Major

A major natural gas pipeline group has called on FERC to provide pipelines with assurance that information shared with power generators to promote reliability will not be a violation of the Natural Gas Act (NGA) or agency regulation, and would not expose pipelines to potential civil penalties in the event that a disclosure would cause economic harm to a power generator.

A major natural gas pipeline group has called on FERC to provide pipelines with assurance that information shared with power generators will not be a violation of the Natural Gas Act (NGA) or agency regulation, and would not expose pipelines to potential civil penalties in the event that a disclosure would cause economic harm to a power generator.

Piedmont Natural Gas, a major natural gas distributor based in Charlotte, NC, has signed a 15-year contract with Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. to purchase a “meaningful portion” of its natural gas supplies from the Marcellus Shale beginning in December 2015.

After relying on industry voluntary actions regarding drilling setback and water sampling approaches, Colorado regulators are poised to establish new mandatory rules covering exploration and production (E&P) companies.

Two major Dodd-Frank Wall Street regulatory reforms — real-time reporting of swap transactions and swap dealer (SD) registration — began last week, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) said.

Two major Dodd-Frank Wall Street regulatory reforms — real-time reporting of swap transactions and swap dealer (SD) registration — began earlier this week, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) said.

Lacking anything like the Bakken to its north and not seeing a major new play on the horizon, South Dakota oil and natural gas authorities nevertheless have begun the process for upgrading the state’s exploration and production (E&P) regulations, including adding provisions addressing hydraulic fracturing.

As its first major decision following the San Bruno pipeline failure two years ago, California regulators on Thursday approved a three-year pipeline enhanced safety plan for Pacific Gas and Electric Co. (PG&E) but denied utility ratepayer support for most of the cost of the utility proposal.

Penn Virginia Corp.’s 40% working interest partner in its Lavaca County, TX, Eagle Ford Shale acreage has elected to go “nonconsent” on the last 17 initial unit wells on the acreage. Penn Virginia said it will seek a partner to acquire the 40% working interest. Of 17 initial unit wells, seven have been drilled, two are being drilled and eight remain to be drilled, the company said. The current working interest partner will have no participatory rights in any subsequent wells drilled in the unit. As a result, Penn Virginia’s net Eagle Ford acreage in Lavaca County will increase from about 9,200 acres to about 13,400 acres upon the drilling of all of the initial unit wells. “We expect that each of the drilling units will support up to an additional four primary development wells after the initial well,” Penn Virginia said. “To date, our Lavaca County wells have generally met or exceeded expectations with average reserves of approximately 500,000 boe and attractive economics.” In October, Penn Virginia acquired about 4,100 net Eagle Ford acres in Gonzales and Lavaca counties for about $10 million. Other nonoperated working interest owners were expected to acquire some of the acreage (see Shale Daily, Oct. 4). One year ago, the company said it was exploring the Eagle Ford with an undisclosed “major oil and gas company” (see Shale Daily, Dec. 21, 2011).