PA Court Rules Fracking Not ‘Abnormally Dangerous’ Under PA Law
An article in the left-leaning Harrisburg Patriot-News has this incendiary opening: “Is it ‘abnormally dangerous’ to drill and frack for oil under a massive oil refinery, particularly if that well is bored beneath a tank filled with 3.6 million gallons of gasoline? A decision issued by a divided Commonwealth Court panel on Monday will give a Pennsylvania community a chance to find out.” In a court decision filed on Monday, the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania will allow a driller to drill and frack a well that is close to (but not directly underneath) the above-ground 3.6 million gallon petroleum tank. At first blush, especially when reading an opening like the one in the Patriot-News story, the average reader would think such a plan is stark raving mad. But when you dig into the details, a far different story emerges. As usual, mainstream media misrepresents many of the facts. We’re here to sort it out for you…
Read More “PA Court Rules Fracking Not ‘Abnormally Dangerous’ Under PA Law”
Technically, this is not a Marcellus/Utica story, but it is (and should be) of interest to those of us who concentrate on the Appalachian region. The very first application has been filed in Illinois for a permit to drill and frack a shale well. Woolsey Operating Co., headquartered in Kansas, has filed a high volume horizontal hydraulic fracturing (HVHHF) application with the Illinois Dept. of Natural Resources (DNR). The DNR has assigned the application Review Number HVHHF-000001 — the very first. Which is momentous. We’ve only seen two mainstream news sources (from Illinois) pick up on what is really big news. No national news sources have covered it–yet. The press release from the DNR provides some details, like the location of the proposed well (southern Illinois, in White County). What the announcement and news stories don’t say is which rock layer will the shale well target? MDN found the answer by reviewing the application…
The U.S. Geological Survey has just done us all a big favor. USGS decided to do some in-the-field research to see if there’s any truth to the wild claims of anti-drillers that fracking somehow leaks up through a mile or more of solid rock to pollute water wells. We’ve heard that bogus claim for years–since shale drilling in the Marcellus began in 2004. Those claims were made popular by the Josh Fox and his fake documentary “Gasland.” So USGS researchers went down to Texas, Louisiana and Arkansas–where there’s a lot of oil and gas drilling–and randomly selected 116 domestic and public-supply water wells located as close as 360 feet to unconventional (i.e. shale) oil and gas wells. The researchers published their findings in a new study/paper in the journal Environmental Science & Technology in a paper titled “Methane and Benzene in Drinking-Water Wells Overlying the Eagle Ford, Fayetteville, and Haynesville Shale Hydrocarbon Production Areas” (full copy below). What did the USGS researchers conclude? “Using chemical, isotopic, gas and groundwater-age tracers to thoroughly evaluate those samples — USGS researchers concluded that low concentrations of methane and benzene detected were likely naturally occurring and not attributable to shale development.” Thank you USGS…
Helmerich & Payne is the largest drilling rig contractor in the U.S. Their rigs can be found all over the world. In the U.S., H&P may H&P rigs are located in Texas, in the Permian basin, drilling for oil. Although a fair number are also in North Dakota and Colorado. If you look at H&P’s rig locations from last July (the most recent stats they publish, on their website), you’ll find 13 active H&P rigs in the Pennsylvania–in the Marcellus Shale. A year later, we are assuming (based on recent data) that those numbers have gone up everywhere, including the Marcellus. Even if H&P’s rig count is still just 13 in the PA Marcellus, that represents 38% of the active rigs in the Marcellus as of April (see 
Envelope please! (No, this is not Warren Beatty, we have the correct envelope!) Each year the Ben Franklin Shale Gas Innovation & Commercialization Center (SGICC) runs a contest and awards a $20,000 prize to three companies ($60,000 purse) for the “best shale energy-oriented innovations, new product ideas, or service concepts that are either in the development stage or recently launched” in the Marcellus Shale. This year’s winners were recently announced: Frontier Natural Resources, Inc. won for commercializing the first small scale LNG facility in Pennsylvania, using natural gas from an adjacent gathering and compression facility. PetroMar Technologies, Inc. won for commercializing FracView™, a low-cost borehole imaging tool that takes high resolution pictures, even through drilling mud. And Sensor Networks, Inc. won for its product line of permanently installed battery powered ultrasonic sensors, providing remote, wireless data collection of critical pipe infrastructure wall thickness. Here’s the deets… 
Hold that decline curve! Researchers at Los Alamos National Laboratory have done “extensive data mining” and analysis of 20,000 shale gas wells. In a paper published in the journal Applied Energy titled “The shale gas revolution: Barriers, sustainability, and emerging opportunities” (full copy below), Los Alamos researchers say that refracking existing wells with new technology can transform those wells from “diminished producers” (so/so wells) into “high-performers” long after the wells had supposedly hit peak production. “We hypothesize that manipulating tail production could re-revolutionize shale gas extraction,” said lead author of the study, Richard Middleton. Refracking eliminates the cost of drilling a new bore hole, and provides a smaller environmental footprint. What’s not to love! Let’s get refracking… 
Every now and again a gift lands in our lap, unexpectedly. Such is the case today. A third year law student at the University of Buffalo School of Law, Kelsey Hanson, has researched and written a masterful paper on the potential for LPG (liquefied propane) fracking in, yes, New York State. The paper, titled “Hey New York, You Can Frack: An Examination of How Liquefied Petroleum Gas Sidesteps New York’s Fracking Ban to Provide a Legal and Practical Approach for Horizontal Drilling in New York’s Marcellus Shale” (full copy below) has just been published in the Buffalo Law Review (how did that happen?!). In the paper, Hanson first gives a background of traditional fracking, then zeros in and explores LPG fracking–its benefits and its pitfalls. She concludes that the NY Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC) has left the door open, legally, for shale LPG fracking in the Empire State. She also gives us a much-needed update on the question MDN gets asked frequently: Whatever happened to LPG fracking in Tioga County, NY? The article is eminently readable, full of great information, and worth your time…
Thumbing their collective noses at Ohio RINO Gov. John “foreigner hunter” Kasich, Republican legislators in the House added a “little-noticed provision” in the state budget deal that will give the legislature, and not the governor, the power to select members of the Ohio Oil and Gas Commission. That small change would have huge consequences. How? the Oil and Gas Commission is charged with approving potential drillers on state land. Five years ago, Kasich flip-flopped on the issue and since then has not allowed shale drilling in state-owned forests and state-owned parks–by refusing to add any new members to the Commission. It is a de facto moratorium from the governor that prevents fracking on state-owned land. Enough is enough. Republicans intend to change it this year…
More fake “research” is on the way courtesy of the anti-drilling Southwest Pennsylvania Environmental Health Project. The Project is launching a so-called public health registry. Log in to the website and if you live within five miles of a drilling site, you can report your latest headache in an attempt to link it to (and smear) shale development. Yep, just blame everything on drilling. Got allergies? Blame drilling. Headache? Blame drilling. Earache? Blame drilling. Er, a “performance issues?” Blame drilling. (Maybe they’ll give you some free Viagra.) That’s the purpose of this latest sham initiative by the same group that has brought us such glittering examples of “research” as “The List of the Harmed”…
Penn State University professor Terry Engelder, the geologist who first discovered the potential of the Marcellus (and called “the Father of the Marcellus Shale”) is retiring from Penn State in June. The Marcellus Shale boom, while starting with a single Range Resources well in 2004, is largely due to the insights of Engelder. In 2007 he did some “back of the envelope” calculations that showed (first) there is roughly 50 trillion cubic feet (Tcf) of recoverable natural gas in the Marcellus. He later revised that number, to 489 Tcf. It was Engelder’s calculations that caught the interest and confidence of drillers who then decided to give the Marcellus a try. The rest is history–and we have Dr. Engelder to thank. Penn State News does a good job in providing a tribute to celebrate the contributions of Engelder to the university’s geosciences department. What will Engelder miss the most when he retires? Finding new shale layers? Figuring out new techniques to extract oil and gas? Maybe a better way of predicting earthquakes? Nope. He’ll miss the people–students and the professors/staff at “one of the finest geosciences departments in the world.” Here’s a proper sendoff for a key figure, a giant in the canon of the Marcellus story…
Earth Day is the day Big Green has a collective orgasm over Mom Earth and their efforts to keep her clean. We have no issue with responsible stewardship of our natural resources and keeping the environment clean. Everyone (with a brain) aspires to that. We do have a problem with worshiping the creation instead of the Creator. Worshiping the earth is what Earth Day is all about. Each year it gets more nutty than the last. It was with some glee we noticed that our friends at Energy in Depth have done their own bit for Earth Day–by compiling a list of scientific studies that prove fracking has been good for cleaning up the environment. It’s true! We’re not joking. Because of fracking, and because of the growing use of natural gas, our air is cleaner. Fracking and horizontal drilling has resulted in fewer drilling locations dotting the landscape–prettier to look at, and healthier for the environment. There’s a fair amount of fake science floating around out there, funded by anti-drilling organizations. EID has compiled a list of real science studies. Have a look…
Pardon me, but may I ask, How long is your lateral? We don’t mean to ask such a personal question, but in this case, size matters. You see, the longer the lateral, the more return on investment (ROI) you get–according to top officials from Eclipse Resources. Eclipse Resources, a Marcellus/Utica pure play driller headquartered in State College, PA that drills mostly in Ohio, fielded top officials at two different events this week to talk about the company’s drilling program–and their impressively long laterals. MDN editor Jim Willis heard Eclipse CEO Benjamin W. Hulburt at the Oil & Gas Investment Symposia (OGIS) in New York on Tuesday. On Wednesday, Eclipse’s vice president of drilling, Oleg Tolmachev, appeared at the Utica Upstream conference at Walsh University in North Canton. They both hit on a theme that struck a chord with us–namely, that by drilling longer lateral Utica wells, the company is drastically lowering the cost per foot of drilling–and by doing so, they raise the ROI, making their shale wells more profitable than their competitors’…
Metaphorically speaking–Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan’s finger was on the trigger of a loaded pistol, pointed at the head of the once-great State of Maryland. And now, Hogan pulled the trigger, assassinating any hope of new jobs, new wealth for some of the state’s poorest people (farmers and landowners in western Maryland), and new tax revenue for local communities. BANG. Done. Killed. Death. Thanks Larry, you da man. We previously reported that the Maryland House had loaded the chamber, and then the Senate had cocked the gun and put it in Hogan’s hand (see