West Virginia University will be partnering with the National Energy Technology Laboratory, Shell, and the University of Pittsburgh to develop marketable products from shale gas. This is an exciting opportunity for WVU and its students that hopefully will spur further cooperation; so long, that is, as the researchers for WVU and Pitt don’t talk sports. Continue reading
Author: Joseph Schaeffer
When Insuring Your Hole-In-One Giveaway, Pay Attention to Minimum Yardage Requirements
I’ve not thought much about holes-in-one, mostly because my golf game is such that I’ve never been in any danger of making one. The charity responsible for the Greenbrier Classic golf tournament, however, must have given them some thought. Not only did it decide to award spectators a cash prize in the event of a hole-in-one on a certain hole, it purchased insurance to protect itself in the event of any pay-out. This turned out to be a smart move, because two golfers made holes-in-one resulting in nearly $200,000 in total payouts. Continue reading
Citizen Suits at Risk in West Virginia?
This fall, the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia held that whether landowners are entitled to water replacement under the Surface Coal Mining and Reclamation Act, W. Va. Code § 22-3-1 et seq. (“SCMRA”), is a question to be resolved by the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection (“DEP”) rather than the State’s circuit courts. This ruling has potentially significant effects on the prosecution of citizen suits under SCMRA and similarly-written State environmental laws. Continue reading
A Study in Contrasts
The same day that the United States opened the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil and gas exploration and production, France passed a law banning the production of all oil and gas by 2040. Although the latter measure is largely symbolic, the contrast between the two countries’ approaches to energy could not be more striking. Continue reading
Nothing Says “Kentucky” Like Fried Chicken …
Or a claim for “bourbon pollution.” The plaintiff in Brown-Forman Corp. v. Miller undoubtedly phrased his claim in more formal language, but the heart of his complaint was that the “angel’s share” escaping from bourbon barrels on his neighbors’ properties was promoting the growth of “whiskey fungus” on his.* Continue reading
Is it an Unfair Trade Practice When You're the Buyer?
Most consumers are at least familiar with the existence of unfair trade practice statutes and anti-trust law. Likely very few, however, have stopped to consider whether those statutes apply to the leasing of oil and gas interests in the Marcellus Shale. Yet, those are the precise questions at issue in Commonwealth of Pennsylvania v. Chesapeake Energy Corp. et al., No. 2015IR0069 (Pa. Ct. Comm. Pl. Dec. 15, 2017). Continue reading
Natural gas prices decline sharply in WV in last 10 years
The oil and gas industry’s West Virginia trade association, WVONGA, issued a press release yesterday attributing $1.5 billion in savings to residential ratepayers from lower gas prices. Those lower gas prices, of course, are due in no small part to the remarkable shale gas boom spurred by advancements in hydraulic fracturing. Continue reading
