Politico By Elana Schor The Obama administration unveiled the first major national safety restrictions for fracking on Friday, touching off a swift backlash from the president’s critics in Congress and the energy industry. Two oil industry groups immediately sued to challenge the rules, calling them “a reaction to unsubstantiated concerns,” while 27 Senate Republicans introduced […]
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Bloomberg View By Leonid Bershidsky As the price of oil continues to fall, the U.S. shale oil industry is showing remarkable resilience. Output is at a 30-year high and stockpiles are the largest since tracking started in 2004. Speculators who push down the price of crude see this as evidence of a glut, but it […]
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The Stanley News and Press By John Finnerty HARRISBURG — Gov. Tom Wolf’s plan to tax gas drillers will pump millions of dollars into schools, but it could also help subsidize alternative energy sources like wind and solar. Wolf proposes borrowing $675 million for economic development projects, which will be paid down by $55 million from […]
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Wall Street Journal By JUSTIN SCHECK and SELINA WILLIAMS After spending more than five years and billions of dollars trying to re-create the U.S. shale boom overseas, some of the world’s biggest oil companies are starting to give up amid a world-wide collapse in crude prices. Chevron Corp., Exxon Mobil Corp. and Royal Dutch Shell […]
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Power Source Royal Dutch Shell’s Appalachian operations received a certification for meeting 15 performance standards targeting improvements to shale gas development, the Pittsburgh-based Center for Sustainable Shale Development said Wednesday. The performance standards — which aim to go beyond existing shale regulations in the Marcellus and Utica shale states of Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia […]
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NGV Global News Bestobell Marine, a President Engineering Group (PEGL) company, has received an order from Wärtsilä Fuel Gas Handling Division (FGH), to supply the Middle East’s first LNG (liquefied natural gas) fuelled harbour tug. The order will see Bestobell Marine supply a complete set of cryogenic globe valves to be fitted in Wärtsilä’s LNG-Pac […]
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Power Source By Marc Levy HARRISBURG, PA. – Pennsylvania state investigators are close to wrapping up an investigation into complaints that landowners in northeastern Pennsylvania are being cheated of royalties by natural gas companies exploring the Marcellus Shale, Attorney General Kathleen Kane said Tuesday. Kane told the Senate Appropriations Committee that agents from the office’s […]
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UPI By Daniel J. Graeber WASHINGTON, March 18 (UPI) — The U.S. government will roll out new standards in the coming months to cut the amount of shale natural gas wasted through flaring, the interior secretary said. Much of the natural gas associated with shale oil deposits is burned off, or flared, because of a lack […]
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philly.com By Andrew Maykuth Gov. Wolf’s proposed severance tax on Marcellus Shale natural-gas production contains a unique feature that sets a minimum taxable level, guaranteeing that the state would capture its share no matter how low the gas price sank. The severance tax, dubbed the Pennsylvania Education Reinvestment Act, would set a minimum value of […]
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Powersource By Laura Legere The era of shale drilling waste pits is closing in Pennsylvania. Storage tanks and the companies that market them are on the rise. Last week, the Department of Environmental Protection announced plans to ban temporary waste pits at Marcellus and Utica shale gas well sites, marking the official end, if the […]
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