Consol Energy Scales Back Its Drilling Plans

Scott Detrow

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Scott Detrow is a congressional correspondent for NPR. He also co-hosts the NPR Politics Podcast.

Detrow joined NPR in 2015 to cover the presidential election. He focused on the Republican side of the 2016 race, spending time on the campaign trail with Donald Trump, and also reported on the election's technology and data angles.

Detrow worked as a statehouse reporter for member stations WITF in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and KQED in San Francisco, California. He has also covered energy policy for NPR's StateImpact project, where his reports on Pennsylvania's hydraulic fracturing boom won a DuPont-Columbia and national Edward R. Murrow Award in 2013.

January 26, 2012 | 11:00 AM

Yet another drilling company is scaling back its drilling output, due to low natural gas prices.
Earlier this week, Chesapeake trimmed its dry gas operations by a third. This time, it’s Consol.
More from the Post-Gazette:

Lucrative joint ventures in its gas division and strong overseas sales in its coal division helped Consol Energy post record fourth-quarter profits, but low natural gas prices have forced the Cecil-based energy firm to scale back 2012 drilling plans, the company announced today.
Consol Energy announced a profit of $196 million, or 85 cents per diluted share, for the quarter ended December 31, up from the $104 million and 46 cents seen this time one year ago. Revenue for the quarter was nearly $1.4 billion.

The Pittsburgh Business Times reports the company will cut its Pennsylvania operations by $130 million, which will mean 23 fewer Marcellus Shale wells.