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Linde featured in Northeast Pensylvania Business Journal
Growth Industries:
Linde Corp.
BY DAVE GARDNER / PUBLISHED: MARCH 8, 2017
The Tesmec 1475 trencher weighs about 200,000 pounds, or 100 tons and has trenching capacity of 8 to 16 feet at a walking speed.
Linde Corp., with a decades-long history in utility and infrastructure construction, is cashing in on the riches within the Marcellus Shale without forgetting its commercial roots.
Scott Linde, president, described how his grandfather began an excavation business in Honesdale during 1964. The recovery operations after Hurricane Agnes in 1972 created opportunities for the company to work within the valley for sewer reconstructions, and subsequent legislation such as the Clean Water Act opened doors for Linde to expand and flex its infrastructure-based muscles.
In somewhat of a surprise, Linde’s phone rang more than a decade ago as Cabot Oil & Gas reached out for assistance in the relatively new arena of natural gas recovery.
Linde was asked to assist with construction of a midstream pipeline into New York, and the company eventually developed 10 master service agreements within the Marcellus Shale region for gas midstream projects.
“We specialize in pipelines with diameters of 24 inches or less,” Linde said. “In effect, this means we follow the circus and leave the bigger stuff to the national contractors.”
Linde still marvels at how quickly the gas business exploded in Pennsylvania. His first exposure to the promise of gas recovery seemed to be yet another NEPA pipe dream that would offer promise and quickly fold, but the view changed with an eventual understanding of the technology used to drill horizontally and target shale gas deposits.
With an eye on comprehensive development of his business, Linde has also not abandoned his organization’s traditional bread and butter work of utility infrastructure development. As an example, the company is upgrading municipal cast iron gas lines, which can be a century old, to plastic, plus combined sewer overflow projects.
“We sincerely attempt to deliver every segment of pipeline process, and even buy the hay to resod the landscape,” said Linde. “DEP must certify every step and will confirm even that the grass is growing again after pipeline completion.”