Going To Bed -- Goodnight -- Good Luck To All -- February 3, 2020

Iowa Caucus Updates Everywhere -- February 3, 2020

Updates

Later, 12:21 p.m.  ET: news anchors now suggesting that if democrats can't even manage a "primary" in Iowa, how in the world does one think they can run the country. 

Later, 12:17 p.m. ET: no reports yet. This is a huge disaster for Iowa. 

Later, 11:32 p.m. ET: precinct chairman for precinct 11 (Ames, Iowa) -- on the first vote, twice as many caucus-goers in his corner than the second candidate -- by the time the final vote came in, precinct 11: Biden, 2 delegates; Sanders, 2 delegates; Buttigieg, 2 delegates. 

Later, 11:00 p.m. ET: still no results. Nada. Nil. Zilch. None. 

Later, 10:00 p.m. ET: at this time four years ago, 80% of votes had been reported. So far tonight, not one precinct has reported. Television news outlets are trying to figure out what to talk about. Again, by this time, they thought it would be pretty much over.
 

Original Post

Because I'm driving Olivia to soccer practice -- to and from -- I will miss some of the breaking news.

One of a gazillion sites is this New York Times site.

This was my prediction posted yesterday.

February 2, 2020, day 396: based on the most recent Iowa poll (the Emerson, 1/31 - 2/2) this is my prediction (remember, a viable candidate must receive a minimum of 15% of the votes). In the Emerson poll, the non-viable candidates polled a combined 22%. So, here's my predication:

• Sanders (28%) will get 2% from the non-viable camp: 30%
• Biden (21%) will get most of Klobuchar's voters (7%%): 28%
• Buttigieg (15%) will get some of Klobuchar's voters; all of Yang's (8%): 23%
• Pocahontas (14%) will get 5% from the non-viable candidates: 19%

From The New York Times:

• mostly likely only four "tickets" will come out of Iowa with delegates
• multiple candidates might declare victory: there will be four sets of results

The New Times has this as their prediction:

• Biden: 22%
• Sanders: 22%
• Buttigieg: 18%
• Pocahontas: 15%  

The New York Times projection only adds up to 77%; my projection adds up to 100%.

Wow, It Simply Never Quits -- UAE Natural Gas Discovery Could Be Largest Since 2005 -- Bloomberg -- February 3, 2020

Link here.

• new discovery: the Jebel Ali reservoir
• located between Dubai and Abu Dhabi (two biggest sheikhdoms in the United Arab Emirates)
• 80 trillion cubic feet of gas resources;
• the country is seeking to become self-sufficient in gas supply by 2030, a step that would allow it to break its reliance on imports from Qatar
• is that around 150 billion boe?
• could meet the country's gas demand for nearly three decades
• building nuclear, solar and coal-fired power plants, while Adnoc has invited international companies to help tap previously inaccessible gas deposits
• the Jebel Ali discovery is the biggest since the Galkynysh field was found in Turkmenistan 15 years ago, according to WoodMac’s Yates
• the announced resources would make it the fourth-biggest gas field in the Middle East behind Qatar’s North Field and Iran’s South Pars, which are part of the same Persian Gulf deposit that make up the world’s largest offshore gas field
• Abu Dhabi’s Bab field is the third-largest, according to WoodMac. 

See this post to put 80 trillion in perspective.

Enbridge Line 3 Update -- February 3, 2020

Link later.

From the [Calgary] Financial Post:

Enbridge Inc. has cleared the last remaining hurdle before it can begin construction on replacing its $9-billion Line 3 pipeline project running from Edmonton to Superior in Wisconsin.

The Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (PUC) voted 3-1 on Monday to both accept a revised environmental impact statement and to issue a ‘certificate of need’ for the Line 3 pipeline replacement project through the state, which resolves the last remaining regulatory hurdle before the 390,000-barrel-per-day pipeline project.

“There is no dispute that the current pipeline was built in the 1960s and is corroding and operating at about half its normal capacity,” said Commissioner Valerie Means as she prepared to vote in favour of the granting Enbridge a certificate of need for the pipeline.

I follow pipelines of interest here, although this page has not been updated in ages.

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Sophia Is Learning Coding

Sophia is 5.5 years old and is already learning coding.

Her older sisters learned coding at UT-Dallas a couple of summers ago.

I just happened to catch this commercial during the Super Bowl; one of the better one I happened to catch. 

Daily Activity Report Site Not Yet Posted For February; WTI Settles Below $50; OPEC Rattled; Another Day With No New Permits? -- February 3, 2020

Other oil:

• Brent: $54.09
• OPEC basket: $58.94

 *******************************

Back to the Bakken 

Active rigs:

$49.84	2/3/2020	02/03/2019	02/03/2018	02/03/2017	02/03/2016
Active Rigs	54	64	58	40	44

One new permit: #37359

• Operator: Whiting
• Field: Pronghorn (McKenzie)
• Comments: 
• Whiting has a single Helling permit in section 19-150-101, Pronghorn oil field;

Three permits renewed:
EOG (2): two Ross permits in Mountrail County
CLR: one Gordon Federal well in Dunn County

Two producing wells (DUCs) reported as completed:
35988, SI/NC, Slawson, Moray Federal 1 SLH, Big Bend, 16K over 13 days; see below:
32400, n/d, Slawson, Atlantis Federal 2-34-35H, Big Bend, 22K over 36 days; no recent documents at file report; see below;

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DUCs Reported As Completed

The well:

• 35988, SI/NC, Slawson, Moray Federal 1 SLH, Big Bend, 16K over 13 days; from the file report:

• API: 33-061-04402
• spud: April 18, 2019
• cease drilling: May 27, 2019
• middle Bakken;
• vertical drilled in 51.7 hours in three runs;
• vertical began on May 17, 2019
• reached KOP on May 19, 2019
• curve drilled in 18.9 hours; 
• curve landed 6' below the Shoal, at the target line, 1' high of the landing target
• lateral: started late at night, May 23, 2019
• target: 12 foot window just below the Shoal
• 100% drilled within zone; 15% drilled outside of the 12' target window
• TD: 20,700'; reached late in the evening, May 27, 2019
• gas: 206 - 3,676 units
• FracFocus: fracked 12/3/19 - 12/14/19; 13.25 million gallons water (a big frack); 91.1% water by mass;

Neighboring wells:

• 27887, 845, Slawson, Mustang 1 SLH, Big Bend, t9/14; cum 134K 11/19; unremarkable;
• 24873, 357, Slawson, Neptang 5-22-15TFH, Big Bend, t8/13; cum 312K 11/19; unremarkable; simply a great well;

**********************************

The well:

• 32400, n/d, Slawson, Atlantis Federal 2-34-35H, 33-061-03922; Big Bend, 22K over 36 days; from the file report:

• spacing: 2560-acre
• from FracFocus: fracked 10/30/19 - 11/14-19;  12.2 million gallons water (a big frack); 91.4% water by mass)

Neighboring wells:

• 32398, 535, Slawson, Atlantis Federal 5-34-35MLH, Big Bend, t7/19; cum 68K 11/19;

Pool	Date	Days	BBLS Oil	Runs	BBLS Water	MCF Prod	MCF Sold	Vent/Flare
BAKKEN	12-2019	17	9195	8815	38793	19123	9181	8875
BAKKEN	11-2019	9	3941	3874	28393	6668	950	5251
BAKKEN	10-2019	1	12	15	0	24	0	18
BAKKEN	9-2019	10	7873	7743	12503	12899	0	11995
BAKKEN	8-2019	31	45652	45781	82239	75833	0	70660
BAKKEN	7-2019	3	1283	718	11413	2073	0	1921

• 32399, 1,665, Slawson, Atlantis Federal 2 SLH, Big Bend, t8/19; cum 28K 11/19;

Pool	Date	Days	BBLS Oil	Runs	BBLS Water	MCF Prod	MCF Sold	Vent/Flare
BAKKEN	12-2019	1	183	1	1842	353	183	145
BAKKEN	11-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	10-2019	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
BAKKEN	9-2019	12	4124	4159	7881	4198	928	2766
BAKKEN	8-2019	29	23446	23010	850	22050	0	19342

MDU Grows -- February 3, 2020

MDU has acquired PerLectric, Inc. Press release here.

PerLectric, Inc., is a leading electrical construction company in Fairfax, Virginia. Founded in 1992, PerLectric provides electrical construction to government, mission critical, commercial and health care customers.

PerLectric will operate as a subsidiary of MDU Construction Services Group, Inc. Financial details of the acquisition were not disclosed.

"PerLectric expands the geographic footprint of our construction services to the Mid-Atlantic region," said David L. Goodin, president and CEO of MDU Resources. "We already work with many of PerLectric's customers in other areas of the U.S., and this acquisition provides us an opportunity to serve those customers in a new market."

Fairfax is part of the Washington, D.C., metro area, the sixth-largest metro area in the United States that also boasts the second-highest total commercial construction starts. Northern Virginia is one of the world's largest data center markets.

Rush Limbaugh: Advanced Lung Cancer -- Self-Reported -- February 3, 2020

Reported on his show, 1:50 p.m. CT, February 3, 2020.

1:58 p.m. CT: on Drudge, above the banner; not yet on Fox News.com.

2:15 p.m. CT: on Fox News.com.

Anyone Notice A Pattern Here? -- February 3, 2020

Updates

February 5, 2020: a reader shared this information about these wells -- see comments:

These wells are There Forks B1 and middle Bakken. Other fields are doing 2560s. These wells are keeping the 1280-acre spacing. They will use two pads, 5 going north and 7 going south, based on blue prints. I think they might change some field orders to include more wells, 6 wells was based on 2012 designs. They are maxed out on my space but left the field only half developed. A field near by increased from 6 wells to 14 wells. I assume that they will do this as well. I also noted that they used the term "Three Forks B1." They never used the "B1" before. If I'm reading it correctly the length of the lateral is "LINER – LAT #1: 11,037 feet."

Comments:

• I'm not sure what the reader means by two pads. Everything below suggests one pad in each of the three drilling units; one pad with four horizontal wells; two pads each with five horizontal wells. The wells are all running south to north based on the map below.  (Unless the reader means that these new wells are on a separate pad from the original parent well, and then that makes sense -- two pads in each drilling unit as shown below.)
• This may be the first time this operator has used "B1" (although I doubt it), but "B1" is a common acronym in the Williston Basin when talking about the Three Forks. Three Forks B1 is the first bench of the Three Forks.
• These wells are on "DRL" status and not on the confidential list; the information for these wells is available over at the NDIC site, basic subscription required.

Graphic:

Anyone note the pattern here?

Anyone want to guess where the next five-well pad will be drilled?

For newbies: this is "classic Bakken."

Observations:

• when the Bakken boom began, it would have been natural for drilling units/spacing units to be one section (640 acres -- one of those one-mile squares in the graphic above);
• but for some reason, the operators and the state regulators agreed that the "standard" Bakken drilling unit would be two sections (1280 acres; one mile by two miles) -- this turned out to be an incredibly prescient, perfect spacing unit (the Permian is still trying to sort our spacing units);
• in the early days of the boom, the setback rules were more restrictive than they are now;
• the first well/horizontal was drilled early in the boom -- "to hold the lease by production" -- once a company had a producing well -- no matter how little -- that protected the lease for the entire spacing unit for the operator;
• later the operator could come back and drill development/infill wells;
• the original wells in the graphics above were drilled inside the drilling unit (due to restrictive setback rules) and lots of oil was "orphaned" along the southern section line;
• since the early days, the setback rules have become less restrictive, and the operators are taking advantage of that by siting the wells outside of the spacing unit, and then perforating the horizontals as close to the section line as possible;
• although the new horizontals run in the same direction as the original horizontal, that is not always the case; there are any examples of new horizontals running in the opposite direction as the original well;
• in a "virgin" area like this, the new wells are generally all middle Bakken wells, but as the area becomes more saturated with wells, there will be more Three Forks wells, first targeting the first bench; later targeting deeper benches; because these four or five wells are so closely spaced, it is likely that about half are middle Bakken well, and about half are Three Forks, first bench wells;
• older wells are taken off line when the new wells are fracked; but the older wells are not necessarily taken off line when the new wells are "simply" being drilled;
• when the original wells (or the "parent" wells) are brought back on line, there is generally an increase in production; sometimes it is significant; often not; sometimes that jump in production lasts a long time; sometimes it lasts one month;
• note: these spacing units have five to six horizontals; look how much "space" is available for more wells; 

A reader seeing the graphic above made these comments:

That graphic was especially interesting. 

The wells on leftmost pad look like the 'curve' is  south of the section line, which might indicate that the perforations start immediately as the lateral crosses (northerly) into the new section.

More rock would be accessed  this way, and, perhaps, at the toe also? 

If the pooling/Unitization/Setback changes allow wells to closely approach the next section at the toe?

The numbers on the well files should show this as they always include the start/stop footage of the perforations. 

I would not be surprised if those wells on that left most pads had longer lengths of perforated wellbore than the other two pads. 

I no longer have the data accessible so I cannot check. 

If my speculation is correct, these longer perforated laterals - emanating from both the heel and toe portions - could significantly boost production numbers.

The reader is exactly correct about the"longer perforated laterals" -- all things being equal, this will result in increased production.

But all is not equal: the newer wells will be fracked with new frack strategies (including more proppant).

In addition, because of the original wells, the geologists and roughnecks will be much more familiar with the peculiarities of the spacing unit.

I assume there is much more that could be written but that's enough for now.

By the way, the drilling unit with the horizontal with a permit number #19500 is likely to be drilled next, but as of yet, not even any permits have been issued for the drilling unit.

Notes From All Over, Part 2 -- February 3, 2020

Got widgets? Highest level since July, 2019 -- US manufacturing: US ISM January manufacturing PMI at 50.9 vs December 47.8. Not a trivial jump. US manufacturing going forward, following China's coronavirus? Probably a wash, though I suspect US ISM February manufacturing PMI will rise slightly.

Solar minimum: catching the eyes of mainstream media readers. "Mini ice age" could be felt as early as this summer. "Solar minimum" could last well into the 2050s. Impeccable source.

Impeachment value:

Trump's campaign ended the year with nearly $103 million cash on hand, compared to the combined $64 million raised by Democratic hopefuls Bernie Sanders, Joe Biden, Elizabeth Warren, Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar and Andrew Yang, according to new Federal Election Committee filings.

Got cash?

Although Sanders, Warren and Buttigieg burned through more cash than Biden, the three candidates each had millions more than the former vice president did at the end of the year. Biden raised and spent about $23 million from October through December and ended the year with about $9 million in the bank. Though he initially pledged not to accept PAC money, Biden reversed course in late October amid low fundraising numbers.

***********************************

GDP

Guyana: world's fastest growing economy. My hunch: among western nations, the UK will have the fastest growing economy in 2020.  [Later: this was posted at 11:48 a.m. this morning. Now, this afternoon, just a couple of hours later -- Britain's productivity decline is the worst in 250 years. -- Bloomberg! Once the shackles of the EU removed; the uncertainty of Brexit resolved; and, new trade treaty with the US, the UK should have no trouble reversing this.]

**********************************

Guns

Gun ban? I thought guns were banned on college campuses.

 

Auto Sales -- January 2020

EVs, from a SeekingAlpha contributor:

Global electric car sales finished December 2019 with 279,000 (up from 177,000 sales in November 2019) for the month, representing the third best month ever, down 4% on the record December 2018, with market share not quoted for December 2019, and 2.5% for all of 2019 (YTD).

Total 2019 sales were ~2.2 million up ~10% of 2018. Tesla Model 3 was by far the most popular global selling electric car in 2019 with 300,075 sales almost 3x the nearest competitor BAIC EU-Series with 111,047 sales.

EVs are tracked here.

• total EVs sold in US in 2019:  329,528
• of those, Tesla, 192,250 (or 58% of the total EVs sold in the US)
• 158,925: Tesla Model 3
• 19,225: Tesla Model X
• 14,100: Tesla Model S
• non-Tesla
• 16,418: Chevy Bolt
• 7,524: Ford Fusion
• 4,910: Chevy Volt 

*********************************

From Homer

Paean. A paean is a hymn of praise or thanksgiving. You might sing a paean in church, where many hymns extol the greatness of God. Paean was originally a song of praise for Apollo, or Paian as he was sometimes called.

From Rediscovering Homer, Andrew Dalby, p. 10:

Paon in Sappho's dialect is a title of the god Apollo. In other Greek dialects the word was usually Paieon (but it has many spellings), and its meaning was understood differently. It was a variant of the name of the country god Pan -- an ancient God, though not a very respectable one, and not one of the twelve Olympians. 

Also it was a kind of song, and as such it is already mentioned in the Iliad, though not in the description of [Achille's] shield. [Iliad 22.391-393]

In general, then, a paieon was a hymn of praise.

The boasting son, the paieon reached its highest pitch of literary perfection 150 years after the making of the Iliad and the Odyssey, when the poet Pindar raised the genre to an entirely new level.

For me, I find it amazing how fast the Greeks took to writing. The written alphabet had barely come into place, and they were already writing down such epics as the Iliad and the Odyssey. 

After the Trojan king Hektor was killed, the women of Troy were said to wailing/mourning his death.

And white-armed Andromache led their wailing,
Holding the head of man-killing Hektor in her hands.

... the women mourned after,
And next Hekabe led their bitter wailing ...

And then after Hekabe, it was Helen's turn:

Helen, third of all, led the wailing.

Thus, the women lamenting Hektor's death:

• Andromache: Hektor, King of Troy's wife;
• Hekabe: sometimes called Hecuba, was the wife of King Priam making her queen of Troy. She was his second wife and mother to 19 of his children, including Hector and Paris

Helen: and everyone knows who Helen was.

December, 2019, Production Data For Bakken Wells Now Being Reported -- February 3, 2020

Scout tickets require a subscription.

I'll be spending most of the day going through the scout tickets.

Notes From All Over, Part 1 -- Nothing About The Bakken -- February 3, 2020

Books: well, that didn't last long. I mentioned that I was going to read (again), the The New Yorker anthology on articles from the decade of the 60s. I read half a dozen articles, got bored, put it down and moved on. Too many articles on the Vietnam War. If folks think Trump is divisive, they need to re-live the LBJ days. And it cost upwards of 250,000 South Vietnamese lives. There are 57,939 names on the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. I think the wrong guys have been impeached over the years.

McNamara: born and raised in San Francisco; US Berkeley; Harvard Business School; US Army Air Forces during WWII; a "whiz kid" at Ford Motor Company; close adviser to JFK; and US SecDefense remembered for counting body bags.

Market: I won't be looking at the market until later today at the earliest; I may not look at the market until the end of the week. We'll see. I will check on dividend announcements. For those who like dividends, it's been a great year so far. Nothing so far today. CenterPoint Energy announces no change in dividend going forward.

Bye-bye-JCP: may be booted from NYSE.

Back to books: from my top shelf, Rediscovering Homer: Inside the Origins of the Epic, Andrew Dalby, c. 2006. One has to be a real fan of Homer, et al, to enjoy this book. Way too much detail. Great to read one or two pages at a time in a peaceful setting.

Speaking of which: I have found that one of the most peaceful settings every school morning is watching the birds outside Sophia's house. We put out lots of bird seed on the patio -- three different locations -- and two bird feeders. I chase the big black crows away who always seem to arrive first. They leave (I assume they come back after we leave the house for the day). The first songbirds to arrive: the blue jays. And they are big (or they fluff out their feathers to stay warm which makes them look bigger than they really are). Then the cardinals: usually one male-female pair. And finally all the little junkos, finches, sparrows, and three mourning doves. Usually one squirrel shows up. I used to chase the squirrel away, but no more. I've learned that the songbirds are not particularly bothered by the squirrel.

Peaceful setting: Sophia's kitchen has a huge bay window from which to watch the birds. I wash the dishes by hand ("never" use the dishwasher); by hand, it's very relaxing and there's no bending up and down filling the dishwasher. While standing there washing the dishes (and I never dry them; I let them drip-dry) I can watch the birds. Sophia is eating her pancakes. Incredibly peaceful to watch the birds. My earliest memories, back to my toddler days, are of cedar waxwings in the evergreen shrubs even when it was 40° below zero (Fahrenheit). During the summer, walking in the fields outside of Williston: the western meadowlark. My maternal grandfather's hobby  in late retirement, before he moved to a nursing home, painting models of birds. He was incredibly crafty. Quite an artist in his own way.

Books: I have one full bookshelf devoted to birds. Those books will not be given away. I'm giving away most of my other books. Another box will be donated to the school today, including a  pristine 3-volume set of Ernest Hemingway's letters and a pristine 3-volume set of Mark Twain's autobiography. At one time those books were worth "everything" to me, but I find that I don't read from them much. I've moved on. Or perhaps I should say I've moved back -- back to Homer.

Politics: Sanders will easily top Pocahontas. The trial her hurt big time -- but -- by the way, do you know the first place Pocahontas visited after the US Senate adjourned after voting "no witnesses"? To a brewery in Iowa. I kid you not. Why did an image of Kavanaugh just flash across my beady little eyes?

Fracking: being reported everywhere it's important -- and that's not very many places -- Pocahontas, who plans to ban fracking and shut down oil and gas production in the US, receives a very small amount of royalties from oil minerals in her home state of Oklahoma; sounds like about a thousand dollars a month was the best she ever did. 

Red Queen Fell Off Her Treadmill in 2018

The "Red Queen" fell off her treadmill in 2018.

From the EIA over the weekend, increased production, fewer wells:

*************************************

Grilled Lamb For Super Bowl Sunday

The "recipes" all say 2-inch lamb chops will be medium-rare at 3 - 4 minutes on each side on a medium hot grill.

I've never found that to be true.

Yesterday:

• Two lamb chops: cave-man style -- directly on the wood charcoal; four minutes, turn, and then two more minutes; six minutes total;
• Five lamb chops: on the grill, four minutes on each side; 8 minutes total;
• Four lamb chops: on the grill, four minutes on each side; turn, an additional 2 minutes; 10 minutes total;

Results:

• Cave-man style: perfect
• 8 minutes: too rare, and both my wife and I life rare fish (sushi); barely seared tuna; and, rare to medium-rare lamb chops;
• 10 minutes: perfect

I had planned to do the lamb chops for four minutes on each side cave-man style but it was obvious they were going to be done much more quickly than that. After take the lamb chops off the charcoal, they were placed in heavy-duty aluminum to finish cooking for another 15 minutes (in the car on the ride home).

Directly on "organic" wood charcoal.

Eight Wells Coming Off The Confidential List -- February 3, 2020

LNG: regional innovations growing demand off the pipeline grid. Makes me think of the Belarus discussion over the weekend. 

Electric fracking: Range Resources -- contracts with US Well Services for electric hydraulic fracturing on a dedicated basis into 2021. Link here. USWS’

“Clean Fleet” technology that runs on electric power powered by natural gas turbine generators on the wellsite. The firm pointed out the system replaces all conventional diesel engines with gas-powered electric motors, adding that it lowers fuel costs by up to 90 percent.

Saudi: considering cuts of 500,000 bopd; perhaps even as much as a temporary cut of 1 million bopd. WSJ. Comments at the linked article: embarrassingly immature considering the readers are WSJ readers. I expect more from WSJ readers.

******************************************

Back to the Bakken 

From a reader this morning:

EIA shows ND reserves in 18 were still slightly below 14. Some recovery from the abyss of 16. But still less than during the boom. 

https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=RCRR01SND_1&f=A.

Active rigs:

$51.43	2/3/2020	02/03/2019	02/03/2018	02/03/2017	02/03/2016
Active Rigs	54	64	58	40	44

Eight wells coming off the confidential list -- 
Monday, February 3, 2020: 8 for the month; 115 for the quarter, 115 for the year:
35856, conf, XTO, FBIR Bird 21X-19A, 
35098, conf, Oasis, Kellogg Federal 5297 12-30 6T, 
35047, conf, XTO, Johnson Trust Federal 21X-6EXH-N,

Sunday, February 2, 2020: 5 for the month; 112 for the quarter, 112 for the year:
35885, conf, Liberty Resources, Paige 158-93-19-18-3MBH, 
35855, conf, XTO, FBIR Bird 21X-19E, 
35665, conf, Lime Rock Resources, Neal 5-33-28H-144-95L, 
35116, conf, Oasis, Kellogg Federal 5297 11-30 5T, 
30189, conf, Oasis, Lewis Federal 5300 11-31 2B,

Saturday, February 1, 2020: 0 for the month; 107 for the quarter, 107 for the year:
None.

RBN Energy: flurry of changes continue in Texas Gulf Coast gas markets. One word: Belarus. Archived.

When it comes to Texas natural gas markets, the Permian tends to steal the show. With its roughly 2 Bcf/d of annual production growth, constrained pipelines and absurdly cheap — sometimes even negative — pricing, it’s hard for the other gas hubs in the Lone Star State to garner much attention.

However, the myopic focus on West Texas overlooks a noteworthy gas market shake-up taking place on the Texas Gulf Coast, where most of the Permian’s incremental gas production is headed and where multiple new liquefied natural gas facilities are coming online to move the new supplies into world markets. Also, new export pipelines are moving increasing volumes south of the border to Mexico. Today, we provide an update on the latest in Texas Gulf Coast gas infrastructure changes and their potential impacts on the region’s supply and demand balance.