2018 NAGF

Check out the 2018 post-forum video to hear more about participants’ experience at the NAGF.

2018 Press Coverage

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  Permit rewrite is no ‘slam dunk’ for stalled pipelines

  A push by President Donald Trump’s administration to revise water permit guidelines probably will not revive construction on a handful of stalled pipeline projects anytime soon. The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is working to update guidelines that tell states how to issue so-called section 401 water permits for pipelines and industrial projects. The administration started the initiative amid complaints that water permits have become a vehicle for states to block development. New York over the past three years, for example, blocked the Constitution pipeline and halted the Northeast Supply Enhancement project by denying them water permits. The two pipelines, proposed by midstream operator Williams, represent $1.7bn in investment and are intended to boost natural gas deliveries upstate and into New York City.

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  US nearing finish line on oil, gas rule rollbacks

  President Donald Trump’s administration says it is six months away from finishing work to overhaul the previous administration’s rules on offshore drilling, vehicle fuel-economy standards and methane leaks. Those timelines were announced today in the administration’s fall regulatory agenda. The upcoming revisions are part of a first round of major deregulatory actions for the oil and gas sector since Trump took office, giving the administration a shot at revising federal requirements adopted under former president Barack Obama it says are unnecessary or too costly. The oil sector is expected to save more than $170mn/yr on compliance from the upcoming revisions to offshore drilling rules and methane leak restrictions. The fuel-economy rollback could also generate billions of dollars a year in revenue for producers and refiners from a projected 500,000 b/d increase in US oil demand.

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  U.S. Gas Demand Is Growing Faster Than Production, Williams Says

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  FERC’s LaFleur Sees Significant Risk of Gas Pipe Overbuild

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  Permian Is Flaring 2 Mtpa Worth of LNG Exports, Tellurian Says

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  Tellurian, LNG CEOs See Potential for Deals Getting Done in 2018

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  China May Hike Levy on U.S. LNG as Spat Heats Up, Group Says (1)

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  Panama Canal Says Volume of LNG Ship Traffic Will Triple by 2020

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  Watch This Spread for Signs of Tight LNG Market, Tellurian Says

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  Tellurian CEO Explains What "LNG Winner" Has to Do

  Tellurian CEO Meg Gentle explained how the US can be a winner in LNG exports at the Energy Dialogues LLC North American Gas Forum in Washington D.C. on Oct. 15 and what makes up Tellurian’s secret sauce. “We will need to see roughly a doubling of the current 11 Bcf/d of LNG export capacity to meet global demand in just a few years,“ she said, but added on the LNG panel that “at least $175 billion in infrastructure of export terminals and pipelines is needed” as well to help support U.S. burgeoning production to meet that demand. For example, she said the Permian flaring is a tragic waste as to her it translates to 11 Bcf/d of LNG export capacity that is not coming to market. The Permian is just one of the basins that needs more infrastructure, she said. “The U.S. LNG market is about to overtake Europe’s position as the second largest interconnected global market,” Gentle said.

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  FERC Commissioner LaFleur Discusses Her 'Unpopular' Views

  FERC Commissioner Cheryl LaFleur opened her keynote speech before a gas industry crowd by warning her views might not be “popular.” She opened at the Oct. 15 Energy Dialogues LLC North American Gas Forum in Washington, D.C. by saying that three notable changes have occurred since she first took office, and the first is just the sheer abundance of natural gas. The second is the emergence of renewables in generation which she said, “is a dynamic favorable for natural gas.” And the third is an international and national focus on climate change and environmental issues. She said all three have made life at FERC busier. “Our work on pipelines is getting harder—bigger dockets and more comprehensive reviews,” she said. Partly, the latter was a result of the August 2017 Sabal Trail decision (Sierra Club v. FERC), she explained.

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  "Molecules Are Money"- Why Reducing Methane Emissions Is Key

  Methane emissions was a major theme at the Energy Dialogues LLC North American Gas Forum in Washington, D.C., summed up by the comment, “Molecules are money.” U.S. State Department Deputy Assistant Secretary for Oil and Natural Gas Shawn Bennett made the remark, but another panel took up the challenge of methane emissions and how it is naturally in the industry’s best interest to reduce methane emissions. Economic self-interest Not only from a public relations and environmental standpoint should the industry do its utmost to reduce emissions but also from an economic self-interest was the main takeaway of the Oct. 16 panel discussion. Various members of the panel highlighted what their companies are doing and why. Noble Energy’s environmental and regulatory policy manager Kate Fay summed up the attitude of the panel, “Keeping methane in the pipe is obviously a need, it’s not just economics but also the right thing to do.”

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  LaFleur Sees Risk of Gas Pipeline Overbuilding, Comments on Four Commissioner Dynamic

  Amid legal challenges to most natural gas pipeline certificate orders from FERC and uncertainty on federal policy regarding climate change, “our work on pipelines is getting harder,” Commissioner Cheryl LaFleur said October 15 in a speech at the North American Gas Forum.

  LaFleur addressed FERC’s assessment of gas pipeline applications and its environmental reviews under the National Environmental Policy Act, including the ongoing review of FERC’s certificate policy statement. The policy statement and implementation of it considers precedent agreements as an indication of long-term need for new pipeline facilities. If that continues to be the case, “there is a significant risk of pipeline overbuilding,” LaFleur said. That possibility of overbuilding was a factor mentioned for consideration by FERC in the 1999 policy statement, but it has not been a theme in most of the cases FERC has addressed in the last 15 years.

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  LNG Project Owners Trying to Secure Buyers, Tout Advantages, Deal with Steel Tariffs

  The dichotomy of having an advantageous position globally for selling natural gas from the U.S. while facing higher costs due to steel tariffs is among the issues facing LNG export project developers, speakers said at the North American Gas Forum October 16.

  Lawmakers from Congress offered almost no hope that the steel tariffs and the Trump administration’s trade dispute with China will be resolved anytime soon, and no chance for legislation to improve pipeline siting as a stand-alone bill on state use of the Clean Water Act (CWA).

  Pipeline siting and the use of gas storage to address the varying output from LNG export facilities is becoming increasingly important for export project developers, said Octavio Simoes, president and CEO of Sempra LNG & Midstream.

  Sens. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), Shelly Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), Steve Daines (R-Mont.) and James Inhofe (R-Okla.) in July introduced legislation to modify Section 401 of the CWA to limit states’ ability to use the water quality certificate process as a veto against pipeline facilities, which has been an issue in New York state.

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  Pipeline Constraints, Water Concerns, Lack of Policy Direction from Congress Addressed

  The energy sector has been subject to the policy whims of different presidential administrations, with federal agency directives and the courts’ interpretation of those directives playing a larger role than Congress, a former White House energy staffer said during a panel at the North American Gas Forum.

  “Congress is not passing energy legislation in any meaningful way,” so the policies affecting the oil and natural gas industry reflect pendulum swings from administration to administration, said Mike Catanzaro, partner with CGCN Group. Catanzaro served as an energy and environmental policy advisor in the Trump White House and noted that the administration’s energy policies were outlined in executive orders and federal agency decisions, which have been subject to legal appeals in the courts.

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  PERSPECTIVE: Gas Industry Wary as Energy Policy Shifts Toward Executive Branch, Courts

  At this month’s North American Gas Forum (NAGF) in Washington, industry officials and analysts were less than thrilled with how US policy is developing as it relates to natural gas. With Congress having abdicated its responsibilities and handed most energy policy decisions to the executive branch and hence to regulators the sector faces mountains of litigation and an abundance of business uncertainty, participants said at the event organized by Energy Dialogues. In terms of gas infrastructure projects, developers and their opponents “litigate, litigate and relitigate” at a huge cost, said Jeff Berkowitz, CEO of energy consulting firm Delve. Administrative policy decisions are much more easily challenged in court than laws passed by Congress. As a result, groups like the Sierra Club have sued to block every US LNG project and many gas pipelines, usually based on vague standards as to whether or not an environmental review was “adequate” or “sufficient.”

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