E&P

Staff members of Ohio’s Muskingum Watershed Conservancy District (MWCD) plan to recommend on Friday that the board of directors reduce annual property tax assessments beginning in 2015, on the grounds that the district is bringing in more revenue from oil and gas leases in the Utica Shale.

The stubborn cold of last winter that buoyed natural gas prices and wells that keep flowing at surprising rates, combined with a slowly breaking bottleneck and a race to push the play’s boundaries beyond Ohio in search of more liquids once again has the spotlight growing brighter on the Utica Shale.

An index of oil and natural gas upstream activity in Texas reached a new high for February with increasing production — for oil the highest since 1980 — higher commodity prices at the wellhead following along with a booming workforce.

Robust crude oil production driven by the shale revolution has produced significant increases in the railroad shipment of oil, and in the next few years that means an almost quantum leap in shipments to California’s major West Coast refineries, according to state energy projections. In two years, more than a quarter of the oil processed is expected to come via rail.

Encana Corp. is readying a spinoff of PrairieSky Royalty Ltd. to create one of Canada’s largest energy royalty companies with 5.2 million acres in Alberta that extend to the U.S. border.

Mexico’s proven reserves of oil and natural gas fell 3.1% in 2013, according to data from the nation’s energy ministry. Meanwhile, national oil company Petroleos Mexicanos (Pemex) has signed cooperation agreements with France’s Total SA and GDF Suez SA.

Drilling for natural gas and oil in northern Colorado has American Rivers calling the state’s White River one of the most endangered rivers in the United States.

Five years ago it was unthinkable that U.S. ethane supplies could be shipped overseas, but advantaged domestic natural gas supplies have opened new opportunities, an expert said Tuesday at the annual meeting of the Gas Processors Association in Dallas.

Continued production growth in oil and natural gas is forecast, but the rate of growth will be slowed somewhat by upcoming state and federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM) regulations, North Dakota’s top oil/gas regulator said Friday while reporting a production slowdown due to harsh winter weather.