January

Ben van Beurden, 55, who was appointed downstream director and a member of the executive committee for Royal Dutch Shell plc in January, was named to succeed Peter Voser as CEO on Jan. 1 (see NGI, May 6). Van Beurden has been responsible for refining and marketing businesses, as well as overseeing the trading companies. He also is responsible for the petrochemicals manufacturing and marketing business, which has been eyeing expansions in the United States because of increased natural gas activity, as well as the gas-to-liquids business. He joined Shell in 1983 and has worked in Houston, the Netherlands, Africa, Malaysia and most recently, the UK. He is credited with helping to turn the petrochemicals operations to profitability after several quarters of big losses. The Dutch national earned a master’s degree in chemical engineering from Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands.

Her resignation from the Commission does not come as a surprise as she informed President Obama in January that she planned to leave the CFTC before her term ended (see Daily GPI, Jan. 28). Asked where she intended to go after the CFTC, Sommers told NGI, “I don’t know. I have not started looking for my next opportunity yet.”

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is probing a chemical emergency at an oil well facility in January, where an inventory of chemicals wasn’t available to first responders as required under federal law.

Oilfield services provider Flowserve Corp. will relocate some of its pump division operations from New Jersey to Pennsylvania, a 15-mile move that brings more than 100 jobs to a state much more supportive of the company’s bread and butter: oil and gas drilling.

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.

Liquids-rich onshore plays from a stable of better-known assets, including the San Juan Basin, and an emerging portfolio of unconventionals will “almost double” domestic liquids production this year, Encana Corp. U.S. chief Jeff Wojahn said Tuesday.

A long list of legislation that targeted the natural gas industry in West Virginia failed to receive enough support from lawmakers before they adjourned last Saturday. However, the House of Delegates enacted a series of resolutions, perhaps offering a glimpse of things to come.

Federal officials have given a green light for a project in eastern Utah to drill an exploratory well in the Harley Dome natural gas field to capture helium, which, if the operation proves successful, could result in a helping to build supplies of the scarce gas.

Researchers from Cleveland State University (CSU) said Ohio counties with significant Marcellus and Utica shale development have seen only a modest increase in job creation in 2012, but those same counties also saw a large increase in retail sales.