natural gas

In a decision that could further torpedo shale development in New York, the state’s highest court ruled Monday that local governments can enact bans on oil and gas activities, including hydraulic fracturing (fracking), because the statewide oil and gas mining law doesn’t trump municipalities’ zoning powers.

With the country’s natural gas storage network refilling faster than expected and analysts calling for a mild summer to further tamp down demand for the resource from the power generation sector, Northeast natural gas prices in the forward market have been making their way lower in recent weeks.

Despite poor results and the unabashed early decisions of some unconventional operators to abandon altogether what was once thought to be the core of Ohio’s Utica Shale, neither the oil and gas industry nor the communities waiting for economic opportunity have written off the play’s northern tier.

Physical gas for weekend and Monday delivery fell like a rock in Friday’s trading. Market points across the board were lower, in some cases by deep double digits, with the East and Northeast taking on the brunt of the selling.

The Federal Trade Commission has closed its investigation ofRegency Energy Partners LP’s $1.3 billion acquisition ofEagle Rock Energy Partners LP’s midstream business. This was the final regulatory approval required for the deal’s closing, which is planned to occur Tuesday (July 1). The deal was announced late last year (seeShale Daily,Dec. 23, 2013).

Trading for the week ended June 27 may be something of a watershed for the bulls, with hefty declines in both physical and futures pricing auguring a shift to a lower pricing regime and those campaigning for higher prices based on a large storage deficit throwing in the towel.

Natural gas futures Thursday morning continued the recent tradition of outsize market moves off modest storage injection misses by industry forecasters.

Friday deliveries of natural gas headed sharply lower in Thursday’s trading at virtually all market points as traders made sure they got their deals done prior to the release of government storage data.

Producers targeting the liquids-rich stacked pay zones in the emerging Central Northern Oklahoma Woodford (CNOW) play have a new gathering and processing system coming their way.