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Anton, Schlumberger Venture to Cut Size by Firing Workers

An oilfield service venture set up by Schlumberger Ltd. (SLB) and Anton Oilfield Services Group (3337) is considering cutting costs because of the partnership’s slow progress. Sichuan-based Tongzhou IPM Services Co., set up in September 2012, is trying to cut operating costs and could reduce the number of workers, said Wang Bo, Anton’s Hong Kong-based spokesman. The move doesn’t imply that Anton and Schlumberger, the world’s largest oilfield-services provider, plan to shut the venture. “We think the unit could still be competitive in the oilfield-services market if we improve efficiency, control cost and react more quickly to market demand,” Wang said. Schlumberger’s Houston-based spokesman Joao Felix declined to comment and referred all questions to Anton. Schlumberger’s plan to take advantage of China ’s shale gas push and establish a presence in the resource-rich Sichuan province will take a blow should Tongzhou be dismantled. It may also add to troubles […]

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Natural Gas Boom Is Drowning Out Coal Industry’s Battle Cries

4729 Votes Natural Gas Boom Is Drowning Out Coal Industry’s Battle Cries While a lot of the political fodder during the 2014 election season focused on the “war on coal,” a bigger and even stronger show of force is transforming the nation’s economic landscape, especially in “war torn” Appalachia: natural gas. The natural resource has emerged from the back burner of U.S. energy development and onto the hot seat. Over the last seven years, it has not only fueled new economic growth but it has also changed the way electricity is generated. Beyond the newfound abundance — a result of shale gas drilling technologies — the manufacturing sector has subsequently boomed. To be clear, dry natural gas can be used for electric generation. Wet natural gas, or natural gas liquids that include methane, ethane butane and propane, are separated from the dry gas. Those elements are then used as […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple
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Pennsylvania Benefits from Oil, Gas Extraction in the State

Fracking for oil and natural gas in Pennsylvania is creating a significant amount of economic stimulus for the state in the form of new jobs and funding that will help pay for infrastructure, according to the Pennsylvania Business Daily. And while there is some resistance from activists, Pennsylvania communities are becoming more open to drilling in the state, according to the Pennsylvania Independent Oil and Natural Gas Association Director of Public Outreach, Dan Weaver. The broader acceptance is a relatively new occurrence, Weaver said. “Four or five years ago, everyone was using scare tactics, saying that there was going to be mass, widespread devastation and everything was going to just go downhill. We’re four or five years later, and there is no mass, widespread devastation,” Weaver said. While devastation has not found its way to the area, employment opportunities have: the drilling is creating thousands of good jobs in […]

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Shale revolutionary for United Kingdom, company boss says

Momentum is building behind fledgling British shale natural gas industry. UPI/Gary C. Caskey Ineos Chairman Jim Ratcliffe unveiled preliminary plans to give momentum to the fledgling British shale natural gas industry. At a Thursday conference, the chairman said substantial investments could follow developments in shale . "I believe shale gas could revolutionize U.K. manufacturing, and I know Ineos has the resources to make it happen, the skills to extract the gas safely and the vision to realize that everyone must share in the rewards," he said. Ineos acquired shale exploration and development licenses near a power plant a few hundred miles from the Scottish capital, Edinburgh. The British Geological Survey said the available reserves there are "modest." The emerging shale industry in the country has been met with opposition from environmental activists concerned about the fallout from the controversial drilling practice known as hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, as well […]

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Russia-China Gas Deals Could Kill America’s Dream Of Natural Gas Exports

4727 Votes Russia and China have signed  two large natural gas deals  in the last six months as Russia turns its attention to China, in reaction to sanctions and souring relations with Europe, currently Russia’s largest energy export market. But the move has implications beyond Europe. In the department of everything is connected, U.S. natural gas producers may be seeing their dream of substantial liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports suffer fatal injury because of Russian exports to the Chinese market, a market that was expected to be the largest and most profitable for LNG exporters. Petroleum geologist and consultant  Art Berman –who has been consistently skeptical of the viability of U.S. LNG exports–communicated in an email that Russian supply will force the price of LNG delivered to Asia down to between $10 and $11, too low for American LNG exports to be profitable. Now, let’s back up a little. […]

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What It’s Like to Have Fracking in Your Backyard

4725 Votes Ed Wade’s property straddles the Wetzel and Marsh county lines in rural West Virginia and it has a conventional gas well on it. “You could cover the whole [well] pad with three pickups,” said Wade. And West Virginia has lots of conventional wells — more than 50,000 at last count. West Virginians are so well acquainted with gas drilling that when companies began using high-volume horizontal hydraulic fracturing in 2006 to access areas of the Marcellus Shale that underlie the state, most residents and regulators were unprepared for the massive footprint of the operations and the impact on their communities. When it comes to a conventional well and a Marcellus well, “There is no comparison, none whatsoever,” said Wade, who works with the Wetzel County Action Group . “You live in the country for a reason and it just takes that and turns it upside down. You […]

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50 Ways to Leave The Marcellus—The Race to Increase Natural Gas Take-Away Capacity

4725 Votes The economics of natural gas production in the dry Marcellus, the wet Marcellus and the Utica are so favorable—and the shale gas resource so bountiful—that the only real limit on how much the Marcellus/Utica plays can produce is the capacity of the pipeline network in the Northeast and neighboring regions to take gas to market. And there’s the rub, because the region’s gas transmission infrastructure was designed decades ago to deliver large volumes of gas to the Northeast, not away from it. That’s why the midstream sector has made “a new plan, Stan,” and is now in now in the midst of a major reworking of the pipeline system—not just within and near the Marcellus/Utica but just about everywhere east of the Mississippi. The $30 billion re-plumbing effort and its effects on the gas market as a whole are the subject of RBN’s latest Drill-Down Report, “ 50 […]

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Did Russia and China just sign a death warrant for U.S. LNG exports?

Printer-friendly Russia and China have signed  two large natural gas deals  in the last six months as Russia turns its attention eastward in reaction to sanctions and souring relations with Europe, currently Russia’s largest energy export market. But the move has implications beyond Europe. In the department of everything is connected, U.S. natural gas producers may be seeing their dream of substantial liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports suffer fatal injury because of Russian exports to the Chinese market, a market that was expected to be the largest and most profitable for LNG exporters. Petroleum geologist and consultant  Art Berman –who has been consistently skeptical of the viability of U.S. LNG exports–communicated in an email that Russian supply will force the price of LNG delivered to Asia down to between $10 and $11, too low for American LNG exports to be profitable. Now, let’s back up a little. U.S. natural […]

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U.S. shale gas output breaking records

No signs U.S. shale natural gas boom will slow down, a division of the Platts energy services company says. UPI/Gary C. Caskey DENVER, Nov. 7 (UPI) — U.S. natural gas production has risen for the 10th consecutive month, moving steadily into "unchartered territory," analysis from Platts finds. Bentek Energy, the forecasting unit of Platts, found gas production in the Lower 48 states averaged 69.9 billion cubic feet per day in October, breaking the previous record and posting the 10th straight month of gains. Gas production in October was 7.9 percent higher year-on-year. Jack Weixel, director of analysis at Bentek, said projects slated to come online in the U.S. northeast should push the U.S. gas output above the 72 billion cubic feet per day mark by the end of the year. "The current level of production is unchartered territory for the domestic natural gas market and shows no signs of […]

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Illinois Lawmakers Approve Fracking Rules

URL: http://www.rigzone.com/news/oil_gas/a/135811/Illinois_Lawmakers_Approve_Fracking_Rules CHICAGO (AP) — Illinois lawmakers signed off Thursday on long-awaited rules regulating high-volume oil and gas drilling, clearing the way for companies to get "fracking" permits and unleash what they hope will be an energy boom in the southern part of the state. But a number of key details were not disclosed including how the state plans to fund the hiring of new workers to oversee the practice, which uses high-pressure mixtures to crack open rocks and release trapped oil and gas. The delay in the fracking rules — which took more than a year for the state Department of Natural Resources to write and which were revised by a legislative committee — prompted complaints from industry that energy development would suffer. The final rules must be submitted to the Secretary of State to be published by Nov. 15. The secretive approval process set off alarm bells […]

Posted On : Published By : Tom Whipple