Shots

House Energy and Commerce Committee ranking member Joe Barton (R-TX) and other Republicans Tuesday took pot shots at the Democrats’ proposed cap-and-trade system for controlling greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, saying it would deepen the nation’s economic turmoil by driving up energy prices and sending millions of jobs overseas.

CNX Gas Corp.’s first horizontal well in the Marcellus Shale is producing at a rate of 6.5 MMcf/d, which sets a company record for daily output. The production rate is among the highest reported to date by any producer operating in the Appalachian Basin play. The CNX well, located in Green County, PA, began flowing on Oct. 2 at an initial rate of 1.2 MMcf/d and 4,000 pounds/square inch (psi) of backpressure. The backpressure gradually was reduced, which allowed daily production to increase to about 4 MMcf/d until early in December, when newly installed surface equipment enabled the well to flow at the record rate. The backpressure was being held at 2,640 psi. Cumulative production from the well prior to the record rate achieved was 106 MMcf. The Marcellus well was drilled to a vertical depth of 8,140 feet in the Huntersville Chert, penetrating 83 vertical feet of shale. CNX holds a 100% working stake in the well and also has 100% net revenue interest. The Pittsburgh-based independent is drilling its second vertical Marcellus Shale well, which would be hydraulically fractured using second and third horizontal wells.

“Mischief” at several well sites in a rural area near Fort St. John, BC — including valves being tampered with and shots fired at structures — does not appear to be related to a series of minor explosions along an EnCana Corp. natural gas pipeline near Dawson Creek, BC, earlier this year, Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) investigators said on Thursday.

Top House Republicans Wednesday unveiled a comprehensive energy reform agenda aimed at increasing all forms of domestic energy. They took shots at the Democratic leadership, claiming that not only has the party done little to alleviate energy prices, they have made them worse.

Commodity is king when it comes to liquefied natural gas (LNG). In today’s market the companies that control LNG supply are calling the shots. And more often not, national oil companies are “getting smarter” and not giving up control of their natural gas/LNG supplies.

Commodity is king when it comes to liquefied natural gas (LNG). In today’s market the companies that control LNG supply are calling the shots. And more often not, national oil companies are “getting smarter” and not giving up control of their natural gas/LNG supplies.

As traders had anticipated Friday, a holiday weekend blast of winter weather that managed to bring freezing rain and snow into parts of the South was too short and not severe enough to keep prices rising Tuesday. Instead, dollar-plus losses at several Northeast citygates led overall softening that yielded non-Northeast declines ranging from a dime or so in the Pacific Northwest to 40 cents.

The energy industry’s two major trading exchanges took a few more shots at each other last week but this time they were outside the courthouse. IntercontinentalExchange (ICE), the industry’s main over-the-counter bilateral commodity trading platform, received regulatory approval to allow Nymex floor traders and locals to trade OTC products on its system. Meanwhile, Nymex launched its new electronic futures trading platform with 34 energy futures derivatives for trading among multiple parties.

Enron Chairman and CEO Kenneth L. Lay got in a few shots at theelectric industry in general, and the California marketspecifically, during a conference earlier this week that was calledto address spiraling winter gas prices.