PA Anti Strategy: Weaponize Recent Court Ruling Against Shale Dev

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It’s clear that radical environmentalists who (irrationally) oppose the use of fossil fuels believe the recent decision by Pennsylvania Supreme Court is a gift from Gaia (Mother Earth goddess). As MDN previously reported, last week the Pennsylvania Supreme Court of Appeals, in a sharply divided 3-2 decision, sided with a virulent anti-drilling group, the Pennsylvania Environmental Defense Foundation, against the state in saying that any revenue generated from leasing and drilling on state-owned land MUST be used solely for conservation and the environment (see PA Supreme Court Hands Antis Partial Victory re State Land Drilling). However, denying the state Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DCNR) from funding itself with lease/royalty revenue was inconsequential, a distraction from the real aim. The decision, according to the radicals, further strengthens the state’s so-called Environmental Rights Amendment to the state constitution. What it means, in very practical terms, is that the antis now plan to use a decision ostensibly about how a single state agency gets its funding, to apply the philosophical underpinnings (the right to a clean environment) as a weapon against judges and the Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP), to force them to consider whether or not issuing a given permit for a project “harms” the “rights” of PA citizens to a “clean environment.” In other words, the radicals are weaponizing a court decision to use against the shale industry–and they’re signaling, via their sycophantic mouthpieces at StateImpact Pennsylvania, that’s exactly what they intend to do…

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