GPB Capital Adds to Waste Management Portfolio with Latest Acquisition

GPB Capital, a New York-based alternative asset management firm, announced that its GPB Waste Management platform has purchased a majority interest in Mud Masters LLC, a wastewater processing company based in Cambridge, Ohio.

GPB Capital, a New York-based alternative asset management firm, announced that its GPB Waste Management platform has purchased a majority interest in Mud Masters LLC, a wastewater processing company based in Cambridge, Ohio. Transaction terms were not disclosed.

Mud Masters will be fully integrated with another GPB Waste Management portfolio company, Buckeye Water Service LLC in order to offer a package of transportation, testing, and disposal services to customers in the oil and gas industry in eastern Ohio and western Pennsylvania.

Mud Masters, located midway between Columbus, Ohio and Pittsburgh, primarily serves clients with operations at oil and gas fields in the Utica and Marcellus shales in eastern Ohio, western Pennsylvania, and West Virginia.

The company provides testing and disposal options for the liquid and solid wastes that result from drilling and extraction at oil and gas fields, as well as lab analytics of the byproducts. Mud Masters also sells brine and sawdust to oil and gas companies.

“Oil and gas discoveries in the Utica and Marcellus shales have led to the permitting and drilling of more than 2,500 shale wells in those areas since 2010, and this presents Mud Masters and Buckeye Water Service with a very promising growth opportunity,” said Rod Proto, senior advisor with GPB Capital responsible for the firm’s waste management strategy.

GPB Waste Management will integrate Mud Masters as a tuck-in acquisition into Buckeye Water Service, which was acquired in August 2017. New Concord, Ohio-based Buckeye Water Service provides fluid hauling and storage, oilfield trucking and equipment, roll-off container, and solid waste removal services to customers engaged in drilling and development in the Utica and Marcellus shales.

Mud Masters offers Buckeye Water an exclusive agreement with a disposal well, Clearwater Five, located near Cambridge, Ohio, which the company says will help Buckeye cut down on transportation time and costs. In addition, Mud Masters will be able to access Buckeye’s larger fleet of liquid transportation trucks.

GPB Capital focuses on acquiring or investing in income-producing companies and assets and has raised more than $1.5 billion in capital.

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