DOE Nixes Use of “Climate Change” Phrase, Enviros Throw Tantrum
We found this story kind of funny. Apparently the word has gone out at the Trump Dept. of Energy that staffers, when preparing reports for the public, should avoid using the phrase “climate change.” Which is an asinine phrase, let’s admit it. By definition the climate changes. It changes every day and has since there’s been a climate. Anti fossil fuel zealots have tried to co-opt the phrase to mean “man-made global warming.” Because Mom Earth isn’t actually warming, it’s kind of hard to keep calling it “global warming.” So they invented the euphemism “climate change” instead. Team Trump has had enough of that kind of verbal dissembling. No more. Say what you mean and mean what you say. And so the egghead prima donnas who think they’re SO much smarter than everyone else are in full, fake outrage mode. They’re making fun of the adults in the room who have told them to straighten up and quit acting like petulant children…
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The same old (very small) cast of environmental radicals is claiming victory in Maryland over the recently passed bill to ban fracking statewide–a bill that now sits on traitor Gov. Larry Hogan’s desk (he’s promised to sign it). Radicals from the Chesapeake Climate Action Network (and Food & Water Watch, and the Sierra Club, et al), who are waging a holy war against fossil fuels, say this momentous occasion is evidence of new “bipartisan” support sweeping the nation–that Maryland’s vote has “national implications.” It’s nothing of the sort. Anti-fossil fuel nutters are still by and large Democrats (and Socialists) and confined to a few far-left states (Maryland, New York, Vermont). Larry Hogan is an anomaly–a Republican who ran on a platform of support for fracking who suddenly, without warning and for inexplicable reasons, flipped and promised to sign a ban bill should one be proffered. We wonder, who paid who? There is corruption at work in this situation, of that we have no doubt. All of the so-called “leaders” of the ban frack movement in the Maryland legislature come from either the Washington, D.C. suburbs, or the Baltimore area. They are located on the opposite side of the state from where fracking would, theoretically, take place. These enviro radicals have hijacked the property rights of landowners in Allegany County and Garrett County, the only two Maryland counties with commercially viable shale deposits that could be fracked. It will be a sad day when Hogan turns his back on the people of Maryland and signs the law…
As MDN reported, last week U.S. District Judge Robert Mariani ruled against a Wayne County landowner in a lawsuit that challenged the right of the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) to stop fracking in the Delaware River Basin (see 
Good news for Pennsylvania drillers: the PA Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) finally, after years of review, granted permission to two different companies to operate two new wastewater injection wells in the Keystone State. One well is located in Elk County, the other in Indiana County. With these two new injection wells coming online, the state will have a total of eight operating injection wells (vs. hundreds in Ohio). You may have seen news about the newly authorized injection wells from other news sources yesterday. But you read MDN for “the rest of the story.” And here it is, something you won’t find anywhere else (until other news sources read MDN): As soon as the DEP issued the permits for the injection wells, the DEP filed lawsuits against the two townships where the injection wells will be located, because both of those townships–Highland Township in Elk County, and Grant Township in Indiana County–had previously passed so-called Home Rule Charters in an attempt to prevent the injection wells from being located in their towns. The DEP has sued each of them (copy of the Highland lawsuit below) to correct laws that attempt to prevent the DEP from doing its job in authorizing the injection wells. We have the full news of the DEP’s decision to permit the injection wells, along with details about the lawsuits, below…
Yesterday President Trump made a trip to the Environmental Protection Agency to sign an executive order titled the “Energy Independence Executive Order” which takes aim at rolling back Obama’s disastrous Clean Power Plan. The new executive order also lifts a ban on leasing federal lands for coal mining, nixes new regulations aimed at trapping every last molecule of methane from oil and gas drilling & pipelines (unrealistic and very costly), and reduces, but does not eliminate, the role of so-called global warming when making decisions about authorizing new infrastructure projects. It was, by all accounts, a red letter day for responsible environmental policy–a day to correct some of the extreme overreach we’ve seen by the EPA over the past eight years under the Obama regime. Below we have a copy of the executive order and some of the reaction to it…
The Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) is a $3.5 billion, 301-mile pipeline that will run from Wetzel County, WV to the Transco Pipeline in Pittsylvania County, VA. The project, which filed an official application with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in October 2015, is being built by EQT, NextEra Energy and several other partners. The project has faced stiff opposition from landowners in both West Virginia and Virginia. Although the project is not yet fully approved by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), the project did get a favorable Draft Environmental Impact Statement from FERC last September (see 
Last December the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) said it would go on a “listening tour” in early 2017, to focus on so-called environmental justice–whatever that is (see 
In May 2016, Williams’ Transcontinental Gas Pipe Line Company (Transco) pre-filed with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) for a project called the Northeast Supply Enhancement project (see 
Several weeks ago the Maryland House of Delegates put the bullet in the chamber of gun when they voted to ban fracking (see 
In May 2016 a landowner in Wayne County, PA–in the Delaware River Basin–filed a lawsuit against the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) asking a judge to declare the DRBC does not have jurisdiction to prevent construction of a natural gas well (see 
Delays in turning around permit applications for new Marcellus drilling is hurting the industry, according to the Marcellus Shale Coalition (MSC). MSC president Dave Spigelmyer says lack of certainty in the PA Marcellus means more drilling goes to neighboring West Virginia and Ohio–even to Louisiana. The PA Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP), responsible for reviewing and issuing permits, sounds somewhat defensive about their lack of performance, blaming delays on staff shortages, staff turnover, and “enhanced scrutiny of permit applications.” The Pittsburgh office now takes over 200 days (over 6 months!) to process an erosion control permit–up from 139 days in 2015. Simply not acceptable…
In January 2016, the Obama Dept. of Interior posted a new rule that will make it all but impossible for oil and gas drillers to drill on federal lands (see