Fewer

A unit of Tokyo Gas Co. Ltd. is buying an undivided 25% interest in the Barnett Shale assets of Quicksilver Resources Inc. for $485 million, marking a milestone for the debt-laden Fort Worth, TX-based producer, which has long sought a Barnett partner.

Howard Midstream Energy Partners LLC (HEP) will construct a cryogenic natural gas plant capable of processing 200 MMcf/d in the heart of the Eagle Ford Shale in Webb County, TX, the San Antonio, TX-based company said Wednesday.

Drilling in Eastern Tennessee’s dry gas Chattanooga Shale play has ceased due to low natural gas prices, so the focus has shifted to extracting oil from the state’s Fort Payne formation, which lies atop the Chattanooga. Miller Energy Resources, Inc. this week is shipping its first tanker truckload of oil produced from the Fort Payne’s only unconventional well, according to Gary Bible, vice president of geology for the Knoxville, TN-based firm.

A Southwestern Energy Co. official said the company will donate $900,000 to The Nature Conservancy to fully fund the first of a three-phase project to restore waterways in Arkansas’ portion of the Fayetteville Shale.

He insists he’s not supposed to be a cheerleader for the oil and gas industry he regulates, but when Scott Perry, deputy secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection’s (DEP) Office of Oil and Gas Management, talks about the opportunities the Marcellus Shale has brought to his state, it’s easy to forget that distinction.

Operators in Pennsylvania spud fewer Marcellus Shale gas wells last month than the year before, shifted their focus to counties in wetter areas of the play and saw turnover at the top in terms of most wells spud, data from the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) shows.

A flurry of long range forecasts last week all reached the same conclusion: the 2012 hurricane season is expected to produce fewer tropical storms than the last few years.

Add Earth Networks, the owner of WeatherBug, as well as Telvent DTN to the growing list of forecasters that expect the 2012 hurricane season to produce fewer tropical storms than the last few years.

Few companies have either energy or water strategies, and fewer still have integrated energy-water strategies — “a glaring omission” — according to a white paper issued Tuesday by a pair of independent advisers to Deloitte LLP.