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Royal Dutch Shell plc, which has made huge commitments this past year to invest in North America’s abundant natural gas supplies by launching a huge export terminal in Canada and funding onshore fueling stations, on Wednesday agreed to buy out a Norwegian-based company that supplies small-scale liquefied natural gas (LNG) for the industrial and marine market.

Just days after a town in western New York adopted a one-year moratorium on oil and natural gas activities, the town’s only operator made a rare move and decided to shut down its wells and pipelines there, halting royalty payments and free natural gas to landowners.

Houston’s Linn Energy LLC last week made a $1.025 billion cash deal to acquire BP plc’s substantial natural gas operations in the Green River Basin of Wyoming.

Pennsylvania’s Marcellus Shale natural gas drilling declined nearly 7% in the first five months of this year from the same period of 2011 in part as operators began moving from dry gas to wetter targets, according to data from the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP).

ExxonMobil Corp. has ended its shale natural gas exploration efforts in Poland after two test wells failed to produce “sustained commercial hydrocarbon flow rates,” a spokesman said Monday.

ZaZa Energy Corp. and Hess Corp. have ended a joint venture (JV) agreement they made in 2010 for activities in the Eagle Ford Shale in South Texas and the Paris Basin in France. ZaZa is taking over the Eagle Ford activities while Hess will hold the exploration licenses in France.

Atlas Resources Partners LP (ARP) has made a friendly deal to take over privately held Barnett Shale operator Titan Operating LLC for $184 million, giving the Philadelphia-based operator another big natural gas liquids (NGL) lift in the heart of Texas.

Focusing on the Marcellus Shale in Pennsylvania, the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) on Wednesday made a pitch for more rules to cover the handling of wastewater produced in hydraulic fracturing (fracking) with the release of a new NRDC report.

The first natural gas injections have been made into the Ryckman Creek Gas Storage Facility in Uinta County, WY, with Northwest Pipeline and Overthrust Pipeline supplying the first gas, Ryckman Creek Resources LLC said Wednesday.