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University of Texas Goes Amish, Shuns its Own Fracking Study

Breaking AmishThe University of Texas (UT) is the latest institution of “higher learning” to succumb to political correctness—they have withdrawn (censored) a previously published study that concludes hydraulic fracturing does not pollute groundwater. Science has gone out the door at UT like it did at the University at Buffalo, over the same issue. Professors and researchers issue a report, based on scientific evidence, that anti-drillers perceive as favorable to fracking—and the rabid anti-drillers form up like a pack of wolves and hunt down and academically kill anyone connected to the research and resulting report. “You say fracking doesn’t contaminate water, that there’s no scientific proof that it does (going against our orthodoxy)? You’re dead meat—we’re coming for you.”

Thing is, the chief accuser, the alpha wolf who’s doing the hunting, is the Public Accountability Initiative (PAI). Who are they? An anti-fossil fuel organization funded in the background by ultra-leftist and financial markets manipulator George Soros (see this MDN story for background). Bloomberg and other mainstream media won’t touch that part of the story—the part that those doing the accusing are full of conflicts of interest themselves. That doesn’t fit the template narrative of their reporting.

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DOE Study: LNG Exports Under All Scenarios are a Good Thing

The Dept. of Energy – Office of Fossil Fuels commissioned a research report earlier this year by the venerable NERA Economic Consulting. The study, released to the public yesterday and titled, “Macroeconomic Impacts of LNG Exports from the United States” (full copy embedded below), takes a look at liquefied natural gas (LNG) exports from the U.S. NERA considers multiple scenarios of low price/high price, low volumes/high volumes, etc., and concludes that there is no downside to exporting natural gas, and in fact, the more we export, the better.

Why is this NERA report important? Because the DOE will  use it as part of their decision-making process about whether or not to approve requests to build LNG export facilities. There are currently 15 such requests before the DOE. If all 15 facilities were approved, it would provide for 8 trillion cubic feet of natural gas to be exported per year.

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Philly Profs Discriminate Against $15K MSC Shale Scholarship

Two professors at the Community College of Philadelphia (CCP) continue to stir the pot of discontent at the school and have now involved their teacher’s union in an attempt to deny a few lucky students $15,000 in financial scholarships. Say what? Precisely correct. A professor that got his feelings hurt because he wasn’t in the announcement loop, and another professor who’s anti-fossil fuels, joined forces at CCP to oppose a new Energy Training Center at the college because the Marcellus Shale Coalition pledged $15,000 to help with scholarships (see this MDN story for background).

Now the two malcontent profs have enlisted their fellow profs to sign on against it:

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Samples Provide First Clue to Utica Underneath Athens, OH

Although we don’t have a great deal of information about the Utica Shale in Athens County, Ohio, a recently drilled vertical well targeting the Medina sandstone formation reached all the way down to the Utica.

Samples from that well give us some inkling of what may lie below Athens in the Utica layer, and whether or not the Utica would be productive in that area (hint: it’s good news):

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Lupardo to Martens: What Happened to the NY Fracking Panel?

Binghamton, NY-area Assemblywoman Donna Lupardo, a Democrat who so far has been somewhat non-committal on the fracking debate, but who seems to now tilt firmly in the anti-drilling camp, sent a letter to Dept. of Environmental Conservation Commissioner Joe Martens two days ago. Her letter essentially asks, “What happened to the fracking panel you appointed?” Lupardo is one of the members of the High-Volume Hydraulic Fracturing Advisory Panel, a group appointed by Martens in July 2011. The panel has not held any meetings since December of last year (see this MDN story).

Lupardo wants the panel to meet again so she can go on the record with her “concerns” about fracking and the health review under way now (see her letter to Martens below).

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OH Gov. Kasich Continues Trash Talk Out-of-State Workers

Ohio Gov. John Kasich, a Republican and most of the time a good conservative, inexplicably continues his jingoistic talk about out-of-state oil and gas workers as “foreigners”—even though the companies who hire in his state have pumped more than $3 billion into his state so far.

Kasich started that kind of trash talk earlier this year, in February, but he obviously still feels that way and reiterated it again this week:

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Chesapeake Hires Tervita Corp to Build OH Wasterwater Plant

Calgary-based Tervita Corporation, an environmental and energy services company, has been selected by Chesapeake Energy to build a wastewater treatment facility in Carroll County, OH. Carroll is the epicenter of Chesapeake’s drilling in the Ohio Utica Shale. The facility will be used to recycle drilling wastewater from Chesapeake’s Utica drilling, as well as other water-related services.

From the Tervita press announcement:

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