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Gastar Exploration Ltd. is selling about 76,000 net acres in Kingfisher and Canadian counties in Oklahoma for $62 million and also agreed to swap acreage with the undisclosed buyer so that both might concentrate their positions, the company said Tuesday.

Spectra Energy’s Texas Eastern Transmission LP is offering capacity on its Gulf Market Expansion Project, which would give Marcellus and Utica Shale gas access to growing Gulf Coast markets in Louisiana and Texas, including for future export of liquefied natural gas (LNG).

Low natural gas prices have driven down Fayetteville Shale drilling activity and production, but the Arkansas dry gas play has plenty more to give, and the rigs will be coming back to get it when natural gas has a $5 handle, the Arkansas Geological Survey’s Ed Ratchford told NGI.

Three bills that if enacted would place a moratorium on using hydraulic fracturing (fracking) in drilling operations, as well as review oil and gas drilling practices, have advanced in the California legislature along partisan lines in a body dominated by Democrats.

The federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM) did not give sufficient attention to the potential environmental impact from hydraulic fracturing (fracking) when it issued oil/gas leases for 2,500 acres two years ago, a judge in the U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, in San Jose ruled on Monday.

Noting that it wants to give the public an adequate opportunity to review and comment, the Interior Department’s U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) said Wednesday that it is extending the public comment period on two proposed rules: to list as endangered the gunnison sage grouse, which is found south of the Colorado River in Colorado and Utah, and to designate 1.7 million acres of critical habitat for the bird under the Endangered Species Act (ESA).

Appalachian midstream provider MarkWest Energy Partners LP and private equity fund The Energy and Minerals Group (EMG) have completed an amendment to give EMG a larger stake in their joint venture (JV) in the Utica Shale.

Natural gas prices may not be attractive enough for some producers, but Encana Corp.’s management team said it’s possible to make enough money in the Haynesville Shale to justify a five-rig program this year.

Republican leaders in the Ohio General Assembly indicated that they will give some consideration to Gov. John Kasich’s proposal to impose new severance taxes on hydraulic fracturing (fracking) and natural gas liquids (NGL) in 2013, after declining to do so in 2012.