Arkansas Energy Report: Low commodity prices challenge the energy sector

Editor’s note: The Arkansas Energy Report is produced monthly and is sponsored by the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce/Associated Industries of Arkansas, and MISO (Midcontinent Independent System Operator). Talk Business & Politics makes every effort to use information current at time of posting.
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Arkansas’ energy picture in recent months is one of low pump prices, a significant and unfortunate decline in natural gas production in the Fayetteville Shale Play, and a decline in nuclear electric production.

Following are data on various energy sectors. (Talk Business & Politics makes every effort to use information that is current at time of posting the Arkansas Energy Report.)

Arkansas’ Energy Profile (“Arkansas Quick Facts” from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.)
• Marketed natural gas production in Arkansas experienced a nearly six-fold increase between 2005 and 2014. In 2014 it accounted for 4.1% of U.S. marketed production.

• Arkansas, the top rice-producing state as of 2014, typically experiences an increase in natural gas consumption in the industrial sector (which includes agriculture) in the fall when natural gas is used to dry rice after harvest.

• Coal-fired electric power plants in Arkansas supplied over half (54%) of the state’s electricity in 2014 and relied on coal deliveries via railcar from Wyoming.

• Independent power producers provided over 18% of net electricity generation in Arkansas in 2014.

• Biomass supplied all of Arkansas’ non-hydroelectric renewable energy resources for utility-scale electricity generation in 2014.

• Electricity in Arkansas produced by nuclear power totaled 12.53 million megawatt hours year-to-date through November 2015, down 4.5% compared to the same period in 2014.

• The number of rotary rigs drilling for oil or natural gas in Arkansas remained at zero through January and February. The Arkansas rig count dwindled to one in the last week of December after Fayetteville Shale leader Southwestern Energy announced it was taking its final two rigs offline until natural gas prices turned around.

• The number of drilling rigs in Arkansas peak at 60 on July 11, 2008, when Fayetteville Shale development was in full swing, Baker Hughes statistics show.

Link here for more information in the 7-page Arkansas Energy Report.