Draft Day Experience Set for April 28 in Canton

Here's an update on the Draft Night event in Canton next month.

The 2016 Draft Day Experience is set for 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, April 28, at the McKinley Grand Hotel in Canton. Food, beverages, trivia contests, memorabilia auctions and more will be featured, as guests view the first round of the NFL Draft on large video screens. An ongoing Roundtable Discussion with former NFL players will feature comments and analysis between draft picks in a format moderated by Kenny Roda of WHBC-AM in Canton.

Former NFL stars scheduled to appear include Cleveland Browns alumni Don Cockroft, Hanford Dixon, Felix Wright and Anthony Griggs. Other NFL alumni scheduled to attend include Jeff Hastings (Detroit/Pittsburgh), Marv Kellum (Pittsburgh/St. Louis) and Pro Football Hall of Famer Dave Robinson (Green Bay). 

Cost is $125 per ticket and includes the Draft Day Experience, hors d’oeuvres, beverages, a round table discussion with former NFL players, and a silent auction. Proceeds from the event will benefit the Legends Landing, a planned independent and assisted living senior care facility residence for retired Pro Football Hall of Famers and others from the NFL’s Legends Community that will be part of the Hall of Fame Village in Canton.

The Draft Day Experience is being presented by the East Central Ohio Building and ConstructionTrades Council, in conjunction with the Stark Carroll Oil and Gas Partnership and the Pro Football Hall of Fame.

Event sponsorships are available. Main sponsorships include admission to a pre-event VIP Reception at 6 p.m. with NFL alumni and other special guests.

For tickets or sponsorship information, call (330) 451-6207 or visit www.ChooseStark.com.

Exciting Year of Activities Scheduled for the Stark Carroll Oil & Gas Partnership

Now that 2016 is here, it promises to be an exciting year for the Stark Carroll Oil & Gas Partnership.

It will all kick off at 7 p.m. on Thursday, April 28, when we host our 2016 Draft Day Experience at the McKinley Grand Hotel in Canton. We expect a big crowd to come out and watch the excitement and drama of the NFL Draft unfold, plus enjoy great refreshments, trivia contests, football-themed memorabilia up for bids—and the company of several retired NFL players (including former Browns Don Cockroft, Hanford Dixon, and Felix Wright) who will be in attendance! Even better, the proceeds from the event will go toward the planned Legends Landing, a planned residence for retired Gold Jackets, NFL alumni and fans at the Pro Football Hall of Fame Village in Canton.

More information will be announced on our website, www.choosestark.com, on our Facebook page, and in our e-newsletter, “Drill Bits.” We want to express our appreciation to the Pro Football Hall of Fame for their participation in this event, and to Ullico for their early sponsorship commitment. If you’d like to participate as a sponsor of the Draft Day Experience, call (330) 451-6207 or visit our website for details.

Speaking of Facebook, if you haven’t liked our Partnership page, please be sure to do so. We share regular updates about the oil and gas industry, along with information about our events. Go to www.facebook.com/scogp and like our page to stay up-to-date.

The same is true for our “Drill Bits” e-newsletter. Back issues are available under the “News” link on our website, www.choosestark.com. Or you can be added to our email list by calling (330) 451-6207.

Our Pro Football Hall of Fame Enshrinees Roundtable Reception was a big hit last August, and plans are underway for a repeat of this popular event this summer. We’ll also be back with our Shale Shoot and Utica Conference in the fall, plus more events and activities to help promote the oil and gas industry in Stark and Carroll counties. Keep up with all of our news and events on our website, Facebook page and in our “Drill Bits” e-newsletter.

The Oil and Gas Industry’s Silver Lining

With all the gloom and doom in the news about the oil and gas industry, why would anyone remain optimistic about the future of drilling and exploration in the Utica Shale?

Because the oil and gas industry remains important to the State of Ohio and it citizens, for one. Rhonda Reda, executive director of the Ohio Oil and Gas Energy Program, said this an article in Ohio Gas & Oil magazine: “Ohio’s oil and gas industry has been producing crude oil and natural gas from various geological formations beneath our feet for more than 150 years. The past several years have also brought many new companies, jobs and innovations to Ohio’s industry, leading to unprecedented and record energy production levels. As a result, Ohioans are intertwined with the state’s oil and gas industry more than ever before.”

Beyond driving down gas prices at the pump—a fact that Americans are noticing across the country—shale gas development in recent years is poised to produce a boom in petrochemical and plastics manufacturing, according to an article by John Funk that appeared in the Nov. 21, 2015 edition of the Cleveland Plain Dealer.

Funk writing about a Cleveland State University study, reported that it examined “the extraordinary productivity of the wells developed so far, the capacity of the processing plants and pipelines, both those in service and those on the drawing boards, and the most likely rate of additional wells being drilled and gas production over the next five years.”

Much of the shale play under Ohio and West Virginia “produces not just methane but propane, butane and ethane, a trio of hydrocarbons called ‘natural gas liquids’ or NGLs,” he wrote.

Continuing, Funk reported that the study “projects that by 2020, the region—Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia—will have such a surplus of ethane, which must be separated from methane before natural gas can be used as a fuel, that it will only make economic sense to build ethane refineries here rather than try to ship the volatile ethane to crackers on the Gulf Coast.”

As pointed out in the article, economist Iryna Lendel said that while most people tend to focus only on production, “they forget that we should be focusing on downstream development—on manufacturing, because manufacturing creates permanent jobs that require skills and pay well.”

As we shared in an article last November, those jobs are coming to Northeast Ohio—more than 2,000 during the construction of three natural gas-fired power plants in Carrollton, Lordstown and Yellow Creek Township, which is located in Columbiana County.

Tough times come along in any industry from time to time, but the ability to weather those storms and look for the silver lining in an otherwise cloudy forecast provides a vision for what the future truly has in store. And the future for Ohio, and the role the oil and gas industry will play in its economic resurgence, remains strong.

This article appeared in the February issue of ShaleMart magazine

Pipeline Construction Holds Promise for Oil and Gas in Ohio

In November 2014 the Stark Carroll Oil & Gas Partnership sponsored "Pipeline 101," a conference that showcased how the oil and gas industry, and the pipelines that serve it, represent the backbone for economic growth in Ohio, Michigan and the surrounding region.

The topic remains timely, as evidenced by the announcement earlier this month that Kinder Morgan was moving forward with plans to build a 240-mile pipeline across Ohio. If approved, the pipeline will create as many as 1,000 jobs and, when complete, will be used to transport propane and ethane to Canada. 

According to an article in the Canton Repository, "The $500 million pipeline will have an initial capacity of 50,000 barrels per day of ethane or an ethane-propane mix. The two byproducts of natural gas production are valued in plastics production."

The company must first apply for permits from state and federal regulators before beginning work on the pipeline, which will start in Cadiz and stretch through parts of Carroll, Tuscarawas and Stark counties before crossing the state line into Michigan just west of Toledo.

Kinder Morgan didn't stop there. Before the month was over, the company had bypassed the uncertain credit markets by going directly to banks to refinance—to the tune of $1 billion—its maturing debt. The financing will enable the company to move forward with its various growth projects, including the Utopia East pipeline here in Ohio.

Meanwhile, the Akron Beacon Journal reported that the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency will sponsor a public hearing in February on a proposed air permit for a Medina County compressor station for the $2 billion Nexus natural gas pipeline. The pipeline, with a proposed construction timeline beginning in 2017, would stretch for 255 miles and pass through Stark, Summit, Wayne and Medina Counties in Northeast Ohio.

The ongoing construction of pipelines here and in other parts of the country are projects to watch. They will serve to create jobs and bolster local economies as the oil and gas industry continues to weather to downturn that hit especially hard in 2015. 

The Stark Carroll Oil & Gas Partnership promotes the growth and economic impact of the oil and gas industry in Stark County and Carroll County, Ohio.

Reviewing 2015: An Advocate for Oil & Gas in Stark and Carroll Counties

It was another "eventful" year!

The Stark Carroll Oil & Gas Partnership hosted four more great events in 2015. We continue to advocate for responsible oil and gas exploration and for the use of local labor. 

Our conferences have been headlined by industry experts, providing important oil and gas updates to business and civic leaders, while our golf outing and sporting clays championships helped raise revenue in an atmosphere of camaraderie and friendly competition. 

Watch for another great schedule of events in 2016. We look forward to having you join us as we support the oil and gas industry in Stark and Carroll counties! 

Text appeared in the January edition of ShaleMart magazine (right).

A Summary of Issues and Trends Looking to 2016

Despite the recent slowdown in the oil and gas industry, particularly in Ohio, there are still reasons to be excited about the future. As 2016 dawns, let's take a look at what's trending.

Jack Gerard, president and CEO of the American Petroleum Institute, joined the chorus of voices supporting Congress and President Obama in lifting the '70s-era crude export ban.

"This is the start of a new era for U.S. energy," he said. "Ending the decades-old ban on crude exports is a huge win for consumers, jobs, the economy and our energy security."

Gerard said the move would make the U.S. more competitive and would benefit consumers, citing studies indicating that lifting the ban would lower gas prices by up to 12 cents per gallon.

The complete statement from API on the ending of the export ban can be found here.

Production in Ohio's Utica Shale reached record highs in the third quarter of 2015. As Jackie Stewart of Energy In Depth reported earlier this month, production more than doubled over the same quarter in 2014.

"In the third quarter of 2015, the Utica shale produced 5,696,780 barrels of oil and 245,747,686 Bcf (245 billion cubic feet) of natural gas," Stewart wrote. "This sets new records as unconventional shale production totals have increased by more than 100 percent since the same quarter last year."

The article also points out that Carroll County remains one of the state's top oil producers. You can read the entire report here.

Lindsey Klevin of the Ohio Oil and Gas Association discussed the ramifications of lower oil and gas prices in a recent article on OOGA's Oil & Gas Matters blog.

"Robust natural gas production has helped inventories soar to record highs we haven't seen before," Kleven wrote, before also pointing out that new production has slowed "as producers are responding to the current market conditions."

And, while it's a challenging time for producers, consumers are certainly reaping the benefits from higher supplies and resulting lower energy costs, as evidenced by six-year lows on gasoline prices in Ohio: "Consumers are expected to save a reported $7 billion at the pump during this holiday season, which translates out to about $40 per driver."

You can read the entire article here.

In conclusion, we like the sound of Jackie Stewart's summary in her report on Q3 Utica Shale production: "This is all certainly wonderful news for Ohio's growing economy, which--recent reports indicate--will continue to benefit from shale production and the construction of associated infrastructure for years to come."

Here's to 2016!

A Look Back at Our Shale Shoot & Utica Conference

Our spread as it appeared in ShaleMart magazine.

The inaugural Shale Shoot Sporting Clays Championship & Utica Conference took place in Carroll County on Thursday, Nov. 5. About 50 shooters enjoyed a cookout before participating in the Shale Shoot at Upland Valley Sporting Clays in Carrollton. 

The Top Shooter prize, a Colt XSE Combat Elite .45 valued at almost $1,400, went to Bill Mayer II, while the Gun Raffle prize, a $1,400 Henry Big Boy Engraved American Oilman .44 mag., went to Matthew Napski. 

Afterward the scene shifted to Atwood Lake Resort in Sherrodsville for the Utica Conference featuring updates on oil & gas developments from four industry executives. A full buffet meal followed, with additional presentations from State Sen. Lou Gentile and Dave Motts of the Pro Football Hall of Fame. We’re looking forward to the return of this great event in the fall of 2016.

Click on this link for a gallery of photos: Shale Shoot & Utica Conference.