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Energy industry experts on Tuesday urged the U.S. Senate Finance Committee to keep federal tax deductions for intangible drilling costs (IDC) and consider a uniform corporate rate as it considers comprehensive tax reform.

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett said development of the Marcellus Shale was “good for the entire state” but conceded that several challenges lay ahead, in part because natural gas prices remain less than $3/Mcf.

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.

(The following is reprinted with permission of Jim Willis, editor of Marcellus Drilling News (MDN). Jobs in the shale gas industry were the focus of the first ever Natural Gas Career and Education Expo held at Broome Community College in Binghamton, NY Wednesday. MDN editor Jim Willis attended and published a very interesting account. Unfortunately, NGI wasn’t there, but, thanks to MDN, our readers won’t miss out.)

While other proposals regarding hydraulic fracturing (fracking) stayed immobile, the California Senate Natural Resources Committee on Tuesday moved on a strictly partisan vote of 5-3 a proposed bill (SB 1054) that would require exploration and production (E&P) companies to notify surrounding property owners of their plans to employ fracking ahead of starting work. The industry is opposed to pre-notification on proprietary grounds.

Oil and natural gas operators appear to be on the wrong end of a turf war with the coal industry along the length of eastern Ohio, losing “significant” amounts of acreage in coal-bearing townships that also intersect with the state’s portions of the Marcellus and Utica shales.

An uptick in Marcellus Shale development last year didn’t keep an independent auditor from certifying Pennsylvania’s state forests as sustainably managed.

Growing gas supply in the Marcellus Shale and projected growth in gas-fired power generation among southern states could mean a renaissance for the traditional Gulf of Mexico-to-Northeast pipeline business. Spectra Energy Corp. would seem to think so, as its latest project, called Renaissance Gas Transmission, would carry Marcellus gas south to Georgia, Alabama and Tennessee.

Sabine Pass Liquefaction LLC made “significant progress” on its liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal project in 2011, but that wasn’t enough to keep red ink from marring Cheniere Energy Inc.’s bottom line, the company said Friday.