Budget

West Virginia’s severance tax collections continued to plummet in November, driven primarily by low oil and natural gas prices, which have also hurt personal income tax collections and helped to widen a projected budget deficit for fiscal year 2016.

PDC Energy Inc. will continue its focus on the Wattenberg formation heading into next year, devoting most of its 2016 capital budget to exploration and production (E&P) activity in the Colorado play, the company said Monday.

EQT Corp. said Monday that it plans to spend $1 billion on exploration and production (E&P) next year, mainly on Marcellus Shale drilling, but it also budgeted for a five well deep Utica Shale program following successful results in southwest Pennsylvania earlier this year.

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf has confirmed that a deal to end a more than four month state budget impasse doesn’t include a severance tax on unconventional natural gas production, but he added that he won’t give up on that proposal in future negotiations.

It appears a resolution to Pennsylvania’s months-long budget impasse is in sight, and so far it doesn’t include a new severance tax on the state’s natural gas industry.

As exploration and production (E&P) companies cut back spending in order to stay afloat in a low commodity price environment, the downturn has many oil and gas states feeling the budget squeeze as well.

As Pennsylvania’s budget impasse approaches its fifth month, some of the state’s leading oil and gas executives have stepped up their fight against enacting a severance tax on unconventional natural gas production in a signal the issue still remains in play as negotiations drag on.

The Pennsylvania House on Wednesday struck down by a wide margin Democratic Gov. Tom Wolf’s proposal to enact a 3.5% severance tax on unconventional natural gas production, a move that could effectively end the proposal.

West Virginia’s severance tax collections are projected to fall $192 million short of initial estimates for this fiscal year (FY) and grow at nowhere near the pace they did last year, said Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin’s spokesman a day after state-wide budget cuts were announced.