Wash

Data from the latest Baker Hughes Inc. (BHI) rig count shows drillers continuing their return to Louisiana’s Haynesville Shale.

One-dozen U.S. land rigs left play for the week ending April 1, joined by two offshore units for a decline of 14 to 450 operating U.S. rigs (including 420 land-based units), according to Baker Hughes Inc.

One-dozen U.S. land rigs left play for the week ending April 1, joined by two offshore units for a decline of 14 to 450 operating U.S. rigs (including 420 land-based units), according to Baker Hughes Inc.

Plains All American Pipeline LP is constructing a 95-mile extension of its Oklahoma crude oil pipeline to service increasing production from the Granite Wash, Hogshooter and Cleveland Sands producing areas in western Oklahoma and the Texas panhandle. The new Western Oklahoma pipeline will provide up to 75,000 b/d of takeaway capacity from Reydon, OK, in Roger Mills County to PAA’s Orion station in Major County, OK. At the Orion station, crude oil will flow on PAA’s existing pipeline system to the PAA terminal in Cushing, OK. The new Western Oklahoma pipeline is supported by long-term producer commitments and is expected to be in service by the end of the first quarter of 2014, the company said.

Atlas Pipeline Partners LP stepped deeper into the Eagle Ford Shale in South Texas on Tuesday with a $1 billion cash agreement to buy privately held Teak Midstream LLC, a natural gas gathering and processing operator.

Summit Investments has agreed to acquire Bear Tracker Energy LLC for $513 million from affiliates of GSO Capital Partners LP and Bear Tracker Investments LLC. Midstream company Bear Tracker is focused on oil and natural gas in North Dakota and Colorado.

Crestwood Midstream Partners LP late Monday agreed to pay $90 million to buy some of Devon Energy Corp.’s midstream assets in the Barnett Shale and to process the producer’s natural gas output from 20,500 dedicated acres, now estimated at 95 MMcf/d, over a 20-year period.

Penn Virginia Resource Partners LP (PVR) is buying Chief Gathering LLC for $1 billion. Chief Gathering serves northeastern Pennsylvania Marcellus Shale producers and is a sister company to producer Chief Oil & Gas LLC.

The Utica Shale could double or triple liquids production in the Appalachian Basin, increasing the infrastructure challenges in the region, a midstream player told an audience in Pittsburgh on Wednesday.