Securing

Erie, CO, officials voted 6-1 Monday night to end a six-month moratorium on new oil and natural gas drilling after securing agreements with producers that place stricter regulations on their operations.

Dry natural gas drilling is coming to a standstill, but BP plc is “looking to see if it might expand” in the liquids-rich Utica Shale after securing a leasehold earlier this year, CEO Bob Dudley said Tuesday.

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.

On the ground, the shale boom is a mixed bag as rural landowners weigh the alternatives of securing lucrative royalties at the cost of their land being part of an oil/gas industrial push that critics contend is threatening local environments and public water supplies. The Los Angeles Times last Sunday profiled the dilemma through a feature on two brothers with dairy farms in the rich Marcellus Shale in western New York.

After securing a natural gas midstream partnership in the Horn River Basin with Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. (KKR), Quicksilver Resources Inc. now is pursuing a partnership to develop its upstream leasehold, executives said Thursday.

SandRidge Energy Inc. has eliminated some funding issues hanging over its U.S. development plans after securing a $1 billion joint venture (JV) in a key onshore play with Spain’s Repsol YPF SA.

SandRidge Energy Inc. has eliminated some funding issues hanging over its development plans after securing a $1 billion joint venture (JV) in a key onshore play with Spain’s Repsol YPF SA.

SandRidge Energy Inc. has eliminated some funding issues hanging over its U.S. development plans after securing a $1 billion joint venture (JV) in a key onshore play with Spain’s Repsol YPF SA.

Noble Energy Inc. on Thursday added the Marcellus Shale to its core U.S. holdings after securing a $3.4 billion deal with CONSOL Energy Inc. that gives it half of a 663,350 net-acre leasehold in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, including existing wells and midstream infrastructure.