David Callahan stopped by, and we covered some easy steps that can be taken to ease the negative impact on consumers that energy policies have had. It’s not about fossil or renewable; it’s about doing what is right for humanity and the environment while being fiscally responsible.
The Marcellus Shale Coalition is tackling one of the most challenging changes in the energy space. And that is opening meaningful dialogue between all sides to move humanity forward.
Thank you, David, I had an absolute blast, and it is great to hear what the Coalition is up to.
Please connect with David on his LinkedIn account HERE.
We would also like to thank our ENB Podcast sponsor. Enverus. You can find out more at their website: Enverus.com
Enverus-
A shout-out to our fellow travelers with Enverus.
Fellow Podcast Travlers:
Mark LaCour, Editor in Chief, OGGN
Paige Wilson, Host of Oil and Gas Industry Leaders and Co-Host of Oil and Gas This Week Podcast.
David Blackmon, Author, Industry leader, Podcast Host,
ENB Podcast with David Callahan. Episode 93
Automatic Transcription Edited for Grammar. We disavow any mistakes unless it makes us better-looking or appear smarter.
Michael Tanner [00:00:00] Today’s episode of the Energy Newsbeat podcast is brought to you by in various.
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Stuart Turley [00:00:43] Hello, everybody. Today is not only a great day. It’s Friday.
Stuart Turley [00:00:47] But more importantly, I have a fantastic guest stopping by the Energy Newsbeat podcast. My name is Stu Turley, president and CEO of the Sandstone Group. And I’ve got not only the David Callahan, I’ve got the Dave Callahan from the Marcellus Coal Shale Coalition and you’re the president over there, aren’t you, Dave?
Dave Callahan [00:01:10] That’s correct, Stu. But first of all, thank you very, very much for having me here today. I love your podcast, love your coordination with other podcasters and looking forward to a great conversation.
Stuart Turley [00:01:21] Well, I’ll tell you thank you again. And and I haven’t really enjoyed I feel like I know you because I’ve followed every I almost feel like I’m one of the groupies, you know, hanging around and, you know, the old 60s, you know, throwing the hats and everything to you on the stage as you’re out,.
Stuart Turley [00:01:38] You are traveling around spreading the goodness of the inner energy, U.S. energy, and you’re sitting right on top of the Marcellus Shale.
Stuart Turley [00:01:51] Tell us a little bit about the [00:01:52]Marcellus Shale, [0.5s] just as a formation.
Dave Callahan [00:01:54] Sure. Well, it’s not just the Marcellus, it’s the [00:01:57]Marcellus and Utica. [0.8s] We’re blessed in this region to have Marcellus and Utica not just in pay, but in a bit of Ohio and West Virginia.
Dave Callahan [00:02:08] I concentrate primarily on PA, but we do a lot of work with our colleagues in Ohio and West Virginia.
Dave Callahan [00:02:14] But the formation itself is among the largest, if not [00:02:20]the largest, producing the largest basin in the world terms of production, the base and again extending beyond P.A. and Ohio and West Virginia. [8.8s]
Dave Callahan [00:02:29] We rank number one in America and number three in the world. And we’re just, you know, to use a tired term where we’re scratching the surface, we could be doing so much more. We have some needs out there to really, really fully tap the potential of this tremendous resource. And, you know, for your listeners,.
Dave Callahan [00:02:52] We’re getting not just dry gas, the methane that that we all need for it, for heating and manufacturing, power production and more, getting natural gas liquids, very valuable natural gas liquids,.
Dave Callahan [00:03:03] Pethane Propane, Butane, ISO Butane, Pethanes and more. And we’ve developed significant infrastructure and processing and fractionation plants in the region, specialized NGL pipelines to get the product where it’s needed.
Stuart Turley [00:03:19] While, you know, with the energy crisis that we have going on, what a blessing to have all of that right there.
Stuart Turley [00:03:28] I was kind of nosing around on the Marcellus and there’s trillions, trillions of BTU under there. I mean, I don’t know. I mean, I don’t think we even know how big the actual field is, do we?
Dave Callahan [00:03:42] We don’t. And obviously that changes due to technology, due to investment but, you know, the safest way to summarize it is to say that, [00:03:49]We have generations of supply available to us we just need the right policies in place to tap it, the right infrastructure to get it to market. [8.7s]
Stuart Turley [00:03:59] You know, natural gas is making such a talking point, such a big one, because the energy crisis is horrible right now.
Stuart Turley [00:04:11] The EU is just shot itself in the foot. And I think the blast is getting us, you know, the side blast because the East Coast has to buy LNG from outside of the U.S. market.
Stuart Turley [00:04:28] Can you tell us what I’m kind of teeing up a little bit because the market you are so involved with all these things, working with politicians and trying to really solve the problem.
Stuart Turley [00:04:42] We’re only 8 hours away by 300 miles, I guess, from Pennsylvania to the east, I mean, to the East Coast, we can save power. We can save the environment up there. Tell us what you got going on to do that.
Dave Callahan [00:04:58] Or we could certainly talk about the global situation. But concentrating on New England domestically does make a lot of sense.
Dave Callahan [00:05:07] They’re hungry. They’re they’re natural gas hungry. They they don’t have adequate supplies when, as you suggest, where you’re just several hours away.
Dave Callahan [00:05:16] You know, it’s rather remarkable that we’re talking about one of the most advanced economies, if not the most advanced economies in the world. And yet we have FERC and other and jurisdictional utilities up in New England talking about [00:05:31]barely making it through the winter or not making it through the winter with inadequate supplies. [4.4s]
Stuart Turley [00:05:36] Right.
Dave Callahan [00:05:37] What we need is something that’s been rejected several times. Times over, and that’s going to increase supplies up to New England.
[00:05:45] [00:05:45]They’re paying sky high prices for power. They’re paying sky high prices for natural gas [4.8s] because they’re competing with global customers for natural gas, not just on the product, but on the tankers that are very busy and all wrapped up trying to keep Europe warm, keep the lights on in Europe, keep the factories going in Europe, keep the chemical facilities going in Europe as well.
Dave Callahan [00:06:09] So New England, rather than looking toward looking southward and tapping the great supplies that we’ve talked about here in Pennsylvania, they’re left importing natural gas from other nations and as we saw during a couple of the cold snaps from Russia, in a couple of instances, it makes no sense.
Dave Callahan [00:06:31] And they do have some accomplices in the state of New York has been a willing accomplice in this in denying a few of the the federal Clean Water Act certifications that are necessary for pipelines to traverse certain waters.
Stuart Turley [00:06:46] This just boggles my mind. I mean, okay, when you take a look at those the LNG transports,.
Stuart Turley [00:06:54] You know, we have great gasification facilities here on the U.S. We are selling LNG. It’s turning natural gas from what used to be a seasonal market to it’s going to we’re going to sell everything we possibly can and the only limitation is how fast we can gas it. I mean, liquify it.
Dave Callahan [00:07:18] Yeah, Yeah. And we’ve seen in Europe they’re taking great steps, making great leaps technologically policy wise, you name it, to put the necessary infrastructure in place.
Dave Callahan [00:07:33] Just this week, I saw a news report from Europe indicating that there was a massive pipeline being constructed in Germany that would have taken eight years to permit they’re permitting it literally in the blink of an eye to get that pipeline to the shoreline so that then they could start accepting even more natural gas.
Dave Callahan [00:07:53] And, you know, to a point that you made about New England, not just natural gas, meaning the commodity, green natural gas, very clean natural gas cleaner, much cleaner than what they were getting from Russia before.
Stuart Turley [00:08:07] You know, And by the time we think about if you want to talk about saving the planet, by the time you put it on an LNG tanker take coming all the way across the pond or in Russia’s case, you know, they’ve now got the o the I can’t remember what it’s called, but they’ve now got the northern parts with nuclear tankers and nuclear reactors running a crossover and selling the natural gas and oil over to China.
Stuart Turley [00:08:37] And when you when you take a look at why don’t we ship it in a sealed pipeline, less emissions and I’m over here preaching to you, I’m like, where do we go? How do we decide.
Dave Callahan [00:08:50] What we need? We need we need common sense in policy at the state level where this industry has traditionally been regulated and and at the federal level,.
Dave Callahan [00:09:03] Seeing as how the federal government is taking more and more of an active role in regulating, if not hindering the industry when we need common sense.
Dave Callahan [00:09:13] Something that you might have heard me say before. Maybe I’ve said it too often, but, you know, when you when we think about our energy needs and when we think about our energy policy needs, we have to think about price reliability,.
Stuart Turley [00:09:25] Right
Dave Callahan [00:09:26] We have to look at the sustainability factor, the environmental impacts and much more. And you can’t just look at any one of those factors. You have to look at all of them. And natural gas checks, all those boxes.
Dave Callahan [00:09:39] Natural gas is is a logical, commonsense solution to many of the problems that we’re facing in terms of the energy crunch.
Stuart Turley [00:09:50] And I apologize, David, I don’t know this, but when you take a look at the pipelines coming for it, the LNG Regasification is in Boston, if I remember correctly. And so we have decent pipelines going from Boston all outward.
Stuart Turley [00:10:09] Would the pipelines only have to come from the Marcellus to Boston?
Dave Callahan [00:10:13] I believe that that’s certainly one of the places, you know, there are city gates located throughout New England and throughout the northeastern United States where, you know, I’m not an interstate pipeline executive I can’t tell you exactly where it needs to go. But ah..
Dave Callahan [00:10:27] Certainly you would think the infrastructure’s there. However, they also do have a lot of heating oil up in New England as well, where natural gas hasn’t reached.
Dave Callahan [00:10:36] Just as we’re not reaching every home and business here in Pennsylvania, in the heart of the Marcellus, too. There’s still work to be done to extend the distribution as well.
Stuart Turley [00:10:47] You know, just the flat. Common sense. I love your common sense. We’re in a world where we get common sense. You know, I always sit back and my granddad was a farmer, and common sense on the farm was either, you know.
Dave Callahan [00:11:04] That was Horse sense, I believe is what they call that.
Stuart Turley [00:11:07] Yeah. Horse sense. And I learned a lot from him. Yeah. I also learned how to work, which is missing in a lot of folks these days. But we’ll leave that for another story with for.
Dave Callahan [00:11:18] The other podcast.
Stuart Turley [00:11:20] Yeah it’s yeah, the other fun podcast.
Stuart Turley [00:11:23] But besides going out, what can people do? Contact their representatives, contact you? How do we support the Marcellus Shale Coalition?
Dave Callahan [00:11:36] Well, first of all, thank you for for offering that up.
Dave Callahan [00:11:38] They could certainly look at any of our social media channels. We’re on LinkedIn. I’m personally on LinkedIn. Our organization is we’re on Facebook. Look at our website. You can join an advocacy group called United Shale Advocates to talk with legislators. But more than anything else, more than anything else.
Stuart Turley [00:11:58] Right.
Dave Callahan [00:11:59] They can look beyond the headlines. And we we offer good, solid, fact based information so that people can look beyond the headlines.
Dave Callahan [00:12:08] And understand those common sense solutions, understand what’s behind the current energy crisis, understand to the degree, which is a large degree, that government policies are exacerbating the current energy crisis.
Dave Callahan [00:12:24] And once they’re armed with a bit of commonsense, a bit of information to help their friends tell their colleagues.
Stuart Turley [00:12:31] Right.
Dave Callahan [00:12:31] Simple as that.
Stuart Turley [00:12:34] Yeah. It’s not like the old saying. Tell your friends. Tell your friends again and then tell them again. Instead of vote early, vote often. You know, I don’t know how that one goes,.
Stuart Turley [00:12:45] But, you know, when you sit back and you take a look at education in standing up for common sense. Do you know Chris Wright over at Liberty? He is he is the CEO over there. I love his passion for elevating humanity out of poverty.
Stuart Turley [00:13:05] And natural gas is low cost, sustainable energy is critical and it is the lowest cost.
Stuart Turley [00:13:16] The world is now using more coal than it was is because of the high price of putting in grids with renewables and not properly done. Let’s use all forms of energy.
Dave Callahan [00:13:32] Let’s use everything. Anywhere from 2 to 3 billion people in the world who suffer from energy poverty, that that could be they can’t afford the energy or they have inadequate access to energy or the energy they’re using is harmful to their health.
Dave Callahan [00:13:50] Be amazed at what some people in some countries are cooking with and how detrimental it is to their health.
Dave Callahan [00:13:56] [00:13:56]Natural gas because it is portable, because it is clean, reliable, can help meet their energy needs and help bring them out of energy poverty. [8.9s]
Dave Callahan [00:14:05] There’s a there’s a great not just opportunity, but obligation to help economies grow, to help better the lives of billions, billions of people worldwide.
Stuart Turley [00:14:16] You know and I love the idea of your your discussion points. I’ve heard you talk with other folks being a stopper than I am of you.
Stuart Turley [00:14:25] And it is fun to hear your conversations with folks talking about being able to bridge that technology into the future and that is one of the things that I truly appreciate your messaging.
Stuart Turley [00:14:40] Now on the the wet gas with the propane I mean, with all of the other goodness that comes out of there, that is incredible. All the rural think about how much propane is out there for the rural homes and and everything else that usually gets trucked around.
Stuart Turley [00:15:01] It seems to me that it would be better to also pipeline that up. But boy, I it’s kind of funny. I just had all three of my tanks filled up a few minutes ago, just before we started. I love propane.
Dave Callahan [00:15:15] Well, the natural gas liquids, primary ethylene, propane, butane, ISO, butane contains they can be shipped by various means. And in some instances, it’s more advantageous to use a truck to use rail, to use pipeline. But here’s the thing.
Dave Callahan [00:15:30] Those products are desperately needed in this country for the world in which we live in it, the computer, all the equipment you have in front of you, all made of plastic, the car that you drive, you know, many, many, many plastic components that allow it to achieve a reasonable mileage standard, as well as for electric vehicles themselves.
Dave Callahan [00:15:51] Electric vehicles have to be as light as possible, and plastic helps make that happen. And let’s not forget about medical care.
Dave Callahan [00:15:58] Modern medicine would not be possible without the products that that we can make from natural gas liquids.
Stuart Turley [00:16:05] Yeah. Just remember that next time you go in and have a surgery or have a lung removed, you know, it’s like John Wayne. I can’t believe that old John Wayne had a lung removed and he still made movies. Now, that is one tough cookie.
Dave Callahan [00:16:21] I certainly was.
Stuart Turley [00:16:23] And we could use more John Wayne’s right now.
Stuart Turley [00:16:26] Now, what’s next coming around for the coalition? What is the next thing coming around? What are you focused on in Q4?
Dave Callahan [00:16:34] Well, we’re focused on a lot of things right now. Obviously, the elections have just taken place as we record this. The Friday after the election here in Pennsylvania will be dealing with a divided General Assembly.
Dave Callahan [00:16:48] The Senate is is looking to be Republican. The House is up in the air. It could go either way. We have a newly elected governor.
Dave Callahan [00:16:58] And so what’s different? What’s the same? Here’s the thing. Regardless of who is in control,.
Stuart Turley [00:17:04] Right.
Dave Callahan [00:17:05] What we need, again, going back to that common sense approach, what we need is for Democrats and Republicans to work together to represent their constituents because their constituents want low cost, reliable, sustainable energy.
Stuart Turley [00:17:20] Exactly.
Dave Callahan [00:17:21] So let’s all get to work on that for us. You know, looking at whether it’s you know, fully are fully d half hour hefty.
Stuart Turley [00:17:30] Yeah.
Dave Callahan [00:17:31] Our message remains the same. Our tactics remain the same, supplying good, solid, fact based information that people can use. People can understand that people can stand up for and stand behind.
Stuart Turley [00:17:45] That’s nice. Are you going to adapt to the new dress code in the Senate?
Dave Callahan [00:17:52] Well, I didn’t wear a tie today and didn’t wear code. I see you have a coat, so.
Stuart Turley [00:17:56] No, I was talking about the fact.
Dave Callahan [00:17:57] I certainly. I saw your coat. That was called a pivot, my friend.
Stuart Turley [00:18:04] I would. I’m sorry. I’m too stupid. I want to go and just drag it out of you there.
Stuart Turley [00:18:07] But I wonder if that is going to take hold in the Senate, because that’s that’s a real tough one. I’m I can’t wait to see if he shows up there.
Dave Callahan [00:18:17] So regardless of how he’s attired, I, I certainly you know, I’ve liked his statement that he said when asked about if he supports fracking. Now, we all know fracking is just one part of the process of developing.
Dave Callahan [00:18:32] But in my words, I interpreted him as saying I support the natural gas industry and.
Stuart Turley [00:18:39] I’d like to hold them up to that. And I don’t. It’s just like you said, I don’t care about wind, solar. I don’t care what we use. Let’s get the low cost out there. I don’t care if you Republican or Democrat, I don’t care what political affiliation.
Stuart Turley [00:18:52] We have, the disproportionately impacted communities. We have all of the citizens of the U.S. We got to get out of this energy crisis.
Dave Callahan [00:19:01] You know, and we have to allow technology to continue to develop. And we can’t allow the government to stifle technological advances in any of those industries.
Stuart Turley [00:19:11] Now,.
Dave Callahan [00:19:12] It’s what’s gotten us to the point where we are today, you know, to think that, you know, 40 years ago, knowing perhaps some people had a dream of of tapping reserves of natural gas by drilling down vertically and then extending out horizontally. But I don’t know if they were thinking of going out two and three miles. You know, that’s just unheard of.
Stuart Turley [00:19:32] Unbelievable. And this kind of brought me up to a separate little point is I just saw that they are bringing in about the EPA is releasing a whole new set of legislation,.
Stuart Turley [00:19:47] But legislation through regulation is happening.
Stuart Turley [00:19:52] How can you help talk to the EPA or any of these other folks? Because legislation is is where it’s at. But how can you stop it? Because if we’re in a dead duck, is it a lame duck, not dead duck?
Stuart Turley [00:20:07] If we’re in a lame duck environment, how do you work with the agencies in order to stop or help change the legislation?
Dave Callahan [00:20:18] Well, maybe you’re talking about the methane regs that were just released. You know, methane regs DOT two that were just released this morning.
Dave Callahan [00:20:25] We’re we’re still going through them. You know, it’s rather difficult to comment on on multi, multi, multi-page proposal. You know, 5 minutes after they come out, we’re going to go through them with a fine tooth comb.
Dave Callahan [00:20:38] But we’re also going to be proud about sharing that We’ve done a great job in this industry with methane emissions and in this particular region when we have this region up in Appalachia has the lowest methane intensity in the United States and among, if not the lowest in the world as well.
Dave Callahan [00:20:57] So we want to make sure that those regulations are workable, very efficient, and that they allow the technology to continue to develop at its own pace to allow that methane intensity to go even lower.
Stuart Turley [00:21:10] You know, since you tried to use Dave, some Teflon on me, when I was asking you about the new dress code, I threw that out there knowing that you already had that look because I know that when something like that drops, you’re already on it. So I kind of tested it a little bit there.
Dave Callahan [00:21:27] Thank You,.
Stuart Turley [00:21:28] And that was a great, great thing because I just looked at it and threw up because there’s so much there that I was afraid I was going to have to, like, spend the whole weekend reading it. I’ll just wait and steal your material.
Dave Callahan [00:21:44] Well, whatever we come out with in comments, you know, you asked about what people can do. Our comments will be posted on our Web site. Whenever we issue comments, we put them out there.
Dave Callahan [00:21:55] We hold ourselves to a very high standard. We know that our industry is held a very high standard. We back up everything that we say.
Stuart Turley [00:22:03] Fantastic. Well, Dave, thank you so much for doing this. And I just I had a lot of fun and I am I can’t wait to have you back because I know the regulatory process, legislation through regulations, everything else.
Stuart Turley [00:22:18] I want to hear what happens that you’ve got going on in Q1 and Q2 after things are all kind of settled back down because we’ll need an update.
Stuart Turley [00:22:28] Not always available to do it went by way too quickly and looking for. Forward to doing it again.
Stuart Turley [00:22:34] Sounds great. Thanks. Thank you.
Stuart Turley [00:22:36] Thank you. Bye bye.
