Hydraulic Fracturing

Broome County | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Regulation | Statewide NY

Somber Anniversary: Today NY Fracking Moratorium Turns 5 Yrs-Old
July 23, 2013July 23, 2013

Time to fly the flags at half staff. Why? It seems that freedom and liberty in New York State have died. Tyranny has slowly crept in and has now taken up residence in the Empire State. For five long years, landowners in New York have been denied their Constitutional property rights to allow shale drilling on and under their land, and frankly, there’s no end in sight to this travesty of justice. Oh, we New Yorkers have not given up! As Winston Churchill once famously said, NEVER!

But honestly, it’s hard to keep your chin up month after month and year after year, especially when Democrats control so much of the state and just don’t give a darn about individual freedom or the Constitution. It’s especially disheartening when there’s rampant ignorance on the part of many in the general public who only read headlines and don’t bother to try and understand the sometimes complicated drilling issue. As we pointed out yesterday, the drilling issue in New York has devolved into celebrity emotion vs. science (see NY Fracking Debate is Celebrity Emotion vs Scientific Facts).

To mark today’s somber anniversary, the Joint Landowners Coalition of New York will hold a “Five-Year Anniversary Event” at the Holiday Inn Arena in downtown Binghamton…
Read More “Somber Anniversary: Today NY Fracking Moratorium Turns 5 Yrs-Old”
Coterra Energy (Cabot O&G) | Energy Companies | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Research | Susquehanna County

Study Proves Fracking Didn’t Cause Methane in Dimock Water Wells
July 23, 2013July 23, 2013

A research study appears in the May-June 2013 issue of Groundwater, a peer-reviewed scientific journal, that completely debunks the notion that fracking was the cause of methane contamination in local water wells in Dimock, PA (as famously claimed by Josh Fox and Gasland). The article, titled “Evaluation of Methane Sources in Groundwater in Northeastern Pennsylvania” (full copy embedded below), has flown completely under the radar and has received, so far as we can tell, no coverage in the mainstream media. It likely hasn’t been been covered because (a) the findings don’t fit the media narrative that fracking contaminates water, and (b) the study’s lead author is the head geologist for Cabot Oil & Gas, the company accused of contaminating some Dimock water wells with methane from nearby drilling activity.

The study looks at test results for 1,701 water wells around Susquehanna County, PA (where Dimock is located), both close to and far from shale drilling. What does the cold, hard data show? Methane is everywhere in Susquehanna County groundwater–and it has been for hundreds of years. No wonder Susquehanna County is such a productive gas field for Cabot! The study finds that methane in water is more prevalent in certain locations like valleys. Perhaps most importantly–the study finds no correlation between shale drilling and the level of methane in water wells. There’s no more methane in water wells close to drilling than there is in wells far from it. Science is science, and this study cannot be discounted simply because the wizards at Cabot wrote the report…
Read More “Study Proves Fracking Didn’t Cause Methane in Dimock Water Wells”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Crime | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Regulation | Seneca County

Anti-Drillers Provide Fraudulent Ban Petition to Covert, NY Board
July 23, 2013July 23, 2013

An MDN reader has alerted us to some “funny business” going on in the Town of Covert, NY (near Ithaca) on the part of anti-drillers who circulated a petition in support of a town ban on fracking. It appears that at least some of the “signatures” on the petition were fraudulently added by the group circulating the petition, the so-called Concerned Citizens of Covert (CCC). The list of names of those supposedly supporting a ban were presented as a typewritten list to town board members, but (as far as we know), the original signed petitions have not yet been produced by CCC.

One Covert landowner says she did not sign the petition but her name, along with the names of other family members who also did not sign, appears on the typewritten version of the petition. She said it looks like the CCC simply went through voter registration roles and added a bunch of names, claiming they had all signed. If that’s true, the CCC petition should immediately be investigated by the local and state attorneys general (but don’t hold your breath)…
Read More “Anti-Drillers Provide Fraudulent Ban Petition to Covert, NY Board”
Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Regulation

New BLM Fracking Rule will Cost Drillers Nearly $100K per Well
July 23, 2013July 23, 2013

So just how much will the proposed new fracking rule (for wells fracked on public lands) from the Bureau of Land Management cost drillers? The Western Energy Alliance hired the respected economics firm John Dunham & Associates to run the numbers. What they found was that if the new rule goes into effect as written, it will cost drillers an extra $96,913 per well on average, making it cost prohibitive to even bother drilling some wells. Perhaps that’s the intent? The new BLM rule will likely not affect Marcellus and Utica Shale drilling because there is very little federal/public land in the northeast. So why bother to report on it? Because Obama administration officials have expressed their desire to one day “encourage” (i.e. force) the new BLM rule to be used for drilling on private land as well (see Feds ‘Hope’ States will Use BLM Rules for ALL Fracking).

The press release from the Western Energy Alliance, along with the full economic analysis from John Dunham & Associates:
Read More “New BLM Fracking Rule will Cost Drillers Nearly $100K per Well”
Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Public Opinion | Regulation | Statewide NY

NY Fracking Debate is Celebrity Emotion vs Scientific Facts
July 22, 2013July 22, 2013

The following full-throated, pro-drilling op-ed is noteworthy for two reasons. First, it was written by a former Bloomberg reporter, Kelly Riddell (who knew there was even a single pro-drilling person on staff at Bloomberg!). Second, it appeared in the usually anti-drilling Albany Times Union. One pro-drilling article per 50 or so anti-drilling articles is what passes for fair and balanced in the TU.

Hopefully Gov. Andy will tear himself away from paddling canoes and handing out flood relief money to read it. Riddell’s column is well worth your time to read, especially if you live in the Empire State…
Read More “NY Fracking Debate is Celebrity Emotion vs Scientific Facts”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Research

Predictable: Anti-Drillers Discount Fed Study of Fracking & Water
July 22, 2013July 22, 2013

Last week MDN brought you the really important news that preliminary results from a federal study of fracking shows…proves…fracking fluid with chemicals does not magically migrate uphill through a mile of solid rock to the surface to contaminate water (see Breaking: Obama DOE Says Study Shows Fracking Fluids Don’t Migrate). In over 50,000 horizontally fracked wells and over 2 million conventionally fracked wells, it’s never been observed. No scientific studies have ever been able to prove it (much as they’ve tried).

Now we have a study that incontrovertibly proves it doesn’t happen. So what does one Duke University anti-drilling professor with a degree in biology (not geology) say? This study don’t prove nothin’…
Read More “Predictable: Anti-Drillers Discount Fed Study of Fracking & Water”
Energy Companies | EQT Corp | Greene County (PA) | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Research

Breaking: Obama DOE Says Study Shows Fracking Fluids Don’t Migrate
July 19, 2013July 19, 2013

Those who hate fossil fuels and want to stop all shale drilling because of their irrational beliefs are logic-challenged. Witness their claim/belief that fracking fluid (99.5% water and sand, 0.5% chemicals) pumped a mile or more below the surface will magically travel up to the surface and contaminate groundwater supplies. Never mind that 80% of the fluid disappears into small cracks a mile down. Never mind there’s a mile of solid rock between the fluid and the surface. Never mind there have been more than 50,000 horizontally fracked wells since the early 2000s with not a single case of water contamination from migrating frack fluid. And never mind there have been more than 2 million vertically fracked wells worldwide over the past 60+ years with not a single case of water contamination from migrating frack fluid. Anti-drillers cling to their irrational faith that fluid migration has and continues to happen and hucksters like Josh Fox of Gasland and Gasland 2 fame are all too willing to feed their delusion.

Enter the federal government–specifically the Dept. of Energy (DOE) under Barack H. Obama, no friend of the oil and gas industry. Exactly one year ago the DOE’s National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) in Pittsburgh began an experiment of injecting tracer chemicals in fracking fluid at an undisclosed drill site with eight wells in Greene County, PA. (The driller cooperating with NETL to conduct the experiment is unidentified, although MDN has a pretty good guess as to who it is–see below.) The NETL monitored (and continues to monitor) the eight wells over the past year and although the data is still preliminary, what have they found? No migration of fracking fluid toward the surface. Zero. It’s called science–but don’t tell Josh Fox and the nuts who believe him…
Read More “Breaking: Obama DOE Says Study Shows Fracking Fluids Don’t Migrate”
Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA

PA Problem: Act 13 Zoning Case to be Decided by 6 Supremes, Not 7
July 18, 2013July 18, 2013

Potential trouble is brewing for Marcellus drillers in Pennsylvania. As MDN has chronicled since early last year, seven towns (and a few individuals) sued PA over a provision in “Act 13” passed in early 2012 which creates uniform statewide standards for oil and gas zoning regulations–regs that supercede and replace local zoning laws related to oil and gas drilling (see Lawsuit Filed: PA Towns Sue State over Marcellus Act 13 Law). A handful of towns in western PA didn’t like the state telling them where a well can and can’t go. They call it a “one size fits all” solution that doesn’t square with realities in different and varying geographies. The state maintains it has all sorts of safeguards built in and the new uniform standards prevent capricious local town boards from interfering with a legitimate and safe activity. Who’s right? It’s a Solomon kind of conundrum.

The towns sued and won–in two lower court cases. The case was appealed to the PA Supreme Court–but Houston, we have a problem. The PA Supreme Court heard arguments in the case last October. One of the seven justices has since been convicted on a minor fundraising offense and removed from office (see PA Supreme Court Resignation Affects Act 13 Zoning Decision). If the court had previously decided the case without a seventh justice, it likely would have resulted in a 3-3 split. The new justice, Correale Stevens, was installed in June. We’ve just learned that he will not participate in the Act 13 case, meaning it will definitely be decided by six justices. Unless one of them changes, a 3-3 decision would mean the lower courts’ decision stands and drilling in some locations in PA will be thrown into chaos, affecting landowners, jobs and the local economy…
Read More “PA Problem: Act 13 Zoning Case to be Decided by 6 Supremes, Not 7”
Broome County | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Regulation | Statewide NY

JLCNY to Mark 5-Year Moratorium Anniversary at Binghamton Event
July 18, 2013July 18, 2013

The 77,000-member Joint Landowners Coalition of New York (JLCNY) will hold at event next Tuesday, July 23 at the Holiday Inn Arena in Binghamton to mark a somber milestone: the five-year anniversary of the shale drilling moratorium in New York State. This is a shout out to drilling supporters in the Southern Tier area of New York to invite you to attend…
Read More “JLCNY to Mark 5-Year Moratorium Anniversary at Binghamton Event”
Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Regulation

Interior Sec Jewell Grilled by Congress on New BLM Fracking Rules
July 18, 2013July 18, 2013

It’s no surprise that newly-minted U.S. Interior Secretary Sally Jewell is sticking up for federal regulation of fracking as proposed by her agency’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM). For now, BLM rules–once in effect–will be used to regulate fracking on public lands, mostly found in western U.S. However, the Obama administration has expressed its desire to grow the BLM regulations to include private land too (see Feds ‘Hope’ States will Use BLM Rules for ALL Fracking). Danger Will Robinson!

Testifying before the House Natural Resources committee yesterday, Republicans grilled Jewell about the new BLM regulations. Members of her own party (Democrat) chided her over the BLM’s use of FracFocus.org to report chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing fluid. Jewell’s response was less-than-comforting and (we would argue) a veiled threat that the BLM will dump using FracFocus at some point…
Read More “Interior Sec Jewell Grilled by Congress on New BLM Fracking Rules”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Statewide PA

New PennEnvironment “Report”: Soak Drillers for More Bond Money
July 17, 2013July 17, 2013

More huffing and puffing from the anti-drilling group PennEnvironment. Yesterday they released a new so-called report called “Who Pays the Costs of Fracking?” (full copy embedded below). PennEnvironment, using paid interns from an anti-fossil fuel think tank called The Frontier Group to write this drivel, attempt to make the case that drillers don’t pay enough bond money up front for future, possible, maybe, someday problems that might arise–potentially. So make ’em pay now, up front.

Of course their chief recommendation–require obscenely high up-front bonds from drillers–is nothing more than a back-door way of making it more expensive to drill, leading to less drilling. But that’s what these types of organizations do–sit around and dream up ways to slow the use of those evil, nasty fossil fuels…
Read More “New PennEnvironment “Report”: Soak Drillers for More Bond Money”
Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Regulation | Statewide MD

Maryland Public Comment Session #2 on Drilling Best Practices
July 17, 2013July 17, 2013

For years, MDN has poked fun at the State of Maryland and has said, somewhat tongue-in-cheek, that Maryland is the only state more dysfunctional than New York on the topic of hydraulic fracturing and shale drilling. Now? We’d say Maryland and New York are neck-in-neck in the race to screw up the biggest economic and jobs miracle in generations. But we’d still give Maryland a slight edge as being “most dysfunctional.” That dysfunction was on full display at yesterday’s second public meeting held by the Maryland Dept. of the Environment to receive comments on a draft best practices for shale drilling document–a document recently released by the governor’s Marcellus Shale Advisory Commission (see Maryland Releases Draft “Best Practices” in Shale Drilling Report for a copy).

The Baltimore Sun was on hand for yesterday’s second public meeting–held in Baltimore–and filed this report:
Read More “Maryland Public Comment Session #2 on Drilling Best Practices”
Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues

New API Ad Addresses Public Concerns about Fracking
July 17, 2013July 17, 2013

The American Petroleum Institute, the preeminent trade association for America’s oil and gas companies, has just launched a new advertising campaign to address public concerns (and correct media misstatements) about fracking. The ad will be run on TV and radio spots, as well as in print and online. It’s a great video ad (watch it below).

Here’s the announcement from API on the new ad campaign:
Read More “New API Ad Addresses Public Concerns about Fracking”
Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Regulation | Statewide NY

Cuomo and Fracking and Comments (Oh My!)
July 15, 2013July 15, 2013

Kind of a strange editorial in the Rochester, NY Democrat and Chronicle (D&C) newspaper last Friday. The gist of the editorial is that Gov. Cuomo has not distinguished himself by fence-sitting on the fracking issue (we agree with that point). However, the editorial writer(s) have angst that because Cuomo and his lieutenants at the Dept. of Environmental Conservation and State Dept. of Health have taken so long with their respective reviews, that the 200,000 comments from the public filed by a deadline earlier this year will go un-responded to and that the public’s input will be “dismissed” and not considered in the final decision.

Here’s what the D&C editorial says:
Read More “Cuomo and Fracking and Comments (Oh My!)”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Ohio | Statewide OH | Utica Shale

WRLC Says, “Why Can’t We be Friends?” in the OH Utica
July 15, 2013July 15, 2013

The Western Reserve Land Conservancy (WRLC), a nonprofit conservation organization dedicated to preserving the natural resources of northern Ohio, has the mission of working to “permanently protect natural areas and farmland.” The good news is that the WRLC believes Utica Shale drilling in Ohio can be done safely and wisely–with some effort. They also believe that if the Utica becomes “a battlefield” in the fracking wars, all Ohioans will lose. The WRLC says what’s needed by both sides is cooperation and creativity.

We like the WRLC’s sentiment. Only problem is, when dealing with extreme and unreasonable people who view all fossil fuels (and those who want to use them) as the enemy, cooperation and creativity is not possible. There is no middle ground when dealing with unreasonable (as in you can’t rationally reason with them) people who demand a ban on fracking…
Read More “WRLC Says, “Why Can’t We be Friends?” in the OH Utica”
Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Exporting | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Regulation

France Sticks its Collective Head in Frack Sand
July 15, 2013July 15, 2013

Apparently the matter is now settled in France. As long as President Francois Hollande is in office, he will not allow shale drilling in France. Too bad for the French people. Great news for the U.S.–France just became a huge export market for us…
Read More “France Sticks its Collective Head in Frack Sand”