Regulatory

The PennEast Pipeline received a favorable draft environmental impact statement (DEIS) from FERC Friday, bringing plans for the natural gas pipeline, which would traverse the Marcellus Shale, one step closer to reality.

The Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) has issued Spectra Energy Corp. an amended corrective action order detailing a slate of work that must be completed before Texas Eastern Transmission’s (Tetco) Penn-Jersey system can return to full-service after an April blast that damaged it.

Utility regulators in Maine approved a plan to support development of natural gas pipeline capacity — at ratepayer expense — to serve the state as long as other New England states join the effort.

The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) has suspended trading of Atlas Resource Partners LP’s (ARP) common and preferred units. NYSE informed the company last week that it would begin proceedings to delist the company’s units. ARP is now listed on the over-the-counter market. Its common units were trading around 13 cents each on Thursday. The delisting is one part of the company’s financial woes. It has delayed a payment on its borrowing base and exercised its 30-day grace period to pay interest on its senior notes. ARP’s general partner, Atlas Energy Group LLC, was also delisted in March and is currently trading over-the-counter (see Shale Daily,March 21). ARP has producing wells and reserves in 17 states, which include assets in the Barnett, Eagle Ford, Marcellus and Utica shales.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on Thursday approved a pair of orders clearing the way for Eastern Shore Natural Gas Co.’s proposed White Oak Expansion and System Reliability projects in Pennsylvania and Delaware [CP15-18, CP15-498]. The White Oak Expansion would enable Eastern Shore to provide 45,000 Dth/d of firm transportation to the Garrison Energy Center in Dover, DE through the installation of 3.3 miles of 16-inch diameter looping pipeline (Daleville Loop) and 2.1 miles of 16-inch diameter looping pipeline (Kemblesville Loop) in Chester County, PA, and 3,550 hp of additional compression at the Delaware City Compressor Station (see Daily GPI,April 25). The System Reliability Project would decrease the likelihood of brown outs during high demand months through the installation of 2.5 miles of 16-inch diameter looping pipeline (Porter Road Loop) in New Castle County, DE, and 7.6 miles of 16-inch diameter looping pipeline (Dover Loop) in Kent County, DE, and associated facilities. The orders were approved as part of the consent agenda at FERC’s regular monthly meeting in Washington, DC. FERC released a favorable environmental assessment for the projects earlier this year.

The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) has fined Stonehenge Appalachia LLC $1.5 million for a series of unauthorized sediment discharges and a landslide it caused in Western Pennsylvania during the construction of a natural gas gathering system there.

Alaska Gov. Bill Walker appointed Hollis French to the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission (AOGCC). A former state senator from Anchorage, French had a long career in Alaska’s oil industry prior to his work in the legislature. After moving to Alaska in 1978, French went to work on Shell Platform A, five miles offshore in Cook Inlet. His North Slope career started in 1979 with Shell, where he worked his way up to a production operator. In 1984, French began work for ARCO as a production operator and was promoted to lead operator. French will bring 13 years of hands-on oil field experience to the job. He left the oil industry in 1992 to attend law school, ultimately receiving his juris doctor from Cornell Law School in 1995. Upon graduating, he returned to Alaska where he worked as a prosecutor in the Anchorage District Attorney’s Office for six years. In 2002, French was elected to the Alaska Senate, where he served for 12 years and was a member of the Senate Bipartisan Working Group and Chair of the Judiciary Committee.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of Justice announced a settlement with Enbridge Energy LP and several related Enbridge companies to resolve claims stemming from two separate oil spills in Marshall, MI and Romeoville, IL, in 2010. Enbridge agreed to spend at least $110 million on measures to prevent spills and improve operations across nearly 2,000 miles of its pipeline system in the Great Lakes area, and to pay $62 million in civil penalties for Clean Water Act violations, the agencies said. Enbridge will also pay more than $5.4 million in unreimbursed costs incurred by the government in connection with cleanup of the Marshall spill, as well as all future removal costs incurred by the government in connection with the spill. In addition to payments required under the proposed settlement, Enbridge has already reimbursed the government for $57.8 million in cleanup costs from the Marshall spill and $650,000 for cleanup costs from the Romeoville spill, and reportedly incurred costs in excess of $1 billion for required cleanup activities relating to the spills, the agencies said. Enbridge was held responsible for the discharge of at least 20,082 bbls of oil in Marshall and another 6,427 bbls in Romeoville. In 2012, the National Transportation Safety Board said the 30-inch diameter pipeline rupture and spill in the Kalamazoo River in Marshall was the most expensive onshore oil spill in U.S. history (see Daily GPI,July 16, 2012).

North Dakota on Monday became the first state to sue the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over its three new final rules governing methane emissions from oil and gas industry sources.