Barnett Shale

Read the TCEQ report on air pollution

There's been a lot of discussion about air pollution from natural gas drilling in the Barnett Shale, ever since our colleague Chris Vaugh weighed in with his  piece about tests at gas wells in West Fort Worth and DISH.

For those who want to read more, here's the TCEQ's report on air pollution, including the agency's plans for future air tests and responses to questions from State Rep. Lon Burnam: TCEQ air pollution

 

 

 

State Highway Department says Carter Avenue pipeline might run along I-30

The Texas Department of Transportation's Austin office has approved plans for an east-side natural gas line to run down Interstate 30. If the plan gets final approval, it would eliminate the need for a controversial pipeline to run underneath people's front yards on  Carter Avenue. 

We're putting together a story for tomorrow's paper.

-- Mike Lee

 

Networking site for oil and gas mineral-rights owners

For those who are owners of oil and gas mineral rights, there's a new Web site, www.mineralrightsforum.com,

It provides information on oil and gas issues, as well as allowing you to ask questions, share photos and videos and create blog posts. The forum features four discussion categories: general mineral rights, natural gas shale plays, oil and gas leasing help group and mineral rights tax issues. The site also offers a collection of informative videos on topics such as horizontal drilling with hydraulic fracturing and the setting up of a drilling rig. The site also includes news from the energy industry.

--Jack Z. Smith

 

Some in Mistletoe Heights face lease expiration

According to the Mistletoe Heights Neighborhood Association, between 40 and 50 property owners will see their three-year leases signed in late 2006 with Four Sevens start to expire in November and December, depending on when the lease was signed. XTO, which in 2007 signed about 300 property owners to a more favorable lease, is offering new leases to the Four Sevens property owners, but not at the same terms as its 2007 lease, which had a number of environmental and safety protections. Association leaders are recommending that property owners hold off signing until the new XTO lease includes those same protections. To see a copy of the association's letter to home owners, click here: Download MH lease.

-- Jim Fuquay

Houston Chronicle looks at Mitchell and the Barnett

The always-dependable energy team at the Houston Chronicle has produced yet another look-back at George Mitchell and Mitchell Energy's development of the Barnett Shale. We didn't see any new discoveries, so to speak, in the story, but veteran reporter Tom Fowler covers how persistently Mitchell stuck to his idea of extracting natural gas from shale.

Here's the link: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/energy/6720223.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+houstonchronicle%2Fenergy+%28HoustonChronicle.com

Chesapeake Energy has spent about $10 billion in the Barnett Shale in North Texas, including $3 billion in lease bonuses to property owners and hundreds of millions more in royalty payments for natural gas production, company CEO Aubrey McClendon said Friday in Fort Worth. But “we’ve got a lot left to go,” McClendon said. While the company has drilled 1,800 Barnett wells, “we feel like we’ve drilled only about 15 percent of the wells we ultimately need to drill to fully develop this resource,” he said at a luncheon of the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce and Petroleum Club of Fort Worth at Carter Burgess Plaza.

He expects that Chesapeake, which has an 850-employee regional operation in Fort Worth, will “continue to spend about $1.5 billion a year over the next 10 years” in the Barnett, and that royalty payments eventually “will hit a billion dollars a year.” Chesapeake had paid about $850 million in royalties for Barnett production, company spokeswoman Jerri Robbins said. Chesapeake has more than 325,000 net acres of Barnett lease holdings from more than 250,000 owners of mineral rights, the company said.

For more, see Saturday's Star-Telegram.

-- Jack Z. Smith

The Fort Worth City Council tightened its drilling ordinance last night, requiring a vote for any drillng permits and fracturing ponds in urban villages.

This has been under discussion since October.

Read below the jump for the latest story, and a previous story when the proposal first came up.