TOP DOG METHANEX IS spending up to $1.4 billion to construct a third methanol facility in Geismar—an investment that will create one of the largest methanol complexes in the world right here in Louisiana. The project will create 62 new direct jobs with average salaries of $80,000 plus benefits, according to a news release from Louisiana Economic Development. LED estimates another 301 indirect jobs. The three Methanex plants in Geismar bring 230 total direct jobs and another 1,500 indirect jobs to the region. The new plant is expected to generate over 1,000 construction jobs. “Louisiana is a very attractive location for methanol production and the state’s investment attraction programs provide an excellent backdrop for this additional investment,” Mark Allard, Methanex vice president for North America, says. The third plant will generate up to 1.8 million metric tons of methanol per year, LED says. It will be built on a 156-acre site.
IN SO MANY WORDS “Over the next decade, the United States will be one of the three most significant exporters of LNG in the world, and thanks to our vast pipeline infrastructure, much of that LNG will flow through the Pelican State.” GIFFORD BRIGGS, president, Louisiana Oil & Gas Association
Gone BANKRUPT
SIBLING RIVALRY
THE COLLAPSE OF what was once the largest privately owned oil equipment rental company in the world may have its roots in a younger brother protecting his older brother from bullies in the schoolyard. In a story entitled “Cain and Abel and Oil,” New York magazine in July detailed the battle between Bryan Knight and Mark Knight for control of the $800 million Knight Oil Tools. The story details the elaborate conspiracy in Lafayette by Mark Knight to frame his brother using cocaine, painkillers, a henchman and two corrupt cops. The magazine touts the tale as a “brotherly parable” about “how ruthless that rivalry can become among the second-generation inheritors of great wealth, no longer striving to build an empire but only to hold onto the one they were born into.” Knight Oil Tools has since merged with IronGate Energy Services to form Knight Energy Services, based in Houston, and SLEMCO has purchased the company’s former headquarters near the Lafayette Airport, noting on Facebook the acquisition was made for “just pennies on the dollar.”
A HOLDING COMPANY owned in part by Lafayette oilman Michel Moreno and seven of its affiliates have filed for bankruptcy. Louisiana-based Shale Support Global Holdings LLC, a fracking industry supplier, has filed for Chapter 11 in the Southern District of Texas, saying heavy competition and unpredictable energy prices have left it unable to sustain its nearly $128 million in debt. According to documents filed in the petition signed by Moreno, MOR Bison LLC of Lafayette holds a 70% equity security stake in the company and BBR Holdings of Baton Rouge holds a 30% equity stake. BBR Holdings’ managers are Jeffery Bartlam and Stephen Kevin Bowen of Baton Rouge, according to documents on file with the Louisiana Secretary of State. 1012industryreport.com
A handful of Louisiana companies hold the top 40 unsecured claims on file, including Retif Oil & Fuel of Harvey, $596,876; Conveying & Screening Machinery of Pine Grove, $99,937; the New Orleans Public Railroad Corp., $72,724; Pearce Pump Supply of Prairieville, $63,083; Patriot Construction & Industrial of Duson, $60,000; and Hydra Works of Slidell, $38,113. Shale Support Global Holdings estimates the value of its assets between $1 million and $10 million. The company was founded in 2014 and mines monocrystalline sand—or frac sand—in and around Picayune, Mississippi. The quartz sand is then transported to a drying facility south of San Antonio, and ultimately transported to fracking operations in the Eagle Ford basin, Austin Chalk, Haynesville, Tuscaloosa and other shale plays. 10/12 INDUSTRY REPORT • THIRD QUARTER 2019 9