It looks as though the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) has a data problem: They’ve been undercounting the number of Marcellus Shale gas wells in the state by a significant number. It’s especially a problem for legislators who are trying to calculate how much money new impact fees might generate.
Read More “PA DEP Undercounting Marcellus Gas Wells – By 12%”
Although the Pennsylvania House, Senate and governorship are all controlled by Republicans (for the first time in many years), they have not yet agreed on new legislation that puts stricter environmental controls in place over shale gas drilling in the state. The pending legislation, introduced last year after Gov. Tom Corbett appointed an advisory commission to propose new regulations, also includes an impact fee assessed on each new well drilled.
PA Senate President Pro Tempore Joe Scarnati believes all parties to the discussion are very close to agreement and hopes the legislation will be passed by early February, before it can get bogged down in election-year politicking.
Read More “Will New PA Drilling Law/Impact Fee Pass in 2012?”
The Clean Air Council, an anti-drilling environmental group, has set its sights on preventing new compressor stations from being built in the Marcellus Shale as one way to slow down or stop new drilling. Compressor stations remove moisture and pressurize natural gas to move it through pipelines. The two biggest concerns most people have with compressor stations are air emissions and noise—both legitimate concerns.
Compressor stations are regulated and monitored by the PA Department of Environmental Protection (DEP). The federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is also getting involved by using the federal Clean Air Act, which brings some compressor plants under their purview.
Read More “Clean Air Council Targets Pipeline Compressor Plants”
In a wide-ranging article talking about the natural gas industry in Pennsylvania, and how it is maturing, we get this bit about landowners’ prospects in signing new lease deals from a National Association of Royalty Owners (NARO) rep:
Read More “NARO Says Marcellus Land Grab in PA is Over for Landowners”
A recent example from western Pennsylvania illustrates how drilling companies and residents in PA are working together to resolve thorny issues and move forward with gas drilling in a way that everyone can live with:
Read More “Gas Drillers and Townships Working Together Resolve Issues”
Results from two different surveys on resident’s attitudes toward shale gas drilling in New York and Pennsylvania were delivered at the Agribusiness Economic Outlook Conference, held Dec. 13 at Cornell University. Richard Stedman, associate professor of natural resources at Cornell, reported the following from a survey of 6,000 residents in both New York and Pennsylvania:
Read More “Cornell Conference: Majorities in NY & PA Support Drilling”
Leaders from 44 Pennsylvania municipalities in seven counties met Tuesday night to express their concern over state legislation nearing passage that would strip away most local control of shale gas drilling. PA Gov. Tom Corbett believes most control for drilling should be handled at the state level, something the drilling industry also favors, giving drillers an even, consistent playing field across the state instead of a patchwork of regulations that differ from area to area and even from township to township.
But local municipal leaders maintain a “one size fits all” is not the answer—that local leaders and the citizens they represent should have a say on which areas in their locales should be industrialized and which should not, and what restrictions they want to place on drilling activities. Their point: Who knows better the local character and conditions than municipal leaders, who answer to local voters?
Read More “PA Municipal Leaders Say “No” to Proposed Drilling Law”
On Tuesday, the Pennsylvania State Senate have approved a bill that would direct PA utility inspectors to use federal safety standards with most new shale gas gathering pipelines in the state. The measure now goes to the PA House for consideration.
Read More “PA Senate Passes Bill Enforcing Fed Standards on Pipelines”
The Pennsylvania State Association of Township Supervisors (PSATS) originally opposed PA House Bill 1950 and Senate Bill 1100, the two primary bills before the General Assembly that deal with the issue of natural gas development that are now very close to reconciliation and a signature from Gov. Tom Corbett. PSATS’ primary objection is that the bills would strip away most, if not all, municipal authority to regulate gas drilling in their own communities. Recent amendments to the bills have made them “more reasonable” and more palatable to PSATS, but they are still not good enough to garner an endorsement.
Read More “PA Town Supervisors Still Not Happy with Proposed Legislation”
The Pennsylvania legislature has been working on new laws to tighten regulation of the Marcellus Shale drilling industry. Since January 2011, both the PA Senate and House are now controlled by Republicans, as well as the governorship, giving new Marcellus legislation a good chance of passing. The new laws are a result of, and based on, the findings of an advisory committee appointed by Gov. Tom Corbett earlier this year (see this MDN story).
Both the PA Senate and House have passed slightly different versions of legislation and those versions are now being reconciled in committee to work out the differences so a bill can be sent to Gov. Corbett for signing. One of the outstanding issues to be reconciled is how much of a bond should drillers pay to decommission a well.
Read More “PA Legislature Deals with Bonding to Decommission Gas Wells”
Spectra Energy has received Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) approval for their Texas Eastern Appalachia to Market (TEAM) 2012 pipeline expansion project which expands Texas Eastern’s existing pipeline system and allows them to deliver extra Marcellus Shale gas to the northeast market in the U.S. A map detailing the existing pipeline and the proposed upgrades is embedded below.
Read More “Spectra Gets FERC Approval to Expand PA Marcellus Pipeline”
MDN recently highlighted a new study of several hundred water wells by Penn State researchers which found no evidence of chemical or methane contamination related to nearby Marcellus gas drilling (see this MDN story). The study did announce one oddity in the data: increased levels of bromide in seven wells. That oddity has now been explained—it was a lab error. Oops. Bottom line conclusion from the study? Shale gas drilling does not lead to either methane or chemical contamination of nearby water wells.
Read More “Error Found in Penn State Fracking & Water Well Study”
Penn State University professor Terry Engelder, a tireless supporter and promoter of shale gas drilling—particularly in the Marcellus Shale—has just been named one of Foreign Policy Magazine’s “Top 100 Global Thinkers” for 2011 for his research into recovering natural gas from shale using hydraulic fracturing.
Read More “PSU Prof Engelder Named One of Top 100 Global Thinkers”
Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett is hopeful that the Republican-controlled Senate and House will pass new Marcellus Shale drilling legislation that reaches him by year’s end. But one of the political footballs is working out the issue of setbacks, or how far away a gas well can be drilled from a body of water like a creek, a private water well or a spring. Put the gas well too close and critics argue you increase the chance that an accident can damage the water supply. But make setbacks too far and it makes it practically impossible to drill any wells because the state has so many small waterways. That is, it becomes a back door way to prevent all drilling.
Here is the current state of play between the two differing versions of legislation that have passed in the Senate and House which now need to be reconciled before reaching Gov. Corbett:
Read More “PA Legislature Struggles with Gas Well Setback Provision”
A new report on a “housing crisis” in Pennsylvania’s northern-tier counties has just been released by The Institute for Public Policy and Economic Development, a research partnership among Keystone College, King’s College, Luzerne County Community College, Marywood University, Misericordia University, Penn State Wilkes-Barre, The Commonwealth Medical College, University of Scranton, and Wilkes University. A copy of the 200 page study is available to download below.
The study purports to show that when counties attract a lot of shale gas drilling activity, they also attract a housing crisis because workers in the drilling industry make more money than non-drilling industry residents and are willing to pay more to rent housing.
Read More “New Study Claims Housing Crisis in NE PA from Gas Drilling”
The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) is attempting to “kill two birds with stone” by allowing Marcellus Shale gas drillers to use acid mine drainage from abandoned coal mines as water for hydraulic fracturing of shale gas wells. Yet another example of how gas drilling can be good for the environment.
Read More “PA DEP Allows Acid Mine Water to be Used in Fracking”