Maryland

Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Regulation | Statewide MD

Landmen Operating in Maryland Will Soon Have to Regi$ter
April 3, 2013April 3, 2013

Maryland State Sen. George Edwards (Republican) has introduced a bill that will make it crime for anyone to negotiate mineral leases with landowners unless they are first registered with the state as a landman. The same bill has already passed the state House of Delegates with a 135-0 vote in March. In other words, if you’re a landman operating in Maryland, get ready to pay…
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Dominion Energy | Energy Services | Exporting | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Processing Plants | Statewide MD

Dominion’s Cove Point LNG Facility Achieves Important Milestones
April 1, 2013April 1, 2013

Dominion announced this morning it has achieved several major milestones for advancing its Cove Point, Maryland LNG export facility, including contracts with Japan and India to take 100% of the LNG they can produce for export. The Cove Point LNG export facility, which includes the capability to liquefy natural gas into LNG, will cost $3.4 – $3.8 billion to build–a staggering number. It will provide jobs and an economic boost to the entire East Coast, especially Maryland and Virginia.

The Dominion press release from this morning:
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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Statewide MD

Love Canal Mom Uses Fracking Issue for Second 15 Min of Fame
March 14, 2013March 14, 2013

In a pathetic and transparent attempt to tie the miracle of hydraulic fracturing (i.e. “fracking”) to the 1970s issue of chemical contamination at Love Canal in Niagara Falls, NY, anti-drillers in Maryland held a protest rally yesterday in the state capitol of Annapolis. The featured speaker at the rally was Lois Gibbs, the mom who made Love Canal a household name in the 1970s. Her actions indirectly led to the eventual creation of the EPA Superfund program. Just like Yoko Ono and the manifestly untalented Sean Lenon, she’s back for her second 15 minutes of fame and believes she can grab it by riding the coattails of the fracking issue.

Of course, fracking doesn’t contaminate and has nothing whatever to do with the kind of chemical contamination that was found in the Love Canal toxic waste dump—but confusion, obfuscation and deceit is a favorite tactic of the environmentalist left…

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Statewide MD

UMD Issues 172-Page Report on Marcellus Drilling Best Practices
March 13, 2013March 13, 2013

In the past MDN has been critical of the Marcellus Shale Advisory Commission appointed by Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley. There were supposed to provide a set of best practices for hydraulic fracturing to the state legislature and have repeatedly missed their stated deadlines to do so (see Maryland Shale Commission Misses Second Deadline for Report). The first deadline that slipped by was August 1, 2012. Then it was Dec. 31, 2012. Then they (wisely) didn’t commit but said some time in the spring of 2013.

We don’t know for sure, but perhaps their recommendations are late in coming because they’ve been waiting on the University of Maryland (UMD) to complete a report on best practices. Three weeks ago, the UMD Center for Environmental Science Appalachian Laboratory in Frostburg, Maryland, submitted a 172-page report (full copy embedded below) of recommendations for drilling and fracking best practices to the Maryland Dept. of the Environment (MDE).

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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Regulation | Statewide MD

Maryland Fracking Ban Bill Dies in Senate
March 7, 2013March 7, 2013

Good news in the state of Maryland, a state (like New York) considering legislation to delay or outright ban hydraulic fracturing (fracking). Each year the Maryland legislature meets for just 90 days to consider new legislation. During the current session now under way, a bill was introduced in the Senate that would outright ban the miracle of hydraulic fracturing. That bill has, thankfully, died in committee.

However, a moratorium (temporary ban) bill in the General Assembly is still very much alive…

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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Regulation | Statewide MD

Food & Water Watch Pushes for Fracking Ban in Maryland
March 5, 2013March 5, 2013

The anti-drilling group Food & Water Watch believes they have a sympathetic ear with legislators in the State of Maryland—so they’re making an all-out push to get the miracle of fracking banned in the state. Yesterday they released a faux “report” enumerating what they believe are the negatives of fracking. According to FWW, some of the ills fracking will visit upon the pristine state of Maryland include: “air pollution, water pollution, noise pollution, light pollution, marred landscapes and caravans of trucks full of toxic waste.” You mean, just like it hasn’t in PA, OH and WV?

The propaganda (i.e. press release) issued by FWW yesterday:

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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Statewide MD

Maryland Push Poll Gets the Result it Was Designed to Get
February 26, 2013February 26, 2013

A push poll (with loaded questions) commissioned by anti-fracking group Chesapeake Climate Action Network found (surprise!) 78% of Marylanders want to study fracking to death before they allow it in the state.

Does anyone really think this was a legitimate poll? Not when you see the question they asked…

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Regulation | Statewide MD

MD Marcellus Drillers Withdraw Applications, No Drilling for Now
January 23, 2013January 23, 2013

Will there be Marcellus Shale drilling any time soon in the two western Maryland counties that have Marcellus Shale? The short answer: no. You need to have drillers who want to drill, and as of now, applications to drill in the Marcellus from the four drillers who filed them with the state Department of the Environment have all been withdrawn.

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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Regulation | Research | Statewide MD

Maryland Gov Finally Allocates Money for Fracking Study in Budget
January 17, 2013January 17, 2013

The stumbling, bumbling governor of Maryland, Socialist/Democrat Martin O’Malley, finally figured out that if the fracking study he himself ordered back in 2011 is ever going to get done by 2014, he’ll need to find money in the budget to do it. So in a blinding acknowledgement of the obvious, he included $1.5 million in the proposed budget he delivered to the legislature yesterday.

Of course, $1.5 million in Maryland is a rounding error in the state budget, but until now anti-drillers in the state have used lack of funding for the study as a convenient excuse to continue a moratorium on drilling. Look for the state’s Dems to neuter out the $1.5 million and then throw up their hands and say “no funding, no study, no drilling.” Typical.

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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Garrett County | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Regulation | Statewide MD

Maryland Shale Drilling Moratorium to be Debated in Legislature
January 17, 2013January 17, 2013

Want to kill something? Just keep studying it. So says a very perceptive Maryland State Delegate, Wendell Beitzel, who represents Garrett County, MD. Beitzel wants to move forward with Marcellus drilling in Maryland. He faces an uphill battle. There’s a movement on right now to delay drilling by studying it to death (apparently Maryland is taking their cue from New York in that regard)…

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Maryland | Statewide MD

New Map Shows Location of Marcellus Shale in Western Maryland
January 10, 2013January 10, 2013

The Maryland Dept. of Natural Resources has just released a new “Geological Map of Garrett, Allegany and western Washington Counties in Maryland” (embedded below)—the first comprehensive geologic map of the region published in more than 50 years. The map covers the western counties of Maryland, providing a current look at how bedrock units and major surface deposits are distributed. The location of the Marcellus Shale is a prominent feature of the new map.

According to the Maryland DNR:

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Regulation | Statewide MD

MD Commission Finally Makes Recommendations on Shale Drilling
January 8, 2013January 8, 2013

The Maryland Marcellus Shale Advisory Commission, appointed by MD Gov. Martin O’Malley in 2011 to study natural gas drilling and produce a set of best practices for hydraulic fracturing has finally made a series of recommendations for how to regulate shale gas drilling in the state. It took the Commission 15 months to cast their first vote (see MD Fracking Commission Casts First Vote – in 15 Months!), so let’s just say the Commission isn’t setting any speed records for activity.

The recommendations agreed to today are a first pass and leave out some key provisions. The recommendations, such as they are, will be forwarded to the Maryland state legislature which meets for 90 days each year starting in January.

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Dominion Energy | Energy Services | Exporting | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Statewide MD

Dominion Wins Case, New Cove Point LNG Export Facility Proceeds
January 7, 2013January 7, 2013

A court battle that started in early 2012 has a happy conclusion for energy giant Dominion. More than a year ago, Dominion filed for a permit to liquefy natural gas and export it from their facility at Cove Point, Maryland—60 miles southeast of Washington, D.C. Dominion has Japanese customers ready and waiting to buy natural gas from the U.S. But a 1970s legal settlement granted the Sierra Club with the power to reject significant changes to the facility. True to character, the Sierra Club objected in April (see Sierra Club Will Try to Block Maryland LNG Export Terminal).

On Friday, a Maryland judge ruled in favor of Dominion, which means Dominion can now proceed with their plans to invest up to $3.5 billion in the facility (an regional economic tsunami) to get it ready to export Marcellus Shale LNG from Cove Point.

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Regulation | Statewide MD

Maryland Shale Commission Misses Second Deadline for Report
December 18, 2012December 18, 2012

The “Keystone Cops” Marcellus Shale Advisory Commission appointed by Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley to study natural gas drilling and produce a set of best practices for hydraulic fracturing will miss their second deadline to produce a draft report. The first deadline was August 1, 2012 (see this MDN story). At that time, they said “we’ll get ‘er done by end of the year.” Oops. That won’t happen either. Now they’re saying they need extra time and will produce the report “sometime this spring.” Anyone up for a betting pool on when?

Here’s the latest (sad) news from Maryland:

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Anti-Drilling/Fossil Fuel | Garrett County | Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Regulation

Anti-Drilling Group Attempts Head Fake with Maryland Senator
December 11, 2012December 11, 2012

Maryland anti-drilling group CitizenShale is pressuring Maryland’s western senator, George Edwards, to support a moratorium on fracking in Maryland. CitizenShale is using head fakery by saying their request is that Edwards “not oppose” a new moratorium that will be introduced in January by anti-drillers from the Washington, D.C. suburbs (on the opposite side of the state).

The request from CitizenShale came at a pre-legislative meeting held at Garrett College (in Garrett County, one of two counties that have Marcellus Shale under them) where “residents” and those passing themselves off as residents gathered to talk about the upcoming Maryland legislative session that meets for just 90 days each year.

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Hydraulic Fracturing | Industrywide Issues | Maryland | Regulation | Statewide MD

MD Fracking Commission Casts First Vote – in 15 Months!
December 3, 2012December 3, 2012

Fifteen long months after it was created, Maryland’s Marcellus Shale Safe Drilling Initiative Advisory Commission, set up by Gov. Martin O’Malley, has cast its first formal vote. The vote came in western Maryland at a regularly scheduled meeting of the group.

The vote by the Commission proposes four broad principles revolving around (surprise!) money. Maryland legislators are making noise about passing new laws concerning the future of drilling during the next legislative session (due to meet in January), and the Commission apparently wanted to get out in front of some of the ideas being tossed around with their opinion.

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