PA DEP Sec. John Quigley Resigns Over Email Collusion Scandal
Last Friday the Pennsylvania Secretary of the Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP), John Quigley, abruptly resigned. It was sudden and unexpected and came a few hours after Gov. Wolf’s administration announced it has launched an investigation into an email sent by Quigley using a private email account (same m.o. as Hillary) to several radically left environmental groups. He used a back channel to communicate with the groups, to avoid detection and future Freedom of Information Law requests. News reports say the email, which was sent in April, urged the enviro groups to mobilize and press for action to support the onerous so-called greenhouse gas regulations Quigley is trying adopt. Shortly after receiving the email, those groups, including Quigley’s former employer–the radical PennEnvironment–flew into action and began advertisements that support Quigley’s unpopular regulations. The ads targeted Democrats who are opposing the regulations. In other words, John Quigley colluded with PennEnvironment and other radical enviro groups. Whether the collusion was illegal or just unethical will be up to investigators (and perhaps prosecutors and the courts) to decide. It’s very good news–for drillers, landowners and all PA residents–that Quigley is now gone…
Read More “PA DEP Sec. John Quigley Resigns Over Email Collusion Scandal”
In June 2015 then-Secretary of the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP), John Quigley, slapped Range Resources with an $8.9 million fine–the largest such fine ever levied by the DEP (see 
MDN previously reported on the injustice happening in Bulter County where a handful of anti-drilling parents from the Mars School District, backed by money from Philadelphia from Big Green groups Delaware Riverkeeper and Clean Air Council, filed frivolous lawsuit after frivolous lawsuit–denying landowners in Middlesex Township revenue from legally permitted drilling. The actions by these radicalized parents have cost the taxpayers of Middlesex Township over $80,000 in legal fees. So the landowners got together and sued them, to stop this miscarriage of justice (see 
We wonder if the anti-pipeline/anti-fossil fuel zealots in Lebanon County, PA are trying to kill members of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) by boring them to death. The local antis–a small yet vociferous group of nattering nabobs–have hounded the Lebanon County Board of Commissioners into sending along a 1,000-page tome to FERC listing their concerns with two pipeline projects. Along with the bore-you-to-death document, the Commissioners have included a letter requesting FERC extend the comment period on the Atlantic Sunrise Project by an extra 30 days. Which sounds reasonable–except at the end of that 30 days the antis will ask for another extension, then another, and another. That’s the strategy. If you can’t dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with, well, you know what…
What has happened to one of the world’s finest research universities? A press release issued yesterday by Penn State touts their participation in helping set up a seismic monitoring system throughout Pennsylvania. In the announcement, Penn State researchers openly admit this about a series of tiny quakes in western PA that couldn’t be felt at the surface: “We have not done enough analysis of the data to make any conclusions yet, but there is a correlation spatially and temporally between the fracking and the earthquakes.” In other words–“We haven’t actually done the research, but we’re going to say there’s a connection between fracking and earthquakes–because we feel like it.” That’s not science–that’s politics. Real scientists observe first, then conclude. Penn State is reversing that order–they already have their conclusions, now it’s just a matter of warping the observations to fit their conclusions. Sad…
Some great news to share. A landowner in Wayne County, PA–in the Delaware River Basin–has 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. MDN has chronicled, for years, the lawless actions of the DRBC in seizing power it does not have to block shale drilling in essentially two PA counties where there is measurable quantities of shale gas that could be extracted: Wayne County and Pike County. DRBC’s former director, Carol Collier, is a hardened anti-driller who colluded with Josh Fox in making his infamous propaganda film Gasland. Collier is gone and it was thought her replacement, Steve Tambini would bring some order and sense to the organization (see 
Earlier this year Alpha Natural Resources (ANR), primarily a coal company with 27,400 acres of Marcellus/Utica Shale leases, filed for bankruptcy and announced it would sell off its Marcellus assets. ANR previously had a joint venture with Rice Energy (which Rice later bought out). Rice was also interested in the 27K acres ANR is selling as part of their bankruptcy–and made a “stalking horse” bid of $200 million for the assets (see 
New research just published by Indiana University confirms what those with common sense already knew: If at least some of the fees paid by drillers go into the local township’s coffers instead of the county or state–people in that community are more accepting and favorable to drilling. IU questioned 453 PA residents in June 2014 (takes a long time to publish research) asking a variety of questions. The research shows that the public has more trust that revenues will be spent better by their local municipal government than by the county or state. Don’t you just love it when common sense breaks out? Of course PA’s far-left/liberal governor, Tom Wolf, is tone deaf when it comes to taxing the Marcellus industry. He wants to grab all the money he can and give it to teachers unions. PA has an impact fee which keeps 60% of fees raised local–a plan that works. Wolf wants to add a severance tax on top of the impact fee, which would create the nation’s highest severance tax rate (see 
Last month MDN told you that the Penn Township (Westmoreland County) zoning board refused to grant a permit to Apex Energy to build a DEP-permitted well pad in the town (see 
The U.S. Dept. of Energy’s National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) selected Penn State University to lead a consortium of nine universities in all that will study fossil fuel technologies for the next six years. NETL is giving Penn State $20 million of your money (i.e. taxpayer’s money) “to accelerate the development and deployment of fossil fuel-based technologies.” We can certainly think of worse uses for the money. Penn State will lead the Lucky University CoalItion for Fossil Energy Research (LUCiFER). Uh no! That’s not right! Let’s try it again: Penn State will lead the University Coalition for Fossil Energy Research (UCFER). There, that’s it! Here’s what the feds said, and what Penn State said, about the new grant and the new UCFER coalition…
Two more partisan organizations in Pennsylvania are publicly supporting PA Gov. Tom Wolf’s proposed redo of drilling regulations–regulations that threaten conventional and unconventional drilling in the state. The fact that the radical PA Trout Unlimited and the League of [Liberal Democrat] Women Voters of Pennsylvania are supporting the Dept. of Environmental Protection’s update of Rule 78 and 78a is all you need to know about just how bad a proposal it is. These groups join other anti-drilling groups in supporting the new rules (see 
Last night representatives from Spectra Energy held a town hall meeting at the Congruity Presbyterian Church in Westmoreland County, PA to discuss the explosion of Spectra’s Texas Eastern Transmission’s (TETCO) “Delmont Line 27” which exploded in Westmoreland County, PA on April 29 (see