Activities

Republican Sen. James Inhofe of Oklahoma, has requested all of the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) documents related to its investigation of water well contamination in North Texas by Range Resources Corp.

Growing producer demand for well services to support development of North American shale natural gas plays is a main driver behind GE’s planned acquisition of the well support division of John Wood Group plc for $2.8 billion, the company said.

The more one learns about the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) investigation of alleged well water contamination in North Texas by Barnett Shale gas wells drilled by Range Resources Corp., the more something smells, an industry newsletter publisher claims. After examining evidence presented in the case, Gene Powell Jr. said a congressional investigation of the EPA’s action is in order.

Onshore unconventional natural gas producer Penn Virginia Corp. said Friday it will concentrate its exploration activities in oily and liquids-rich plays in 2011 and will spend 40% less than it did this year because of a “weak natural gas price environment and outlook.”

Oil field services provider Halliburton Co. Monday announced that it will publicly disclose fluids used in hydraulic fracturing (fracking) activities, has set up a website to carry this out, and has introduced a first-of-its-kind ecofriendly fracture fluid system made up of materials sourced entirely from the food industry.

Responding to Cabot Oil & Gas Corp.’s “public relations” announcement a day earlier, Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) Secretary John Hanger on Wednesday said he would continue to hold the company responsible for groundwater contamination in Dimock Township, PA.

Only four drinking water wells in Dimock Township, PA, have methane exceeding the Department of the Interior’s (DOI) suggested action levels, according to data released Tuesday by Cabot Oil & Gas Corp., which said the study is further evidence that its natural gas drilling operations did not contaminate groundwater in the area.

An action plan to improve the health of the Chesapeake Bay and the Susquehanna River watershed, including some activities that focus on the impact of drilling for natural gas in the Marcellus Shale, is under way by federal officials.

Pennsylvania’s program for regulating the hydraulic fracturing (hydrofracing) well stimulation activities of oil and gas producers “is overall, well managed, professional and meeting its program objectives,” according to a newly completed review.