West Virginia

In what’s been a stressful week for supporters of a delicate proposal to help West Virginia natural gas producers develop larger tracts of land with co-tenancy legislation, Republican Gov. Jim Justice backed off threats that he would veto the legislation unless the industry agreed to a higher severance tax rate.

This year’s version of legislation that would make it easier for West Virginia’s natural gas producers to block up acreage for longer laterals by gathering leaseholders into large tracts has passed committee and is scheduled for its first reading before the full state House of Representatives on Tuesday.

Ascent Resources Marcellus Holdings LLC and its subsidiaries (ARM), successor companies that had their beginnings with the late Aubrey McClendon, have filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

The Atlantic Coast Pipeline (ACP) cleared a key regulatory hurdle this week, when the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection (WVDEP) waived the state’s water quality certification (WQC) requirement for the project.

During President Trump’s first state visit to China, officials from West Virginia and state-owned China Energy Investment Corp., the world’s largest power company, signed an $83.7 billion memorandum of understanding (MOU) to develop shale gas and chemical manufacturing projects in the Mountain State.

The West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection (WVDEP) said Wednesday it will waive its Clean Water Act (CWA) Section 401 water quality certification permit for the Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP), an apparent about-face that comes less than two months after the agency said it would withdraw and reevaluate its review.

West Virginia has officially thrown out Mountain Valley Pipeline’s Section 401 water quality certification (WQC) and will start over with a review of the project’s application after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit granted the agency’s motion to invalidate the certificate.

A group of West Virginia landowners has appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court to review a May opinion by the state’s highest court that found natural gas producers can deduct post-production costs from royalty payments.

In yet another sign of the growing challenges natural gas pipelines face at the state level, the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection (WVDEP) has thrown out Mountain Valley Pipeline’s (MVP) Section 401 water quality certification (WQC) and plans to reevaluate the project’s application.