Midstream Business Magazine - November/December 2013
Cover Story
LNG Heats Up
A long-awaited breakthrough in North America’s natural gas business—major liquefied
natural gas exports—is about to happen. The impact here and abroad could be huge.
Editor's Note
Editor's Note: How Far We Have Come
Our readers in northern climes may have snow outside their windows by now, a first taste of the 2013-14 winter. Whoknows what the weather has in store for us in a few more weeks?
Construction Update
Arkansas To Gain Product Line
e biggest may be getting bigger. Magellan Midstream Partners LP already owns the longest refined petroleum products pipeline system in the country and continues to expand.
Feature
Diversity In Action
Crosstex Energy’s growth strategy paid dividends before its combination with Devon Energy.
Gaining Investor Interest
Master limited partnerships will continue to grow due to long-term advantages, including steady distributions
with reliable growth to investors.
Houston: It Solved The Problem
MarkWest Energy Partners LP’s assortment of Marcellus processing and fractionation facilities—including its Houston, Pennsylvania, complex—are playing a critical role in ensuring natural gas and natural gas liquids make it to end markets.
Looking Up
Consistent strategies can make master limited partnerships a success upstream as well as midstream.
On A Roll
The expansion and restructuring of North America’s midstream sector provides the line-pipe manufacturing
industry with plenty of growth opportunity.
Pipeline Protection
Foam used in fill applications acts as a seismic buffer for buried structures and retaining walls.
The Longest Wait
Half a decade after submitting its application to build the Keystone XL, TransCanada is still
playing the waiting game.
The Most Elusive Hunt
These aren’t your grandfather’s recruiting strategies. Indeed, everything about the job—and employee—hunt has changed in recent years, creating a new world of recruiting challenges for the energy sector.
The Right Mix
Michael Mears serves as chairman, president and chief executive of Magellan Midstream Partners LP.
Three Unconventional Truths
Here’s an unconventional truth to consider: The U.S. doesn’t need a national energy policy. The nation has a perfectly good “policy” embedded in the Founding Fathers’ dual concepts of a free market and private ownership of property.
What Lies Beneath
Low gas prices have hurt production in the Piceance, but though the basin is struggling, its story is a good one for the midstream. After all, beneath it is the Mancos shale, a regional savior, which is metaphorically rising as producers look to unlock its potential.
Alerian Index
Utilities Carve Out Midstream Assets
Historically, exploration and production and refining companies formed master limited partnerships (MLPs) from their associated midstream assets.
Finance Matters
Maintenance Capex Under Scrutiny
In recent weeks, investor attention has increasingly focused on how master limited partnerships (MLPs) calculate their maintenance capital expenditures (capex).
Master Limited Partnership
A Washington Perspective
Just recently, The Wall Street Journal reported that, according to its analysis, the U.S. will become the world’s largest producer of crude oil and natural gas in 2013.
News Flow
A&D limps along in second half
Even with an estimated pickup in acquisition and divestiture (A&D) activity to the tune of $10 billion in transactions in the fourth quarter, a languid A&D market in 2013 is likely to see transactions totaling only a little more than $30 billion, or roughly half the level in 2012, attendees heard at Hart Energy’s A&D Strategies and Opportunities conference in Dallas.
Challenges ahead in switch from coal to gas
The coal era is coming to a close, say many energy observers. This has been known for years as utilities have had a number of coal-fired power plants set to be retired in the second decade of this century.
Cheniere’s Souki: Good Time To Be In Energy
No one predicted five years ago the situation the country is in today. There was a point that the U.S. was worried they would run out of energy and would have to import everything and they were wrong, he said.
Concho sees 'amazing' growth in Permian
What’s happening now in the Permian basin is no less than “amazing,” and a new, alltime peak for liquids production still isn’t in sight, according to an executive with one of the basin’s biggest players.
DCP executive sees adequate gas capacity
A key executive for one of the Eagle Ford’s biggest midstream players, DCP Midstream, told the DUG Eagle Ford conference in San Antonio the unconventional play will have the infrastructure it needs to move production during the foreseeable future.
Simmons & Co.:reasons for gas-market optimism
Even as producers have pulled back on rigs the past few years, shale plays continue to perform so strongly that gas production continues to climb. Looking ahead, this production is expected to continue to grow more as the rig count increases.
Structured deals speeding along
With a strong incentive to capitalize on low natural gas prices, as well as low interest rates, energy investors have been racing to close structured deals this year according to panelists at the recent Cadwalader Energy & Commodities conference in Houston.
Texas Railraod commissioner: agency's rules must grow with industry
The surge in production in the Eagle Ford during the past few years has brought with it increased state tax revenues, new businesses and a wealth of job opportunities.
U.K. to offer tax breaks for shale-gas development
U.K. Chancellor George Osborne has outlined a series of tax breaks aimed at encouraging investment in the country’s burgeoning shale gas industry.
Why the Marcellus matters
Amid a backdrop of falling gas rig counts and flat gas production in North America, a Bernstein Research report concludes that the Marcellus shale will continue to be the brightest star.
NGL Frac Spread
Better Daya Ahead
Natural gas liquids (NGL) prices were a mixed bag by the end of summer, as demand drivers for multiple products had yet to kick in.
Transaction Update
IPO Fever
Twitter’s going-public plans might be dominating the mainstream media landscape, but initial public offering (IPO) fever is striking the world of midstream too. Devon Midstream Partners LP had initially mulled hopping on the IPO bandwagon, but jumped off soon after.