potentially vegetated buffers, increase non-point source pollution, diminish groundwater infiltration, and risk adversely affecting water quality and quantity in surface and groundwater. Because high volume hydraulic fracturing would most likely occur in headwater areas in the drainage area to Special Protection Waters, the risks of degrading water resources and impairing the effectuation of the comprehensive plan are of particular concern.

Not only does the DRBC ignore the vast increase in forest cover over the last several decades as farmland has reverted to forest, but it also pretends natural gas development uses an unusually large amount of forest land for energy production when the truth is exactly the opposite. Natural gas development disturbs far less forest than biofuels, solar or wind per unit of energy produced and it economically permits landowners the luxury of keeping land in open space and doing forest protection everyone says they favor.

The DRBC and other fractivist-oriented groups using forest protection as a rationale for their positions, in other words, aren’t the least bit serious about forest protection. It’s nothing more than an excuse to frustrate natural gas development. In the DRBC’s case that’s because such development will make it more difficult to make a wilderness out of the Upper Delaware for the gentry class it is so determined to appease.

The post Don’t Talk to Me About Forest Protection Unless You’re Serious About It appeared first on Natural Gas Now.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/dont-talk-to-me-about-forest-protection-unless-youre-serious-about-it/

Thursday, December 27, 2018

Trump administration miscalculated train brake’s worth

The Trump administration miscalculated potential damages from train derailments when it canceled an Obama administration rule requiring the installation of more advanced brakes by railroads hauling explosive fuels, The Associated Press reported.

A government analysis used by the administration to justify the cancellation omitted up to $117 million in estimated future damages that could be avoided by using electronic brakes, Kallanish Energy understands.

U.S. Department of Transportation officials acknowledged the mistake after it was discovered by the AP during a review of federal documents, but said it doesn't change their decision not to install the brakes.

Measures eneacted under Obama

Safety advocates, transportation union leaders and Democratic lawmakers oppose the administration's decision to cancel the brake rule, which was included in a package of rail safety measures enacted in 2015 under former President Obama following accidents by trains hauling oil in the U.S. and Canada.

The deadliest accident happened in Canada in 2013, when an unattended train carrying crude oil rolled down an incline, jumped the tracks in the town of Lac-Megantic and exploded in a massive ball of fire, killing 47 people and destroying much of the Quebec community's downtown.

Brakes applied simultaneously

After the brake rule was enacted, lobbyists for the railroad and oil industries pushed to cancel it, citing the high cost of installing so-called electronic pneumatic brakes and questioning their effectiveness.

Unlike other systems where brakes are applied sequentially along the length of a train, electronic pneumatic brakes, or ECP, work on all cars simultaneously. That can reduce the distance and time a train needs to stop, and cause fewer cars to derail.

"These ECP brakes are very important for oil trains," Steven Ditmeyer, a rail safety expert and former senior official at the Federal Railroad Administration, told AP.

Administration banks on fewer derailments

Under Obama, the Transportation Department determined the brakes would cost up to $664 million over 20 years and save between $470 million and $1.1 billion from accidents that would be avoided.

The Trump administration reduced the range of benefits to between $131 million and $374 million. Transportation department economists said in their analysis the change was prompted in part by a reduction in oil train traffic in recent years, which meant there would be fewer derailments.

But in making their calculations, they left out the most common type of derailments in which spilled and burning fuel causes property damage but no mass casualties, the AP found. Equipping fuel trains with electronic brakes would reduce damages from those derailments by an estimated $48 million to $117 million, according to Department of Transportation estimates left out of the administration's final tally.

Including the omitted benefits reduces the net cost of the requirement to as low as $63 million under one scenario laid out by the agency.


https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/trump-administration-miscalculated-train-brakes-worth/

It’s Time to Use the Commerce Clause to Fight the Trust-Funders

Tom.jpg?resize=75%2C95Tom Shepstone
Shepstone Management Company, Inc.

 

The Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution should be used to fight back against trust-funders trying to monopolize energy development in this country.

I’m about two-thirds of the way through Richard Brookhiser’s wonderful biography, “John Marshall: The Man Who Made The Supreme Court.” Brookhiser is an outstanding biographer and is a New York native, having homes in City and in the Catskills. It’s difficult to write a book about legal cases and make it readable but he accomplishes the task quite easily. One of the cases he relates is Gibbons v. Ogden, which is all about New York, and It occurred to me as I read about the decision, that it offers the strategy we should be using to fight back against the trust-funders financing fractivism.

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John Marshall by Henry Inman

Fractivism is all about banning fracking and opposing pipelines, nowhere more evident than in New York State, which has done both at the direction of Governor Corruptocrat and the instigation of the NRDC gang. Fractivism is, in fact, everywhere financed by trust-funders of the Rockefeller type who constitute the NRDC gang.

What is it these trust-funders desire beyond assuaging their self-imposed guilt at having done so undeservedly well in life? Well, in the Rockefeller case, it’s land they want to make a wilderness playground and to buffer their second-homes from the masses. In the Nathaniel Simons case, it is hedge-fund investment opportunities in green energy scams. Both want to monopolize energy development with renewables; one as a weapon against natural gas development standing in the way of their land acquisition agenda and the other as a corporatist opportunity to milk the taxpayers.

New York’s fracking ban (“at this time”) and the DRBC’s proposed ban as well as the former’s pipeline obstruction are intended to clear a path for those renewables and to ensure they have a future energy monopoly. They have relied upon air and water quality objections to sustain their arguments but those are mere facades. The facts are now overwhelmingly clear that natural gas development has cleaned the air, lowered carbon emissions and protected water quality. There is, moreover, ever more progress on these fronts and fracking has stimulated rural economies while delivering huge cost savings and better air in places such as New York City. It’s simply undeniable.

This is important because, without the evidence they’re dealing with an environmental or health issue, the state and/or the DRBC have no right to interfere with the commerce of the nation. And, they’re doing big-time interference when, for example, New York denies permits to the Constitution Pipeline necessary to deliver Pennsylvania natural gas to New England where it’s desperately needed. They’re also doing interference when they prevent Delaware River Basin landowners from developing natural resources needed in New York City.

Nothing could, in fact, better define interstate commerce than the mesh of pipelines across the country intended to deliver natural gas wherever it’s needed. This argument was made very effectively here, in fact, over five years ago by Attorney Ken Kamlet. That was before two New York cases made it through the appeals process and, unfortunately, no one picked up on it to sue in Federal court. More on that momentarily but, first, there’s the Gibbons v. Ogden decision to be considered.

The case, so well explained in detail by Brookhiser, involved a monopoly granted by the State of New York to run steamboats on the Hudson River. Ogden was the beneficiary of that monopoly, New York being every bit as corrupt then as it is now. Gibbons challenged the monopoly by running his own steamboats in defiance of the state law, which was intended to prevent competition to Ogden. New York State courts said there was no conflict with the U.S. Constitution because there were no Federal steamboat regs and the operation took place entirely within the State of New York.

The case was subsequently appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court and Chief Justice John Marshall issued the unanimous opinion in favor of Gibbons based on the Commerce Clause, which is as follows:

The Congress shall have power…

To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes

Marshall’s opinion focused on the word “among” stating it means intermingled with:

A thing which is among others, is intermingled with them.

This interpretation led him to then conclude the Federal government had a right to regulate and thereby also to ensure commerce among the states without the interference of state regulations he described as both “repugnant and hostile” and “extreme belligerent legislation.”

The intermingling reference is particularly relevant to shale gas resources and natural gas pipelines, both of which involve intermingling of resources and product as they are developed and delivered far and wide across state boundaries. Ken Kamlet makes this case in detail with respect to moratoriums then proposed at the local level in New York. And, everything he says applies even more so to the current pipeline obstruction by the State of New York.

Ken’s arguments and the Gibbons v. Ogden lesson also apply to the DRBC’s proposed fracking ban, which would deprive Delaware River Basin landowners of the opportunity to participate in the commerce that is the shale revolution. It would impose a ban on certain water uses. It clearly has the authority to regulate water use within reason but when it attempts to extend that authority into outright banning of a legitimate use—commerce—by controlling the activity itself (i.e., the wellpad) rather than just the water use, it is obviously violating the Commerce Clause. Moreover, no agency or state should have the authority to stop a pipeline at a border any more than they could stop a railroad, a plane or a truck from passing through.

If the industry is serious about stopping all the fractivist harassment financed by gentry class trust-funders and hedge fund opportunists, it will start taking the State of New York, the DRBC and other such agencies to Federal court for Commerce Clause violations. It’s time to take the offense and this the weapon to use in my humble opinion. But, I hasten to add I’m not a lawyer; I just play one on this blog from time to time. Perhaps some of our redaers from the legal profession will join in with their opinions. You know you are, so please do.

The post It’s Time to Use the Commerce Clause to Fight the Trust-Funders appeared first on Natural Gas Now.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/its-time-to-use-the-commerce-clause-to-fight-the-trust-funders/

Wednesday, December 26, 2018

Oil Bounces After Steep Slide, But Growth Fears Still Weigh

Oil surged on Dec. 26, erasing some of the steep losses that have taken crude benchmarks to lows not seen in 1-1/2 years on perceptions the price slide has gone too far, too fast. Both U.S. and Brent crude were more than 6% higher on Dec. 26, but it was unclear if the move would see any follow-through when trading desks are more fully staffed after the beginning of the new year. Crude has been caught up in wider market weakness as the U.S. government shutdown, higher U.S. interest rates and the U.S.-China trade dispute unnerved investors and exacerbated worries over global growth.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/oil-bounces-after-steep-slide-but-growth-fears-still-weigh/

Are New England Gas Prices About to Go Through the Roof?

Tom.jpg?resize=75%2C95Tom Shepstone
Shepstone Management Company, Inc.

 

It’s hard to give much sympathy to those stuffy Bostonians with their noses up in the air, but New England gas prices are about to shoot through the roof.

The word is out among investors; New England gas prices are about to skyrocket. I’m not bothered, though, and I expect most readers aren’t either. Most of us have had enough of the Boston Brahmin lecturing us about how much they don’t need our gas, even as New England gas prices rose to unprecedented levels and they were forced to import Russian LNG. Now, it appears it may all happen again.

polar-vortex-512x499.png

Yes, New England gas prices are about to soar again, according to this post at Seeking Alpha. Here are the key points:

The U.S. Global Forecasting System (GFS Model) anticipates a return of the Polar Vortex in the first week of January.

A Sudden Stratospheric Warming Event occurred this past week above the Arctic setting the stage for the return of the Polar Vortex.

Natural gas in storage is well below the normal range and will fall even further below normal if the Polar Vortex returns…

If there is another Sudden Stratospheric Warming Event later this winter, then there is a possibility of natural gas in storage getting close to zero. This could create significant shortages before winter is over leading to a potential Black Swan for the economy.

Hmmm…

Yes, New England may well come to regret its pipeline opposition. Let’s hope residents turn their ire toward the two Massachusetts Senators, Markey and Warren, who couldn’t wait to join with fractivists in opposing multiple pipeline projects. And, let’s especially hope they castigate Andrew Cuomo who directed his DEC to block the Constitution Pipeline. May all these pandering pols enjoy the fruits of their demagoguery!

The post Are New England Gas Prices About to Go Through the Roof? appeared first on Natural Gas Now.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/are-new-england-gas-prices-about-to-go-through-the-roof/

Tuesday, December 25, 2018

US Drillers Add Rigs Despite Sharp Decline In Oil Prices

U.S. energy firms added oil rigs for the first time in the past three weeks despite sharp declines in crude futures prices to their lowest since the summer of 2017. Drillers added 10 oil rigs in the week to Dec. 21, bringing the total count to 883, Baker Hughes Inc. (NYSE: BHGE), General Electric Co.'s (NYSE: GE) energy services firm, said in its closely followed report on Dec. 21. This was the biggest weekly gain in rig numbers since early November. More than half the total U.S. oil rigs are in the Permian Basin, the country's biggest shale oil formation. Active units there held steady this week at 486, the lowest since early October.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/us-drillers-add-rigs-despite-sharp-decline-in-oil-prices/

Merry Christmas and Thank A Roughneck for a Warming New Year!

VicFurman-423x512.jpgVictor Furman
Upstate New York Landowner Shale Gas Activist

….
….  

Vic Furman says Merry Christmas and says thank a roughneck as he shares a modified version of “The Night Before Christmas.”

Twas Christmas eve throughout the states.
Stores everywhere, the car lots so full,
Grandma suggested, “I hope were not too late,”
Grandpa’s eyes twinkled, from dinner still full.

The mall had trees decorated in every hall
People were smiling and wishing all well
The children all excited and having a ball,
The Year has been good, Christmas do tell.

The last few weeks were busy with glee
Parties with family gatherings and food,
Misletoes, hanging pictures by the tree,
Eyes twinkle again, seem to set the season mood.

It’s hard to imagine with the snow and the ice,
The celebration of Christ if I may be so bold,
May not be so warm, the season so nice,
Had there been no natural gas to keep from the cold.

So to all who are reading this poem of cheer,
Whether for or against, what brought you here.
Put aside your politics, but down your drink,
Just thank a roughneck for a warming New Year.

Most of all, let me remind you Christmas is for us
Those of us who believe and in whom God we trust.
To shout it from the mountain tops for all to hear
Christ is God’s gift every day every year!!!

Merry Christmas from my family to yours!!!

christmas-634777_1280-340x512.jpg

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Monday, December 24, 2018

Haynesville Thriving On Capital Efficiency

In recent years, the Haynesville Shale has reinvented itself as new operators entered the play with significant funding from private equity. These new entrants earnestly applied new completion techniques and longer laterals, imitating practices honed in plays like the Eagle Ford. Haynesville region gas production is expected to rise to 11.7 billion cubic feet per day (Bcf/d) by year-end 2019, an increase of 13% from Stratas Advisors’ 10.4-Bcf/d 2018 estimate. Longer laterals, greater stage counts and higher proppant loading will continue, and Haynesville activity will remain robust on flat to rising prices. The Haynesville represents the lion’s share of activity. For now, the Cotton Valley is expected to remain relatively stable as the majority of current Cotton Valley operators are either focused on other opportunities or lack scale.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/haynesville-thriving-on-capital-efficiency/

DRBC Fracking Opposition Is Intended to Distract from Real Pollution

Tom.jpg?resize=75%2C95Tom Shepstone
Shepstone Management Company, Inc.

 

DRBC fracking opposition rests on speculation of risks from spills. But, the real pollution threats are all downstream. Is the public just being distracted?

Earlier this year, I wrote a post asking “When Will the DRBC Stop Commercial Shipping on the Delaware?” I pointed out commercial shipping on the Delaware gets the benefit of the doubt when it comes to the very real risks of spills, but, “when it comes to fracking, though, the DRBC would have us believe any possibility of accidents whatsoever is a reason to halt any and all activity.” Yesterday, a reader sent me an article once again pointing out the real threats to the Delaware are anything but fracking. It raises a serious question; is DRBC fracking opposition just an attempt to distract the public from those real threats?

The title of the Inquirer article is largely self-explanatory; “‘Eye-popping’ 245-ton Illegal Dump Cleared Near Philadelphia Drinking Water Intakes.” After all, there is virtually no news release from either the DRBC or its handmaiden, the Delaware Povertykeeper, that doesn’t begin with a reference to the mythical 15, 17 or whatever million people who depend on the Delaware for drinking water. And, now after months of self-serving hyperbole about the non-existent threat to this supply, we learn there was an illegal dump “situated between two of the city’s three main sources of drinking water.” But, the DRBC and the Povertykeeper are talking fracking, which hasn’t had any discernible  impact on Susquehanna.

The illegal dump apparently didn’t amount to much either, but how is it possible it got no attention from the Queen of Obstruction or the DRBC aristocrats? After all, the Inquirer (like the Povertykeeper and the DRBC) is indebted to the Haas family foundations and it called the dump “eye-popping.” The only thing about fracking that is eye-popping is the shale revolution it spawned; a revolution that has delivered us from foreign energy dependence, brought economic prosperity, reduced energy costs and cleaned the air.

There was, too, this interesting observation in the article:

By state law, the Water Department must assess any threats upstream of the intakes to ensure no contaminants or chemicals get into the supply.

My thoughts naturally turned to whether there was reference in these assessments to either illegal dumps or fracking. I searched the Philadelphia Water Department website and found nothing much about illegal dumping although I did find a Marcellus Shale Drilling page. Most of it relates to positions taken in 2011 and 2013 which were largely reasonable, indicating the DRBC could have easily addressed the concerns of Philadelphia at that time. Why didn’t it do so?

The answer is obvious; they didn’t want to. They were already entangled with the Povertykeeper and the William Penn Foundation. Moreover, it was only after the DRBC announced it planned a fracking ban that Philadelphia jumped on board to support it, proving water quality has never been at the heart of DRBC policy on fracking.

Then, there is this 2015 presentation regarding the Philadelphia Water Department’s “Delaware Valley Early Warning System.” Interestingly, it makes no mention of fracking but it does say the natural gas industry could make use of the system; another indication the city was prepared to deal with any perceived risk from fracking and it is only the DRBC that demands a ban. It also addresses real pollution threats, using this slide to illustrate some of the incidents that have occurred:

Screen-Shot-2018-12-24-at-11.06.58-AM-512x288.jpg

Cynanide? What? Yes, here’s the story (emphasis added):

It took Merck & Co. Inc. a week to discover and report a cyanide-related discharge that killed at least 1,000 fish in the Wissahickon Creek and prompted closure of Philadelphia’s water-intake valves.

The Environmental Protection Agency said yesterday that a Merck representative first notified the agency of the spill on Tuesday.

According to the EPA, a Merck official said that a week earlier, on June 13, a vaccine-research “pilot plant” had released about 25 gallons of potassium thiocyanate into the sewer system. The substance is commonly used in making vaccines and antibiotics and should not have been discharged into the sewer system, authorities said. They suspect the chemical combined with chlorine at the sewage-treatment plant and became more toxic to fish.

Merck now faces a continuing probe by state and federal officials, and some anger from the community.

And, the DRBC and the Povertykeeper are worried about fracking 100 miles upstream that has proven to have no discernible impacts on the waters of the Susquehanna? How can anyone take these entities seriously? Their agenda isn’t water quality; it’s stopping oil and gas development that would make it more difficult to do land grabs and make a wilderness out of the Upper Delaware. Everything else is a distraction.

The post DRBC Fracking Opposition Is Intended to Distract from Real Pollution appeared first on Natural Gas Now.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/drbc-fracking-opposition-is-intended-to-distract-from-real-pollution/

Sunday, December 23, 2018

VA Air Pollution Control Bd Delays ACP Compressor Stn Vote, Again

In November Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam abruptly replaced two (of seven) Virginia State Air Pollution Control Board members who were... Continue reading

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/va-air-pollution-control-bd-delays-acp-compressor-stn-vote-again/

Virginia Offshore Wind Project An Expensive Virtue Signaling Exercise

Screen-Shot-2014-10-26-at-6.25.47-AM-75x85.jpgScreen-Shot-2018-12-23-at-9.03.40-AM-75x85.jpgPaul Driessen, Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow
Roger Bezdek, President – Management Information Services, Inc.

 

Virginia has approved a $300-million offshore wind project that will impose killer electricity rates 26 times the typical 3¢ per kWh wholesale price.

In this season of New Year resolutions, we should insist that governors, legislators, regulators, activists and their corporate allies resolve to be more honest, especially on climate and renewable energy issues.

Here in Virginia where we live, Governor Ralph Northam and the Republican controlled legislature have approved Dominion Energy plans to install two Washington Monument-high wind turbines off the Norfolk coast. They claim the “demonstration project” will help advance their commitment to “fighting climate change.” After the two turbines run awhile, they could be joined by hundreds more.

offshore-wind-va-512x284.jpg

Dominion Energy photo illustration of windmills to be placed off Virginia coast to generate electricity prices as high as the tower is in comparison to the boat in the picture. Click for more information.

State regulators blasted the decision, but political fiat, expediency and doubletalk forced them to approve the project. The sorry saga carries important lessons for energy consumers across the USA and world.

There was no competitive bidding for this offshore wind project, which carries a likely under-estimated cost of $300 million. Virginians will pay 25 times the U.S. market price for the turbines – and then pay 78¢/kilowatt-hour for their intermittent electricity. That’s 26 times the 3¢ per kWh wholesale price for coal, gas, hydroelectric or nuclear electricity in Virginia; almost nine times the household price.

As with all wind turbine projects – unless they’re backed up by fossil fuel power plants – this boondoggle will ensure that customers get electricity when it’s available, instead of when they need it; that lights, heat, air conditioning, computers and televisions go off and on many times every day.

The eventual forest of turbines will impact surface and submarine ship traffic, while constant vibration noises from the towers will impair marine mammals’ sonar navigation systems.

But when green preening or climate virtue-signaling is the objective, no politicians are going to be shackled by inconvenient energy, environmental or economic realities or ethics – like these:

Wind power is only pseudo-renewable. The wind may be free. But nothing of what’s required to harness breezes to power civilization is free, renewable, climate-friendly, eco-friendly or sustainable.

Consumers demand and require reliable, affordable electricity 24/7/365. Weather dependent, intermittent, unreliable wind power requires 100% backup by coal or gas power plants that must run all the time on “spinning reserve,” ready to step in every time the wind dies down. That means extra costs, materials and fuels for the backup units – on top of the costs, materials and fuels to make and install the turbines.

Each of these monster wind turbines needs about 800 pounds of neodymium, 130 pounds of dysprosium, other rare earth elements, and tons of iron, copper, concrete, petroleum composites and other metals and materials. Replacing coal or gas backup units with huge rechargeable battery arrays requires lanthanum, rare earth alloys, lithium, nickel, cadmium and assorted other metals – in massive quantities.

Many of those metals come primarily from China, the Democratic Republic of Congo and other places where child labor is common, adults earn a few dollars a day, and health, safety and environmental rules are all but nonexistent. They’re the renewable energy equivalent of “blood diamonds” and slave labor.

Some 300 of the world’s biggest clothing brands banned Uzbek cotton exports for five years, because the country’s government forced teachers, doctors and other people to pick cotton each year. Shouldn’t ethical greenies and government officials apply “responsibly sourced” standards to wind turbines?

Fossil fuels are required to extract and process all these materials, and manufacture and transport the wind turbine components. That means pollution and carbon dioxide emissions, in someone else’s backyard.

In another clever ruse, industrial wind promoters claim turbines generate electricity about a third of the time: a 33% “nameplate capacity factor.” The actual output is closer to 20-30% or even lower, depending on locations. And wind power often fails when electricity is most urgently required: during the hottest and coldest days or weeks of the year, when winds are too weak to turn turbine blades.

During the July 2006 California heat wave, turbines generated only 5% of nameplate capacity. In Texas, wind capacity factors are generally between 9% and 12% (or even down to 4% or zero) during torrid summer months. Wind generation was virtually non-existent in the Pacific Northwest in January 2009. Amid a 2012 heat wave, turbines generated a minuscule 4 megawatts when Northern Illinois electricity demand averaged 22,000 MW! Similar realities prevail all across the USA and world.

The problem worsens as turbines age. A British study found that onshore wind electricity output declines by 16% per decade of operation. It’s worse offshore, because of storms and salt spray.

Offshore wind electricity is extremely expensive. The first U.S. offshore wind farm went online off Rhode Island in 2017 – at $150,000 per household powered. The newest U.S. nuclear reactor cost $4.7 billion but powers 4.5 million homes – at $1,040 per household. That’s a $149,000 per family difference.

RI offshore wind electricity costs 24.4¢/kWh today. Under its contractual price escalator of 3.5% a year, in 20 years RI consumers will be paying almost 50 cents per kWh.

Decommissioning (removing) wind turbines is enormously difficult and hugely expensive. Natural gas plants have 30-40 year lifetimes; nuclear plants can operate for 60 years or more. Wind turbines last 15-20 years, and often far less for offshore leviathans. Off Virginia, salt corrosion is compounded by 50-80 foot storm waves and category 1-3 hurricanes.

Maintenance and removal require huge derrick barges and can be done only during near-perfect weather, with minimal wave height. Actual removal costs depend on the size and type of project, distance from shore, whether monopiles and electrical cables must be fully removed, and whether the seabed must be returned to its original condition. (Should wind turbines get a free pass on these requirements?)

Virginia’s turbines will be 27 miles from the coast. The cost of removing any industrial-scale “wind farm” could run into the billions, and could double the cost of this wind power.

Oil, mining, logging, construction and other projects are typically required to post sizable bonds, before they are permitted to operate (and must endure costly multi-year permit and lawsuit processes). Wind turbine projects are generally exempt. That means billion-dollar decommissioning costs could bring corporate insolvency – and state taxpayers and ratepayers will get stuck with the bills.

Demolition has begun off Denmark for one of Europe’s earliest offshore wind projects. Blades, nacelles and towers must be dismantled and individually removed by big mobile cranes on enormous barges. The concrete foundations must be dismantled on-site by hydraulic demolition shears, then hauled ashore.

Rotor blades are fiberglass, carbon fibers and petroleum resins; burning them releases dust and toxic gases, and so is prohibited. Recycling is also difficult. Imagine hauling 245-foot blades from the monster offshore turbines to landfills. No wonder one study estimates that it will cost $565,000 per megawatt to decommission Europe’s offshore turbines – or about $3.4 million for each new generation 6-MW turbine.

From an economic, environmental or energy perspective, wind energy is simply unsustainable. And it’s all being justified by climate change hype, hysteria, headlines and computer models.

We’re supposed to believe that humans can control Earth’s temperature, climate and weather by controlling the 0.042% of the atmosphere that is carbon dioxide and methane. That major fluctuations in the sun’s energy output, constantly mixing and changing oceanic and atmospheric fluids, and other powerful natural forces are irrelevant. That emissions from thousands of new coal- and gas-fired power plants in Asia and Africa should just be ignored. That pseudo-renewable energy will save the planet.

Governor Northam and legislators who support this nonsense should be punished for energy and climate deceit – or at least forced to run their homes and offices in perpetuity on intermittent, ultra-expensive electricity from wind turbines … at their own personal expense, and not on the taxpayers’ dime.

Paul Driessen is senior policy analyst for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (www.CFACT.org).

Dr. Roger Bezdek is President of Management Information Services, Inc., in Washington, DC (www.MISI-net.com).

The post Virginia Offshore Wind Project An Expensive Virtue Signaling Exercise appeared first on Natural Gas Now.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/virginia-offshore-wind-project-an-expensive-virtue-signaling-exercise/

Friday, December 21, 2018

PA DEP Approves & Permits Shell Falcon Ethane Pipeline

Following an extensive (underscore extensive) review, the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) has approved the permit applications for Shell’s... Continue reading

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/pa-dep-approves-permits-shell-falcon-ethane-pipeline/

Shale Industry Vendor Adam Diaz Does Boot Giveaway

Screen-Shot-2018-05-11-at-6.17.46-AM-68x85.jpgRick Hiduk
Managing Editor of EndlessMtnLifestyles.com

… 

A bunch of Montrose School District children received free boots from Adam Diaz, a pioneer vendor to the shale gas industry in Susquehanna County.

Montrose business owner Adam Diaz and family recently sponsored an unprecedented project in the Montrose Area School District. Approximately 650 children at the Lathrop Street and Choconut schools in grades K through 6 were given free footwear, hats and gloves.

Screen-Shot-2018-12-21-at-7.48.29-AM-512x190.jpg

Choconut Valley Elementary School

Over the course of Dec. 11 to 13, students were led one class at a time to a room set up convincingly as a retail store. Teachers, Diaz family members and employees of the New Shoe Store Plus fitted 10 pupils at a time and sent them on their way with the new apparel.

“I thought he was kidding,” said shoe store co-owner Mauri Conner of Adam’s initial contact with her and her husband, Kevin. “But we were excited to help.” They packed up 200 cases of footwear, hats and gloves in a variety of styles, colors and sizes. Employee Jessica Caines also helped.

He wanted it to be for all the kids. It’s very nice,” Kevin remarked, adding on the second day of the project that it was gratifying to see the younger students who had been fitted the previous day getting off their school buses in their new boots and hats.

Though the first-time endeavor was surely daunting at times, the Conners made it look easy as they went behind the screen to the other side of the room to find the precise size of boot or sneaker where they were stacked in their boxes in well-organized piles. Every student was eligible for the giveaway, with less than a dozen parents of Lathrop students declining the offer.

“We didn’t want to segregate,” Adam said of the fact that the donation was not needs-based. “We wanted every kid to feel involved and have a fun experience.”

“It’s wonderful of them,” said third-grade teacher Ann Lathrop. “The kids are so appreciative and have really looked forward to it.”

Adam’s wife, Julie, is a nurse at the school and told him as the weather turned colder that too many children did not seem to have proper attire. Adam said that he was inspired by Cabot Oil & Gas, a company that routinely spearheads similar community initiatives.

“There is no reason that other contractors can’t do this,” said Adam, suggesting that Cabot shouldn’t always have to take the lead. “We can all give back to a community that is dealing with our impacts. It is because of the work that Cabot gives us that we are able to do this.”

Likewise, Adam added, “It’s important for me to show my daughters that they have to give back.” Katelyn and Tayler Diaz were among those assisting with the fittings.

“What a fabulous way to show their generosity,” Lathrop school principal Karen Ricci said of the Diaz family.

The value of the project was estimated at $75,000.

Editor’s Note: Adam Diaz and family have developed several businesses in Susquehanna County from their foundation as suppliers and service providers to the natural gas industry. Adam is a sterling example of how Marcellus Shale has lifted up the economies of one rural area after another. He took advantage of the opportunity in front of him and is now passing it along to the community. What a beautiful thing! Here he is talking about his enterprises and how gas has raised up Susquehanna County:

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Thursday, December 20, 2018

Pennsylvania Prosecutor Opens Criminal Investigation Of Mariner East Pipe

Chester County, Pa., District Attorney Tom Hogan opened a criminal investigation into Energy Transfer LP’s construction of the Mariner East NGL pipeline in Pennsylvania. “We have seen sinkholes created by the pipeline drilling, contaminated well water and some subtle and not-so-subtle bullying of Chester County citizens by big corporate interests,” Hogan said in a release on Dec. 19. This is the latest in a long series of legal and regulatory actions against Energy Transfer over construction of the Mariner East 2 pipeline.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/pennsylvania-prosecutor-opens-criminal-investigation-of-mariner-east-pipe/

PennEast Opponents Go Radical As Numbers Shrink

Tom.jpgTom Shepstone
Shepstone Management Company, Inc.

Hardcore PennEast pipelines opponents, all 15+/- of them, gathered yesterday in response to a raised fist Facebook appeal to attend an anti-PennEast rally.

Following their defeat in court last Friday, PennEast opponents used their ReThink Energy Facebook page to urge fellow travelers to attend a rally and “Stand Against PennEast’s Abuse of Eminent Domain.” It was hardly a theme designed to inspire, so how did they signal comrades it was worth attending? By employing the red fist of resistance logo of communist/socialist movements, of course. It worked; they got 15 or so hard-core, true-believing, serial protesters to show up.

Here’s the Facebook appeal:

ReThink-Energy-Photo-12-19-18-512x512.png

This particular fist design, according to Tin Eye search, appears to have been appropriated from a May Day poster available at deviantart.com. How fitting. There’s nothing like a little non-conformity to make a socialist conformist heart swell with pride and motivate him.

The only thing better might be the pictures of the two Millennial protesters holding signs that can only described as examples of unsurpassed superficiality. Are we to assume the young fellow with the yellow sign wants no pipelines in New Jersey? Is he one of the relative handful of Jerseyites who don’t heat with gas? Or, is he just an immature 30-some thing? Perhaps the baby rattle he’s also holding provides a clue.

ReThink’s subsequent Facebook posts tell us just how big a success the rally was. Here’s it looked:

safe_image.jpeg

There were, by my count, 13 people plus a dog and the dog was truly bored. No matter; the point was to have something to write about, which the group did here. It’s just another day in the world of fractivism where nothing is ever what it seems or no one is who they pretend to be.

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Wednesday, December 19, 2018

Shell Forms Joint Venture To Produce Offshore Wind Energy In New Jersey

EDF Renewables North America said on Dec. 19 it had formed a joint venture with oil and gas firm Royal Dutch Shell Plc’s new energies division to co-develop a lease area for offshore wind energy in New Jersey. The area, spread over 183,353 acres and located off the coast of Atlantic City, has the potential to produce about 2,500 megawatts of offshore wind energy, EDF said in a statement.

https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/shell-forms-joint-venture-to-produce-offshore-wind-energy-in-new-jersey/

Obama Judge Refuses to Play Chicken and Egg on PennEast

Tom.jpgTom Shepstone
Shepstone Management Company, Inc.

A Federal Judge appointed by President Obama has refused to go along with the “chicken and egg” ruse offered up by New Jersey to oppose the PennEast.

Last Friday, Federal District Judge Brian Martinotti delivered a fine decision that allowed the PennEast Pipeline a giant step forward. He ruled against New Jersey Governor Phil “the Pander Bear” Murphy’s administration, pipeline opponents and some recalcitrant landowners to allow PennEast to access to properties for surveying purposes and for condemnation to move forward.

Martinotti was appointed by President Obama but he followed the law rather than Murphy’s lead. More importantly, he refused to play a patently obvious political game and signaled where he stands if New Jersey tries playing other games down the road.

You can read a highlighted version of Judge Martinotti’s decision here. It’s a 50-page decision but the key elements are confined to a relatively few paragraphs. The essence of the decision, in fact, is summarized in this excerpt from page 43 (emphasis added):

Moreover, FERC has tasked PennEast with a number of environmental conditions which must be satisfied before PennEast can begin construction. Many of these conditions require immediate access to the properties, including but not limited to Conditions 3, 4, 6, 10, 15-17, 21, 23, 30-32, 35, 39, 41, 47, and 51. Immediate access will additionally allow PennEast to survey and collect information needed to complete its Application to the DEP for a Freshwater Wetlands Individual Permit and Water Quality Certificate.

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Defendants argue PennEast’s lack of DEP approval is grounds for this Court to deny injunctive relief. The Court is not persuaded by this chicken-and-egg argument. The DEP is requiring that PennEast have 100% of the surveys “completed before the agency will undertake to complete its review and render decisions on the Permit and Certificate Application.” Therefore, the Court finds PennEast will be irreparably harmed if it is not granted immediate access to the properties to begin surveys, complete its DEP Application, and satisfy FERC’s Environmental Conditions.

As Martinotti couldn’t help but notice, the Murphy administration wanted it both ways; it wanted to prevent PennEast from collecting information needed for filing applications and to also be able to say there could be no such applications without the needed information. It was a classic “chicken and egg” position and the Judge wasn’t about to engage in such childish games.

There was more, though. Judge Martinotti also suggested he wouldn’t be that kind toward the Murphy administration playing Cuomo wannabe games with Water Quality Certification once the application was complete. He did so by citing and relying upon the Third Circuit Court of Appeals and FERC’s order:

(“he Third Circuit has determined that ‘Congress intended to preempt state regulation of rates and facilities of natural gas companies and it clear that the Natural Gas Act was intended by Congress to occupy the field.’” (quoting Pa. Med. Soc. v. Marconis, 942 F.2d 842, 847 (3d Cir. 1991)) (citing Schneidewind v. ANR Pipeline Co., 485 U.S. 293, 300-01 (1988))) (emphasis omitted); FERC Order ¶ 218 (“Any state or local permits issued with respect to the jurisdictional facilities authorized herein must be consistent with the conditions of this certificate. The Commission encourages cooperation between interstate pipelines and local authorities. However, this does not mean that state and local agencies, through application of state or local laws, may prohibit or unreasonably delay the construction or operation of facilities approved by this Commission.”).

This indicates Judge Martinotti gets it. He knows a stupid pet trick when he sees one and he’s not going to fooled by the Pander Bear playing Corruptocrat.

All in all, the decision was very good news for the PennEast. The Sierra Club’s Jumpin’ Jeff Tittel said it all:

“PennEast moves forward and we will fight back and stop this,” the club’s director, Jeff Tittel, said in a statement. “We’ve been fighting PennEast for over four years and they thought it would be long built by now. We want to thank the landowners who denied them access and those who took them to court to fight it.”

If that’s not an acknowledgment of defeat, I don’t know what is. It’s worth noting, too, that the game, from the standpoint of radicals such as Tittel, has always been about delay in hopes that PennEast would die of it. It hasn’t. As Jeff says, it’s moving forward. Hallelujah!

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https://www.shaledirectories.com/blog/obama-judge-refuses-to-play-chicken-and-egg-on-penneast/