Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel

Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Dauphin County | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA

Radical Democrats Invoke God + Sham Science to Bash PA NatGas
March 22, 2016March 22, 2016

Just about nothing makes us more angry than when self-righteous “religious” leaders prance in front of cameras to denounce extracting and burning fossil fuels, like natural gas, as immoral or unethical. They are the height of hypocrisy–because they left them homes and churches heated with natural gas, wearing clothes made from fibers that come from petrochemicals (oil and natural gas), driving vehicles powered by fossil fuels, speaking into microphones with plastics in them and standing at a podium made from a material derived from petrochemicals–to denounce it all. Yet they use it every single day themselves. They claim to have God on their side. Repugnant. The Rev. Dr. Leah Schade (United in Christ Lutheran Church in Lewisburg, PA) and a group of 50 or so other hypocrites recently held an interfaith rally in Harrisburg to call on Gov. Tom Wolf to stop all drilling for gas and oil in the state–because it’s “immoral.” Too bad Rev. Shade lost her way and quit worshiping God and instead now worships nature. Her twisted philosophy is what happens when you quit worshiping the Creator and instead worship the creation…
Read More “Radical Democrats Invoke God + Sham Science to Bash PA NatGas”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Medina County | Ohio | Portage County | Regulation | Statewide OH

OH Antis Circulate Petitions for Bans Already Tossed by Courts
March 22, 2016March 22, 2016

The Pennsylvania-based Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund (CELDF) is a radical environmental group backed with Big Green money that exists to fleece local towns into adopting bans on fracking and pipelines. Last year we carried an expose of the group (see PA’s CELDF Unmasked as Troublemakers in Ohio Utica Shale). Much of their community agitating work is done in Ohio. Time after time their so-called “community bill of rights” initiatives are shot down by Ohio courts. The latest instance (and there have been many) was earlier this month when the U.S. 8th District Court of Appeals overturned the CELDF-created bill of rights law passed in the Cleveland suburb of Broadview Heights (see Mad Moms Hopping Mad Over Court Decision re Broadview Heights, OH). You would think towns would learn that a) these initiatives invariably are challenged and thrown out by the courts, and b) if the initiatives interfere with a local business that sues the town, the CELDF is nowhere to be found (see Anti Group CELDF Won’t Help Grant Twp Pay $1M Judgement). But there’s plenty of insane people–like those circulating petitions in Medina and Portage counties to get a CELDF-backed bill of rights initiative on the local ballot. The very same initiative already shot down by Ohio courts in other locations…
Read More “OH Antis Circulate Petitions for Bans Already Tossed by Courts”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Fayette County | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Regulation | Wastewater | West Virginia

Fayette WV Commissioners Change Ban to Focus on Injection Wells
March 21, 2016March 21, 2016

The Democrat commissioners of Fayette County, WV are scrambling to try and keep their jobs after enacting what is turning out to be a disastrous ordinance to ban all fracking, injection wells, drilling, etc. In January, three liberal Democrat county commissioners from Fayette County, WV, with the backing and help of the radical WV Mountain Party, voted to ban injection wells in the county (see WV County Officially Bans Injection Wells; Children Brainwashed). In fact, the ban is intentionally written so broadly it will also ban the operation of more than 500 vertical oil and gas wells in the county. The next day EQT sued to overturn the ban (see EQT Sues WV County that Banned Injection Wells, Seeks Injunction). Not long after, a U.S. District Court judge slapped an injunction on the county preventing them from enforcing the ban at least until a hearing scheduled for later this month (see Judge Stops WV County from Enforcing Injection Well Ban, For Now). One of the chief architects of the ban, from the Mountain Party, admits the ban is intended to stop all oil and gas activity in the county (see Anti Admits Fayette County, WV Ban Aims to Shut Down All O&G Wells). Facing a lawsuit they will lose, the commissioners have backed away from the position of banning everything to do with drilling in the county. They’ve revised the proposed ban regulation as a tactic to avoid losing their court case–but everyone sees through this latest pathetic attempt. Sensing they won’t win their court case to ban drilling as well as injection wells, they’ve opted to toss the drilling part and go for just banning injection wells. We hope the voters and taxpayers in Fayette County vote the three commissioners out at the next election for their anti-drilling malfeasance…
Read More “Fayette WV Commissioners Change Ban to Focus on Injection Wells”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Litigation

Canadian Company Fights Back Against Green Bully Greenpeace
March 21, 2016March 21, 2016

One of the favorite ways Big Green groups bully companies and municipalities is by using lawsuits against them. We see it all the time in the oil and gas industry. Example: THE Delaware Riverkeeper and Clean Air Council–both based in the Philadelphia area–filed a lawsuit against the Town of Middlesex in Butler County, PA (see ACLU Bullies Threaten Butler County Landowners over Martian Lawsuit). Butler County is on the opposite side of the state from where Riverkeeper and the Clean Air Council are supposed to be operating. Such is how they work. Another favorite tactic is to launch smear campaigns against the industry. One of the most radical Big Green groups is Greenpeace. They’re famous for smear campaigns–full of lies. They tried to run such a campaign against a Canadian forestry company–and the company fought back, in court. And now the court will make Greenpeace open up their records for close scrutiny. Cockroaches like Greenpeace can’t stand the light of day shining into their activities. They’re worried. And that got us to thinking. Why northeast drillers and midstream companies use the example of this forestry company as their model to fire back at THE Delaware Riverkeeper, Catskill Mountainkeeper, Food & Water Watch, and a plethora of other odious groups? Let’s force them to open up their books and expose them for the colluding frauds they are…
Read More “Canadian Company Fights Back Against Green Bully Greenpeace”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues

Carbon Crazies Try to Scare Investors Away from O&G Companies
March 18, 2016March 18, 2016

Ever hear of the concept called “the carbon bubble?” No, we hadn’t either. It is a concept floated in 2011 by the radical Carbon Tracker Institute and made popular a year later by global warming climate kook Bill McKibben. In essence, McKibben and others are trying to scare investors away from investing in fossil fuel companies because, they claim, renewable sources of energy are coming on strong and will make fossil fuel companies worthless. We’re pretty cynical. We don’t think McKibben and others actually believe in man-made global warming from fossil fuels any more than they believe in the tooth fairy. We think it’s an elaborate sham to eliminate personal liberty and choice–forcing people to behave in ways McKibben and those of his ilk want them to behave. They pretend to be the smart ones that know better than we which energy sources we should be using. A recent Forbes magazine article does a good job explaining, and debunking, the false “carbon bubble” theory…
Read More “Carbon Crazies Try to Scare Investors Away from O&G Companies”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Pipelines

30 Big Green Groups Ask FERC to Pay Them to Oppose Pipelines!
March 17, 2016March 17, 2016

In a day and age when we see our country slipping away from us at an alarming rate, and we witness outrage after outrage, when yet a new outage appears, it’s hard to focus attention on it and get worked up about it. We’ve told you the about the latest angle of attack against the fossil fuel industry by fossil haters like THE Delaware Riverkeeper. That angle is to attack the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) with multiple lawsuits, hoping to tie it up in knots and make it dysfunctional (see THE Delaware Riverkeeper Sues FERC, Tries to Close it Down and Dela. Riverkeeper Sues FERC Again – Over Leidy Pipeline Expansion). Here’s the latest outrage that has us hopping mad. Some 30 Big Green groups have filed a petition with FERC asking the agency to set up an Office of Public Participation. The groups, including such luminaries as the Sierra Clubbers, National Resources Defense Council and the Environmental Defense Fund, want to be able to aggressively challenge pipeline (and other) projects that come before FERC–and get this, they want to be compensated for the work they do to challenge those projects! Can you believe it!! They want TAXPAYERS to pay their staffers and lawyers to try and stop the very projects that benefit those same taxpayers! Simply amazing. We’ve truly fallen Through the Looking Glass, Alice…
Read More “30 Big Green Groups Ask FERC to Pay Them to Oppose Pipelines!”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Regulation

How Rich White Billionaires Control the EPA – Connecting the Dots
March 17, 2016March 17, 2016

Ever wonder how in the world fossil fuel haters have such success in places like liberal New York? There’s a pretty simple explanation: follow the money. Anti-drilling shills forever bleat about Big Oil and powerful corporations with deep pockets having undue influence. It’s actually the reverse. Rich, white, liberal billionaires are using their money to buy influence over environmental policy adopted by states and the federal government. How do we know? In 2014 the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment & Public Works published the results of an investigation into how the EPA and other agencies are being influenced by big money in the Big Green movement. The report is titled “The Chain of Environmental Command: How a Club of Billionaires and Their Foundations Control the Environmental Movement and Obama’s EPA” (full copy below). The report name names and fingers foundations like the odious Park Foundation as being behind many of the anti-drilling efforts in the Marcellus/Utica region. The report connects the dots between billionaires, the tax exempt foundations they fund, and how money gets laundered through those foundations and put into the hands of anti-drilling activist groups. Although the report is from 2014, we only recently became aware of it when an MDN reader pointed it out to us (thanks Frank!). The report exposes the irrefutable corruption that exists in the environmental movement…
Read More “How Rich White Billionaires Control the EPA – Connecting the Dots”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Athens County | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Ohio | Regulation | Statewide OH

Mad Moms Hopping Mad Over Court Decision re Broadview Heights, OH
March 15, 2016March 15, 2016

In 2012 Broadview Heights, OH, a Cleveland suburb, passed an illegal “Community Bill of Rights” law that bans oil and gas drilling in their township. Ohio law specifically and plainly states that only the state–not local municipalities–have the sole right to regulate the oil and gas industry. The law was promptly thrown out by a lower court, which resulted in anti-drilling groups including the Ohio Community Rights Network (OHCRN) and Mothers Against Drilling in Our Neighborhoods (MADION), with Big Green money backing from the odious PA-based Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund (CELDF), appealing the decision. It eventually made its way up the chain to the 8th District Court of Appeals. The nutters were so ecstatic when the 8th District agreed to hear the case, they celebrated with “street dramatizations” (see Antis Celebrate OH Appeals Court Hearing with Street Dramatization). They’re not celebrating anymore. The 8th District has ruled against the Broadview Heights law. Not only that, the 8th District is the first court to directly address the so-called “bill of rights” argument. In a crushing blow to the nutters, the 8th District Court said, in essence, “No. Towns don’t have inalienable rights to create laws that supersede the state’s laws.” However, nutters never go away–they blat and bleat and carry on, as they are doing now with this decision. At least we have some resolution in Ohio. This decision is a resounding refutation of the CELDF and their predatory behavior of pressuring towns into passing “bill of rights” laws that ban drilling and fracking…
Read More “Mad Moms Hopping Mad Over Court Decision re Broadview Heights, OH”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | Kinder Morgan | Lebanon County | Pennsylvania | Pipelines | Sunoco Logistics

Pipeline Opposition in Lebanon, PA Fading Away to Nothing
March 15, 2016March 15, 2016

Here’s what MDN notices about pipeline supporters and detractors. Not that long ago MDN editor Jim Willis attended a meeting in Afton, NY supporting the delayed Constitution Pipeline (see Cuomo Needs to “Snap on a Pair” and Approve the Constitution Pipe). Reports say there were over 300 people jammed into that meeting. Then we read about two anti-pipeline groups in Lebanon County, PA holding a meeting to oppose two different pipelines coming through their area–and they can barely scrape together 50 people. What does that tell you about opposition to pipelines? It’s nearly non-existent, except for a few loud mouths that are endlessly interviewed by mainstream media…
Read More “Pipeline Opposition in Lebanon, PA Fading Away to Nothing”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Coterra Energy (Cabot O&G) | Energy Companies | Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | New York | Pennsylvania | Pipelines | Regulation | Statewide NY | Susquehanna County | Williams

Cabot Says Constitution Pipeline Delayed Yet Another Year – Thx NY
March 11, 2016March 11, 2016

In what appears to us to be a “might as well get all of the bad news out in one day” strategy, Cabot Oil & Gas announced yesterday (after losing a case related to water contamination in Dimock, PA) what everyone already knows: The Constitution Pipeline is delayed for yet another year. The Constitution is illegally being held up by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo. The pipeline, approved by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in 2014, will run from Susquehanna County, PA to Schoharie County, NY where it will connect with two interstate gas pipelines. You can only clear trees until the end of March because threatened and endangered bats (don’t ask). New York has managed to delay the pipeline for another entire season. Instead of being ready later this year, the pipeline is now delayed until the second half of next year. Here’s what we want to know: When will Williams (building the pipeline) and Cabot, the major backer and beneficiary of the pipeline, sue New York in federal court to force the issue? When will they realize that Cuomo is NEVER going to approve it–that they will have to force the state to allow it? It’s time to wake up and smell the coffee. New York is run by a dictator…
Read More “Cabot Says Constitution Pipeline Delayed Yet Another Year – Thx NY”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Coterra Energy (Cabot O&G) | Energy Companies | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Susquehanna County

Anti-Driller Vera Scroggins Assaults Phelim McAleer at Dimock Trial
March 10, 2016March 10, 2016

Vera Scroggins is a little-known anti-driller from Susquehanna County, PA who sometimes pops up in the news for trespassing on Cabot Oil & Gas drill sites (see PA Fracktivist Permanently Banned from Cabot Property). We know she has a potty mouth–just witness her abusive treatment of Phelim McAleer (creator of the FrackNation documentary) a few years ago, insulting him and swearing at him (watch this video). It seems Vera has a violent streak too. Yesterday outside the courthouse in Scranton, PA where two Dimock families suing Cabot have a trial under way, Phelim tried to interview and ask questions of a Dimock family not part of the court case, Craig and Julie Sautner. Phelim is persistent, like any good reporter, and he had his camera rolling as he repeatedly asked them to respond to the plaintiffs’ lawyer’s admission that no chemicals contaminated the water in Dimock–as they (the Sautners) have claimed. Vera was with the Sautners and tried to keep McAleer away from them. At one point she physically struck him, several times, all caught on tape. The police were called but no charges have been filed (yet). Here’s the video to show what happened…
Read More “Anti-Driller Vera Scroggins Assaults Phelim McAleer at Dimock Trial”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Regulation

Obama DOJ Considers Prosecuting Global Warming Deniers
March 10, 2016March 10, 2016

Is this what our once-great country has come to under Barack Hussein Obama? The criminalization of free speech? If you simply say, as MDN does, that extra carbon dioxide in the atmosphere–caused by mankind’s activity in burning fossil fuels–is NOT causing Mother Earth to catastrophically warm up, the Obama Justice Department is considering prosecuting you and throwing you in jail. So says the head of the DOJ, Attorney General Loretta Lynch. It is the death of the First Amendment of our tattered Constitution–a Constitution daily shredded by Obama and his sycophants…
Read More “Obama DOJ Considers Prosecuting Global Warming Deniers”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Litigation

Radicalized Children Try to Force Climate Change Action in Court
March 10, 2016March 10, 2016

In August 2015 MDN told you about a lawsuit brought by a group of left coast radicalized children who want to force the federal government to become communist and “force action” on mythical climate change (see Group of Kids Sues U.S. Govt to Force Action on “Climate Change”). This past January the case proceeded with industry groups joining the government as defendants (see Climate Change Lawsuit by Radicalized Children Gets Interesting). What’s happening is that adults are using children to force a radical/Fascist agenda on the American public. The so-called children had their first day in court yesterday. The defendants–the government and groups like the American Petroleum Institute–asked the judge to throw out the case…
Read More “Radicalized Children Try to Force Climate Change Action in Court”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Energy Services | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | PennEast Pipeline | Pipelines | Regulation

THE Delaware Riverkeeper Sues FERC, Tries to Close it Down
March 4, 2016March 4, 2016

Maya van Rossum – THE Delaware Riverkeeper

We thought radical leftists, like Maya van Rossum aka THE Delaware Riverkeeper, loved the heavy hand of Big Government. It appears she and her ilk only love CERTAIN Big Government agencies, like the federal EPA–those they can influence toward their radical anti-fossil fuel agenda. THE Delaware Riverkeeper is attacking a government agency–the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission–the agency charged with reviewing and approving (or not approving) interstate pipeline projects. Maya and company sued FERC on Wednesday with the sole purpose of shutting down the entire agency by defunding it. Delaware Riverkeeper filed their lawsuit against FERC in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia–one of the most liberal jurisdictions across the country. The lawsuit claims FERC can’t objectively make decisions about projects like the Penn East Pipeline (running from the Wilkes-Barre area to New Jersey) because FERC derives some of its operating revenue from the projects it either approves or does not approve. That’s its rationale for attempting to shut down an entire agency of the federal government. This is Riverkeeper’s last ditch “Hail Mary” effort to stop the Penn East Pipeline project…
Read More “THE Delaware Riverkeeper Sues FERC, Tries to Close it Down”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | New York | Statewide NY

NY Lawmakers Want State Pension Fund to Divest from Fossil Fuels
March 2, 2016March 2, 2016

It looks like students at the University of Pittsburgh aren’t the only the only ones who are devoid of intelligence (see Pitt Brats “Demand” Endowment Divest from < 1% Fossil Investments). You can now add a group of Democrat lawmakers in New York State’s Senate and Assembly to the list of fools. Some two dozen Democrat lawmakers want State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli (radical Democrat), the sole trustee in charge of investing the state’s public workers pension fund (worth $178.3 billion), to sell any investments the fund has in companies that engage in extracting fossil fuels. Why? Because they believe in the fairy tale that burning fossil fuels causes Mother Earth, whom they worship, to heat up. Never mind global warming isn’t actually happening and hasn’t been happening for nearly 20 years (see Inconvenient Global Warming Fact: Avg Temp Hasn’t Risen in 18 Yrs)–it’s what you can make people believe that counts…
Read More “NY Lawmakers Want State Pension Fund to Divest from Fossil Fuels”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Coterra Energy (Cabot O&G) | Energy Companies | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Susquehanna County

Dimock Trial Update: Scott & Monica Ely’s Testimony Destroyed
February 26, 2016February 26, 2016

There was a ton of news coming out of the trial two Dimock families have brought against Cabot Oil & Gas in Scranton, PA yesterday. But you wouldn’t know it if you read the Democrat-controlled (and anti-drilling) Scranton Times-Tribune–the newspaper of “record” in the very place where the trial is being held. They’ve quit writing about the trial because the news is so bad for anti-drillers. Both Scott and Monica Ely testified and under cross examination their testimony was obliterated–their claims exposed as lies. Here’s the latest from FrackNation filmmaker Phelim McAleer who has been following the trial from the beginning, and from Natural Gas Now…
Read More “Dimock Trial Update: Scott & Monica Ely’s Testimony Destroyed”