Buying

NuStar Energy LP is buying Eagle Ford Shale crude oil pipeline, gathering and storage, and natural gas liquids (NGL) assets for $425 million from TexStar Midstream Services LP. The deal is part of NuStar’s transition to a fee-based pipeline and storage business and away from margin-based refining and marketing.

Vanguard Natural Resources LLC is buying natural gas and natural gas liquids (NGL) assets in Colorado’s Piceance Basin and in the Powder River and Wind River basins in Wyoming for $335 million from Bill Barrett Corp.

Honeywell’s UOP business is buying a 70% stake in Thomas Russell Co., a privately held provider of technology and equipment for natural gas processing and treating. UOP provides process technology, materials and equipment to petroleum refining, petrochemical, and gas processing industries. It will now be able to offer a range of technologies and products that allow shale and conventional natural gas producers to remove contaminants from natural gas and recover high-value natural gas liquids (NGL). Founded in 2002, Tulsa, OK-based Thomas Russell specializes in the design, engineering, fabrication and start-up of skid-mounted modular packaged plants systems for the recovery and upgrading of NGLs. UOP is paying $525 million in cash for the interest and has a right to acquire the remaining 30% stake. Closing, subject to conditions, is expected during the fourth quarter.

Tallgrass Energy Partners LP of Overland Park, KS, is buying a slate of assets from Kinder Morgan Energy Partners LP (KMP) that the partnership is selling to comply with antitrust stipulations related to Kinder Morgan Inc.’s (KMI) recent acquisition of El Paso Corp.

Tallgrass Energy Partners LP of Overland Park, KS, is buying a slate of assets from Kinder Morgan Energy Partners LP (KMP) that the partnership is selling to comply with antitrust stipulations related to Kinder Morgan Inc.’s (KMI) recent acquisition of El Paso Corp.

Chesapeake Energy Corp.’s stock price jumped on Monday after the company secured a $3 billion term loan and CEO Aubrey McClendon expressed confidence in the company’s ability to complete planned property sales this year to bridge an estimated $10 billion funding gap. In addition, an estimated $1 billion volumetric production payment (VPP) in the Eagle Ford Shale has been sidelined in favor of more noncore asset sales.

Private equity opportunists buying distressed U.S. natural gas assets helped to sustain merger and acquisition (M&A) activity in the U.S. oil and gas sector in the first three months of this year, according to PwC US.

Energy Transfer Partners LP (ETP) is buying Sunoco Inc. for $5.3 billion in a deal intended to diversify the natural gas midstream player’s business by adding transport of heavier hydrocarbons such as crude oil, natural gas liquids (NGL) and refined products. Acquisition of Philadelphia-based Sunoco would also give Dallas-based ETP assets in the Marcellus Shale region.

A bipartisan group of Michigan House lawmakers is urging its colleagues to consider ways to boost natural gas exploration, development and production, including a proposal to put more land up for oil and natural gas leasing, including its considerable unconventional resources, that include the Antrim, Collingwood and Utica shales.