Helped

Former FBI Director Louis Freeh was appointed last week as a special master to investigate apparent misconduct by one of the lawyers who helped manage BP plc’s $7.8 billion settlement fund with Gulf Coast plaintiffs over the deepwater Macondo well blowout in April 2010.

Former FBI Director Louis Freeh was appointed Tuesday as a special master to investigate apparent misconduct by one of the lawyers who helped manage BP plc’s $7.8 billion settlement fund with Gulf Coast plaintiffs over the deepwater Macondo well blowout in April 2010.

Decades of oil and gas drilling, and the jobs and benefits it provides, are engrained in Texas culture, and it’s a way of life that Pennsylvanians now are attempting to assimilate, but residents of both states continue to reconcile the advent of shale gas drilling, according to a survey of 1,600 adults.

Canadian shale drillers are seeking a liquefied natural gas (LNG) counterpart to a federal corporate tax break that helped kick-start Alberta oilsands development in the 1990s.

Canadian shale drillers are seeking a liquefied natural gas (LNG) counterpart to a federal corporate tax break that helped kick-start Alberta oilsands development in the 1990s.

EQT Corp. announced Thursday that horizontal drilling in the Marcellus Shale helped the company achieve record sales volumes overall and in the Marcellus in 2012 — the latter an 85% increase from 2011 — as it posted net income of $183.4 million for the year.

Range Resources Corp. expects to spend about 85% of its $1.3 billion 2013 capital expenditures (capex) budget on liquids-rich and oil projects, predominately in wet areas of the Marcellus Shale and through horizontal drilling in the Mississippian Lime, the Fort Worth, TX-based company said Wednesday.

With working natural gas inventories at a record high, the Henry Hub spot price is expected to average $2.77/MMBtu this year — a 31% decrease from $4.00/MMBtu in 2011 — but it is expected to rebound to an average of $3.49/MMBtu in 2013, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) said in its Short-Term Energy Outlook released last week.

The growth of the natural gas industry in Pennsylvania’s eastern Marcellus Shale helped the area avoid the worst of the 2008 recession, and the positive effects have only just begun, according to a study by the Institute for Public Policy and Economic Development (IPPED). A comparison of the impact of the Marcellus on Pennsylvania’s 10th congressional district, the Barnett Shale in Texas and the Fayetteville Shale in Arkansas led IPPED to conclude “that there is definite potential for growth in wealth, employment and housing” within Pennsylvania’s 10th congressional district, which includes many of the top producing counties. Core drilling counties fared better than noncore drilling counties, but the economic benefits of the Marcellus spilled over throughout the region.