Hydraulic Fracturing

Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Statewide PA

Krancer: States Do a Good Job, Feds Should Butt Out on Fracking
June 17, 2013June 17, 2013

Three cheers for former PA Sec. of the Department of Environmental Protection Michael Krancer who, talking on a recent radio program, said the Obama administration’s desire (and plan) to regulate fracking at the federal level is unnecessary and the “feds should back off.” He said the individual states already do a great job and the feds have no business horning in.

We sure do miss having the mince-no-words Krancer as Secretary at the DEP…
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Delaware County | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | New York | Regulation

Exclusive: Sidney, NY Sued by Landowners over Fracking Moratorium
June 14, 2013June 14, 2013

Three town board members in the Town of Sidney (Delaware County), NY should be concerned–very concerned. They voted February 13th to enact a one-year moratorium against shale drilling and fracking. Two other board members voted against the moratorium, so it passed. Now, all residents of the Town of Sidney will have to shuck out more money in taxes to defend that vote–on Wednesday they were sued by a group of local landowners whose property rights have been violated by the ban.

The worrisome part for Sidney is who is doing the suing on behalf of the landowers–Hinman, Howard & Kattell (HHK)–the same law firm that successfully sued Binghamton over their moratorium. Binghamton’s moratorium was found illegal and tossed last year (see NY Judge Throws Out Binghamton Fracking Moratorium). Below is a summary of the lawsuit against Sidney, as provided to MDN by HHK:

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | New York | Regulation | Statewide NY | Tompkins County

Dryden Files Request with NY Highest Court to Not Consider Appeal
June 14, 2013June 14, 2013

Although New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has dithered for more than a year on whether or not to allow fracking–and continues his equivocation–there is a much more important drama unfolding that will ultimately, in our opinion, determine whether or not New York will ever see meaningful shale drilling. The more important issue is now in the courts. Specifically, it revolves around whether or not New York’s highest court, the Court of Appeals, will hear a pair of cases from towns that have banned drilling.

A few weeks ago we told you about the appeals from a landowner near Cooperstown (Middlefield) and from Norse Energy (Dryden) asking the Court of Appeals to hear the case and overturn the town bans. The Town of Dryden has now sent their own request to the Court of Appeals–asking them to not consider the case…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Herkimer County | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Regulation

Manheim Latest NY Town to Pass Illegal Fracking Moratorium
June 13, 2013June 13, 2013

Yet another New York town has foolishly voted to extend a moratorium on drilling. Why foolish? A judge threw out a similar moratorium in Binghamton, NY last year (see NY Judge Throws Out Binghamton Fracking Moratorium). Depending on the language used and general circumstances, moratoriums in New York are illegal. Outright bans, for now, are still legal–although a pair of cases is (hopefully) headed to the state’s highest court which may overturn the right of towns to ban fracking (i.e. stop them from stripping away the rights of property owners).

The latest NY town to pass a moratorium and announce to the world it’s closed for business is Manheim (Herkimer County), NY. Note to Manheim taxpayers: Get ready to open your wallets to defend an expensive lawsuit…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Berkeley County | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Statewide WV | West Virginia

Intelligence to be Sacrificed at WV Stop the Kaboom Festival
June 13, 2013June 13, 2013

The crazies are at it again. Radical anti-fossil fuel activists, calling fracking “extreme resource extraction” that is “destroying the planet,” are organizing a hippie-fest in Hedgesville (Berkeley County), WV this Friday through Sunday to raise money to agitate against fossil fuels–the very same fossil fuels the people organizing and attending use every day of their lives. The so-called “Stop the Kaboom Music and Arts Festival” (bring your own pot) is now in its third year and hopes to be bigger and better than ever…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Onondaga County | Regulation

Pompey, NY Votes to Ban Drilling, Bullies 2 Board Members
June 12, 2013June 12, 2013

The Town of Pompey (Onondaga County), NY, near Syracuse, voted on June 3 to ban all fracking and shale drilling in the town. We’d like to take this opportunity to once again deliver a brief history lesson of how and why this is nothing short of mob rule and not classic democracy in action.

First, the news from Pompey and how three town board members (Carol Marsh, Greg Herlhy and Victor Lafrenz) bullied two other board members (Carl Dennis and Craig Smithgall) into not voting, and how those three individuals unilaterally snatched away the property rights of 15-20 landowners in the town who already have gas leases, with a single vote…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Regulation | Statewide NY

Bloomberg: NY Dead Last in Business Because of Fracking Moratorium
June 12, 2013June 12, 2013

An article appearing on, of all places, the ultra-liberal Bloomberg news service, compares both California and New York and their neck-and-neck race to be dead last in business friendliness. Although both states have ineffective governors and shoot themselves in the head on a number of issues, the article concludes that New York wins the dubious distinction of being “dead last” for business climate primarily because of one deciding factor: fracking.

California, even with Gov. Jerry “Moonbeam” Brown and its pot-smoking, granola-head legislature has embraced (or at least not rejected) fracking, while New York’s Gov. Andrew “Ditherer” Cuomo, frightened of his loony left, has continued to block fracking. New York is entering a fifth year of a de facto moratorium on drilling and it has killed the upstate economy.

From the article:
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Hydraulic Fracturing | Litigation

The Thorny Issue of Proving Water Contamination from Fracking
June 12, 2013June 12, 2013

Does fracking cause water contamination? Anti-drillers have repeated the claim so often, and the claim has been picked up and repeated and amplified by the mainstream media so often, that it’s now almost an article of faith. Axiomatic. Self-evident. At a minimum, a wide swath of Americans who don’t know much about oil and gas drilling have their suspicions that fracking may indeed contaminate water–primarily because of the negative media coverage they’ve heard.

Keith Hall, director of the Louisiana Mineral Law Institute and an assistant professor of law at Louisiana State University has written an excellent article appearing in the online Ohio State Law Journal Furthermore. The article is titled, “Hydraulic Fracturing Contamination Claims: Problems of Proof” (full copy embedded below). In the article, Hall addresses the problems of landowners in attempting to prove that fracking (or oil and gas drilling) has contaminated their water. He concludes it this way:
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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Regulation | Statewide NY

NY Fracking Moratorium Bill in Senate Still Stalled, TY Repubs
June 12, 2013June 12, 2013

Thank God for the Republicans in the New York State Senate. Because of the leadership (and opposition) of people like Sen. Tom Libous (Binghamton, NY) and Senate Co-Majority Leader Dean Skelos, a bill in the Senate to extend a fracking moratorium statewide until next May is still stalled and likely will not come to a vote. A similar bill has already passed the Democrat-dominated NY Assembly…
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Antero Resources | Chevron | Energy Companies | Energy Services | Fayette County | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Pennsylvania | Williams

6 Western PA Families Sue Chevron, Williams over Drilling Activity
June 11, 2013June 11, 2013

Six families in Fayette County, PA have filed a “nuisance” lawsuit against Chevron, Williams and WPX Energy claiming nearby gas drilling activities have “diminished their ability to make use of their property” and have ruined the “quite use and enjoyment” of their homes. The families claim they’ve suffered from the effects of “toxic chemicals” due to the drilling activities in the area.

The AP story with details (slightly edited to remove some of the anti-drilling commentary AP adds to such stories):
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Air Quality | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Litigation | Regulation

13 States Send Letter to EPA, Draws a Fracking Line in the Sand
June 11, 2013June 11, 2013

We’re not quite sure how this one slipped by our radar, but a month ago the attorneys general from 13 brave states–1/4 of all states–sent a letter (copy embedded below) to the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) drawing a line in the sand and saying, “Don’t step over that line” when it comes to regulating fracking. To which we say, “Horray!” Finally, someone with backbone to push back against a rogue, out-of-control EPA desirous of regulating anything and everything–in violation of the U.S. Constitution.

New York, of course, was not one of the 13 signatories. However, West Virginia (with a Democrat governor), was. Ohio signed it too. Sadly, even though Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett is pro-drilling, the new Democrat attorney general in PA, Kathleen Kane, is anti-drilling and she refused to participate in signing the letter–even though her state is reaping huge rewards from shale drilling and stands to lose big-time under an activist EPA.

Here’s what prompted the letter…
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues

MDN Goes to See Gasland 2 & Josh Fox at Binghamton Screening
June 10, 2013June 10, 2013

MDN editor Jim Willis attended a screening of Gasland 2 in Binghamton last Wednesday night. This article is my impressions of the movie, of Josh Fox (who was there) and of the crowd of 300 or so assembled to watch it. Let me start with a review of the movie itself, which runs about 2 hours long. When the movie was over I had to leave before the Q&A with Fox got underway–off to pick up my 16 year-old son from a late after-school activity. On the way home he asked me about the movie and I told him about the opening 10 minutes:

Fox somehow, secretly hired a helicopter to give him a ride over the BP oil spill from the Deepwater Horizon platform in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010. Fox talked about the spill and showed stunning pictures of oil stretching for miles on top of the waves. He then interviewed local government officials from Louisiana who claimed BP was putting nasty chemicals on the oil in order to “sink it down” to the bottom of the ocean, where it would, according to Fox, accumulate into some sort of sludge laying barren that part of the ocean and its ecosystem.

My son stopped me: “What does that have to do with gas drilling, dad?” My response: “Exactly son. You asked the exact right question–a question that 295 of the 300 people in that audience tonight will never ask themselves.”
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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Regulation | Wayne County

Impotent DRBC Killing Farmers in Wayne County, PA with Moratorium
June 10, 2013June 10, 2013

Sadly, there’s a large swath of land in northeastern Pennsylvania, in Wayne and surrounding counties (see map below), that has the same disease as all of New York State. It’s called a shale drilling moratorium. Why is there a moratorium in Wayne County? Most of Wayne, all of Pike County and parts of a few other NE PA counties are located within the Delaware River Basin Commission’s jurisdiction, which has had a ban in place since 2010. The DRBC is controlled by five voting members: the governors of Pennsylvania, New York, Delaware and New Jersey, plus a member of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. It’s hard enough to get one state government to sign off on drilling–but four? Including NY?? Good luck with that.

An article in yesterday’s Wilkes-Barre Citizens’ Voice looks at how the impotent DRBC is killing farmers in NE PA with their moratorium…
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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Public Opinion | Statewide NY

Latest Q Poll Results – NY Support for Fracking Trends Up
June 7, 2013June 7, 2013

It’s been a while since MDN has covered the polls numbers in New York State–how many NYers are for or against shale gas drilling and fracking. The latest Quinnipiac University statewide poll numbers were released yesterday and show that while the state remains fairly evenly divided as a whole (46% in favor, 44% against), if you look at the trend information, you notice the number of those who favor drilling are trending up, and the number against is trending down. Which will no doubt cause more angst among the hippie protester crowd who thought they were winning the debate by using lies and fear tactics.
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | New York | Oneida County | Regulation

Utica, NY Bans Shale Drilling in the Utica (and Marcellus)
June 6, 2013June 6, 2013

It seems life in New York State is full of irony. The Marcellus Shale is named after the town of Marcellus, NY, where there is an outcropping of shale at ground level and the reason that particular shale layer was so-named. A while back the Town of Marcellus banned shale drilling. In like manner, the Utica Shale is named for Utica, NY. Tuesday night, the City of Utica Common Council banned drilling and fracking within city limits. Not that it would happen there anyway–but still, Et tu, Brute?

We find this brief reference on the blog site of the local Utica newspaper:
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Fayette County | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Pennsylvania | Regulation

Perry Twp Anti-Driller Trots Out Same Old Lies about Drilling
June 6, 2013June 6, 2013

A local anti-drilling, anti-fossil fuel resident of Perry Township (Fayette County), PA asked the town board on Tuesday to institute a five-year drilling moratorium in the town. A quick check of the Marcellus and Utica Shale Databook 2013 (Vol. 1) shows no permits issued in Perry for drilling for the first four months of 2013, although a few permits were issued in neighboring towns. The anti-driller used the old, worn-out fear tactics of cancer-causing sand and chemicals (run for the hills!) to try and convince town officials into acting unwisely…
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