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Gas transportation system key to boosting power sector’s gas use: Oglethorpe

A US Environmental Protection Agency proposal to increase the capacity factor of natural gas-fired combined-cycle power plants to 70% by 2030 is "doable," but only if the country’s gas transportation system is strengthened, officials with a large Georgia generation and transmission cooperative said Wednesday. Oglethorpe Power, which supplies wholesale power to 38 electric cooperatives in the state, could comply with language in EPA’s June proposal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the generation sector 30% below 2005’s level by 2030 in part by increasing the use of gas-fired units to the 70% level, CEO Mike Smith said in a second-quarter earnings call. But Smith said transitioning to an era when combined-cycle units provide much of the nation’s baseload power would require a significant expansion of the existing network of gas pipelines. EPA’s proposed rule is "very bullish" on natural gas and would put the fuel into a "very dominant" […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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BP Names New CEO of US Shale Unit

BP announced Wednesday that it has named David Lawler chief executive officer of its US Lower 48 Onshore business. Lawler, who brings more than 20 years of industry experience to the role, will begin Sept. 15 and report to Lamar McKay, BP’s Upstream Segment chief executive. Lawler, 46, takes over just months before BP formally establishes a separate business to manage its onshore oil and gas assets in the continental United States. The move is designed to give the business the flexibility it needs to aggressively compete in the rapidly changing market. “With an impressive track record at integrated oil and gas companies as well as independents, Dave is uniquely qualified to lead our onshore business during this exciting transition,” McKay said. “His experience and skills match up perfectly with our goals for the business. I’m confident he will create a competitive and sustainable operation that will be a […]

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A New Frontier for Fracking: Drilling Near the Arctic Circle

Hydraulic fracturing is about to move into the Canadian Arctic, with companies exploring the region’s rich shale oil deposits. But many indigenous people and conservationists have serious concerns about the impact of fracking in more fragile northern environments. Among the dozens of rivers that flow unfettered through the Canadian North, the Natla and the Keele may be the most picturesque and culturally important. They are especially significant to the Dene people of the Sahtu region, which straddles the Arctic Circle in the Northwest Territories. Both of the rivers flow crystal clear out of the Mackenzie Mountains along the Yukon/Northwest Territories border before coming together in their final course to the Mackenzie River. Conoco-Phillips fracking project in Sahtu Photo credit: Conoco-Phillips. A Conoco-Phillips shale oil fracking site in the Sahtu region of Canada’s Northwest Territories. For hundreds — if not thousands — of years, the Mountain Dene people have been […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Potential oil window is last gasp for Utica Shale

Tweet YOUNGSTOWN 11 Jim McKinney, senior vice president and general manager from EnerVest, a Houston-based company, said his company believes that with changes in drilling techniques, activity will increase in the oil-rich northern part of the Utica Shale, which includes Trumbull County. “When companies first drilled, they were using the same techniques they were using in the dry- and wet-gas areas of the Utica,” he said. EnerVest has found in Tuscarawas and Guernsey counties that by using more water and sand in the fracking process, there can be success in the oil-rich portions of the Utica, McKinney said. “Oil has different molecules than gas,” he said. Companies were using 200 feet to 250 feet spacing between injections, but for the oil area it needs to be shorter, about 150 feet, McKinney said. “It allows the oil to move more freely toward the well bore,” he said. If the tests […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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BP Hires Chief to Run its U.S. 'Lower 48' Onshore Business

BP PLC said Wednesday that it hired David Lawler, an executive with U.S. independent petroleum producer Sandridge Energy Inc., to run a separate business unit it is creating for the U.S.’s lower 48 states. The move is part of BP’s plan to restructure its shale-focused U.S. assets in response to the difficulties that it and other big oil companies have had profiting from the shale boom in the country. Mr. Lawler, most recently an executive vice president and chief operating officer of Sandridge, will take over a new business with "separate governance, processes and systems" from the rest of BP, the company said in a statement. He will report to BP’s exploration-and-production chief, Lamar McKay. BP said in March that it would put its lower-48 onshore assets into a new business in an effort to become nimbler and "compete more effectively with the independents," BP CEO Bob Dudley told […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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BP Hires Chief to Run its U.S. ‘Lower 48’ Onshore Business

BP PLC said Wednesday that it hired David Lawler, an executive with U.S. independent petroleum producer Sandridge Energy Inc., to run a separate business unit it is creating for the U.S.’s lower 48 states. The move is part of BP’s plan to restructure its shale-focused U.S. assets in response to the difficulties that it and other big oil companies have had profiting from the shale boom in the country. Mr. Lawler, most recently an executive vice president and chief operating officer of Sandridge, will take over a new business with "separate governance, processes and systems" from the rest of BP, the company said in a statement. He will report to BP’s exploration-and-production chief, Lamar McKay. BP said in March that it would put its lower-48 onshore assets into a new business in an effort to become nimbler and "compete more effectively with the independents," BP CEO Bob Dudley told […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Dozens die in Ukraine in street battles, Donetsk shelling

KIEV/DONETSK Ukraine (Reuters) – Heavy shelling hit residential neighborhoods in Ukraine’s rebel stronghold of Donetsk and government forces fought street battles in other towns on Wednesday as they sought to crush a four-month-old separatist rebellion. The forces of the Western-backed Kiev government are steadily gaining the upper hand over the separatists in Russian-speaking eastern Ukraine and are tightening the noose around the main rebel bastions of Donetsk and Luhansk. Reuters reporters in Donetsk said mortar bombs had struck Chelyuskintsev Street in the north of the city, a few km (miles) from the frontline of the conflict, shattering the windows of several five-floor apartment buildings and shearing off the branches of trees and downing power lines. The attack left large craters in the street and a meter-wide hole in the first floor of one of the apartment buildings. "The Ukrainian army or whoever they are – they’re bombing us again. […]

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Ukraine Fight With Rebels Intensifies as Deaths Mount

Ukraine ’s armed forces said they continue to push back separatists in fighting in the country’s east, as the death toll from the conflict, already more than 2,000, mounted further. Ukraine’s National Guard captured the city of Ilovaysk, leading rebels to counter-attack with tanks and artillery, the force said today on its website. Nine Ukrainian servicemen died and 22 were wounded in the past 24 hours, military spokesman Andriy Lysenko said in Kiev. He later told reporters that government troops control a “significant” part of Luhansk, one of the main separatist strongholds. Thirty-four civilians were killed and 29 hurt in Donetsk, the other redoubt, in the past 24 hours, the regional administration said. “It’s a question of the next month for the rebels to either be defeated or for Russia to send in far larger forces to stop their defeat,” Joerg Forbrig, senior program officer for central and eastern […]

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Europe could learn from U.S. shale success

Europe may be on the cusp of developing a shale natural gas sector that could mimic the expansion in the United States, analysis from finds. Developments in hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, and horizontal drilling have led to exponential increases in U.S. natural gas production since at least 2005. Geological complexities have presented obstacles to a replication of the phenomenon outside the United States. Robert Clarke , director of research into the area for Wood Mackenzie, said U.S. shale gas production has evolved from operations in easy-to-reach and highly productive basins to what he’s describing as "unconventional 3.0" — a phase characterized by a lessons-learned approach to areas once considered too difficult for commercial drilling. "Europe is one of the best areas outside of the United States for this to occur," he said Wednesday in an e-mailed statement. His report says countries outside the United States — notably Mexico, Russia, […]

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Slovakia plants seed in Ukrainian gas sector

Slovakia and Ukraine have laid the preliminary groundwork for a long future in the natural gas sector, the Slovakian minister of economy said from Kiev. The Ukrainian government this week said testing began to send 70 million cubic feet per day from Slovakia to Ukraine through the joint work of transit companies Uktransgaz and Eustream. Ukrainian Energy Minister Yuri Prodan hosted Slovakian Minister of Economy Pavol Pavlis in Kiev to discuss the prospects of a new relationship in the natural gas sector . "Small reverse flow will become a basis for further collaboration between Slovakia and Ukraine," Pavlis said in a statement. Russian energy company Gazprom in June cut gas supplies to Ukraine because of lingering contractual disputes. Most of the Russian gas sent through Ukraine heads to European consumers and the Ukrainian energy minister said his country was still a reliable transit nation. "The Ukrainian side stands technologically […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple