natural gas

San Antonio, TX-based RiverRock Energy LLC has received $125 million in equity commitments from EnCap Flatrock Midstream and RiverRock management. RiverRock said it will develop midstream infrastructure for producers and others needing crude oil logistics services to gather, store and transport crude oil by pipeline and rail. It also will provide infrastructure to handle condensate, fresh and produced water, natural gas liquids and natural gas. “The company is pursuing greenfield and acquisition opportunities in emerging resource plays and other producing basins experiencing rapid growth,” it said.

Elected officials in the City of Broomfield, CO, unanimously agreed to a tolling agreement with Sovereign Operating Co. LLC on Tuesday, as the company moves forward with plans to put them in the crosshairs of a lawsuit over the city’s newly enacted ban on hydraulic fracturing (fracking).

Next-day gas rose Wednesday as forecasters called for temperatures at about normal levels but predicted turbulent and windy conditions capable of sending readings into the below normal camp. With the exception of a handful of points, locations posted gains typically a few pennies on either side of a nickel.

Tulsa-based Oneok Partners LP said on Monday it has completed three natural gas gathering/processing and natural gas liquids (NGL) projects totaling nearly $1 billion. The projects are part of the company’s previously announced $6 to $6.4 billion capital program through 2016, and the partnership has $2-3 billion in unannounced projects on the drawing board.

The use of corn crop residue to make ethanol and other biofuels reduces the amount of carbon in soil, but it also increases carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions to a level that will probably thwart federal goals to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, according to researchers from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Industry representatives in North Dakota on Tuesday told the state’s Industrial Commission that flaring can be reduced without production restrictions or a “one-size-fits-all” regulatory scheme. They urged state officials to adopt an industry task force’s recommended approach submitted earlier this year (see Shale Daily, Jan. 30).

Houston-based, multi-basin player Hilcorp Energy Co. is buying BP plc’s interest in four operated oilfields on Alaska’s North Slope. The transaction streamlines BP’s operations there and expands the Alaska footprint of privately held Hilcorp beyond the Cook Inlet.

The outlook for the Lower 48 states is “increasingly positive” in all regions, with land operations, market activity and pricing strengthening on higher-than-expected cash flows and incremental rig demand, Nabors Industries Ltd. management said Wednesday.

Following a recent workover program in the Niobrara Formation in northeastern Colorado, EnerJex Resources Inc. has been able to achieve a more than 300% production increase from its project there, the company said Tuesday.