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Oil and gas patch output is typically measured in barrels or cubic feet, but gross domestic product (GDP) is another yardstick by which to chart growth, and that’s particularly true in North Dakota, home to the Bakken Shale, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) said Friday.

Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy has signed legislation that would expand the state’s natural gas distribution system at the same time as a planned expansion of Algonquin Gas Transmission will increase supply access to New England.

University of Adelaide researchers in Australia are developing a new type of laser system that will monitor methane levels across large areas in order to monitor emissions of the greenhouse gas. The system has the potential to detect methane leaks from long-distance underground gas pipelines and gas fields, including coal seam gas extraction operations, and to measure methane emissions from animal production, the university said. “We hope to accurately measure methane concentrations up to a distance of 5 kilometers,” said project leader David Ottaway, senior lecturer in the university’s School of Chemistry and Physics. “This will give us an ability to map methane over an area as large as 25 square kilometers in a very short time. At the moment current technology only allows detection at a single point source as it blows past the detector.”

In Texas, natural gas and renewable resources are the energy industry’s peanut butter and jelly, according to a new report paid for by a foundation that bears the name of a shale gas patch pioneer. Free wind and solar need natural gas-fueled generators to back them up, and renewables are cheaper to dispatch than fossil-fueled power sources.

In Texas, natural gas and renewable resources are the energy industry’s peanut butter and jelly, according to a new report paid for by a foundation that bears the name of a shale gas patch pioneer. Free wind and solar need natural gas-fueled generators to back them up, and renewables are cheaper to dispatch than fossil-fueled power sources.

In the article “Consol-Noble JV to Build Marcellus Dry Gas Pipeline” (see Shale Daily, May 29), it was incorrectly reported that a 24-inch diameter dry natural gas pipeline in West Virginia would be completed in six to nine months. The joint venture plans to begin construction of the pipeline in six to nine months, and the time to build and complete the pipeline would be an additional six to nine months. NGI’s Shale Daily regrets the error.

National Property Holdings LP plans to develop the Alamo Junction Rail Park and serve the Eagle Ford Shale region’s growing demand for rail-based logistics and warehousing. The project joins another recently announced park targeting oil/gas patch-related industrial development in the region.

The Obama administration Friday released a national strategy that addresses the environmental, climate change and oil and gas development potential in the Arctic Region.

Former Enron Corp. CEO Jeffrey Skilling, 59, reached agreement with the U.S. Department of Justice that could allow him to be free as soon as 2017, according to a court filing. Skilling agreed to waive his rights to any further appeals and would allow more than $40 million of forfeited assets to be distributed to victims of Enron’s colossal collapse in 2001. Skilling was convicted in 2006 by a Houston jury on 19 criminal counts and originally was sentenced to federal prison for 24 years and four months (see NGI, May 29, 2006). The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in New Orleans twice said the sentence had been miscalculated (see NGI, April 11, 2011). “Although the recommended sentence for Jeff would still be more than double any other Enron defendant, all of whom have long been out of prison, Jeff will at least have the chance to get back a meaningful part of his life,” said Skilling attorney Daniel M. Petrocelli.