The Marcellus Shale | June 2022

Field Overview

The Marcellus Shale is the largest gas play onshore in the US. Located in the Northeast, it supplies the high-demand markets along the East Coast. Most of the basin’s gas is produced through unconventional methods, while the little oil produced is mostly by conventional means. Some of the top formations include the Onondaga and the Huntersville.

State Drilling Statistics

Active Drilling Rigs in Basin- 38 (-1)
Total Rigs in Pennsylvania- 24 (-1)
Total Rigs in United States- 756 (+16)
Total U.S. Rigs 56% YTD

State Permitting Data
Permits Approved – 85

Marcellus Top Producers
Top Producer By BOE – Chesapeake

Basin Highlights

Royalty Payments in 2021 over $123 Million

According to spokesman George Stark, Coterra Energy, which was created via the union of Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. and Cimarex Energy Co., paid $2 billion in royalties in Susquehanna County alone between 2010 and 2021. According to the Public Utility Commission, the industry will pay counties and municipalities impacted by drilling $123,217,163 in impact fees for the 2021 reporting year. With the distribution for this year, localities will have gotten more than $2.2 billion. Although consumers are paying a higher price for natural gas, the returned funds do wonders for local economies.

Conventional and Unconventional not to be Held to Same Standards

Three trade groups representing Pennsylvania’s conventional oil and gas industry are suing the state’s environmental regulators to prevent a new rule on methane and other air pollution from being applied to their well sites. According to the industry groups, the state Department of Environmental Protection created a single rule that applies to both conventional and unconventional well sites “in blatant disregard” of a 2016 state law requiring conventional wells to be regulated separately from those tapping the Marcellus and Utica shales. When the DEP drafted the regulation, it rejected that reasoning, which largely reflects federal criteria that the state must comply with by mid-June or risk fines, including the loss of federal transportation funds. In a letter received by the commission this past month., the DEP withdrew the rule from consideration by the state’s Independent Regulatory Review Commission at its forthcoming hearing on May 19.

Membrane Distillation Deployment

By cleaning the produced water for reuse, engineers from the University of Pittsburgh Swanson School of Engineering are creating a novel method that is already being tried in Pennsylvania, Texas, and North Dakota to lessen the environmental impact of drilling and fracking. A new method that can handle complex and heavily contaminated wastewater is membrane distillation. Through the use of membrane distillation technology, this project—led by Radisav Vidic, professor and department chair of civil and environmental engineering—allows drillers to filter and reuse produced water for use in the oil and gas sector, in agriculture, and for other advantageous purposes. Theoretically, producers could reduce operating expenses by utilizing waste heat to provide the technology’s thermal energy needs. The use of this technique will save the state’s northeastern counties—which are the furthest from disposal wells—nearly $16 million annually in disposal expenditures.

Operators with Most Permits in PA

Top Producers By Gas

Rig Count

PA Oil Production

PA Natural Gas Production

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PETRO Engineering, PLLC via the following sources unless otherwise
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www.eia.gov
www.drillinginfo.com
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