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Marcellus Industry Tells U.S. Sen. Toomey “We Need More Workers”
Pennsylvania’s U.S. Senator Pat Toomey visited the Lackawanna College School of Petroleum and Natural Gas (PNG) near Tunkhannock (Wyoming County), PA yesterday. What struck us about coverage of the event is that PNG officials said they don’t have enough students to fill all of the available, open positions for graduates and that people from the industry said they don’t have enough workers to fill jobs in the Marcellus Shale.
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Last Tuesday, Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth Court ruled that Gov. Tom Wolf’s obscene carbon tax, called the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), will not go into effect until “pending further order of the court” (see 
Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia are all scrambling to form intrastate working groups or other alliances in an attempt to be THE state chosen for one of four regional hydrogen hubs funded by the recently passed so-called Biden infrastructure bill (see 
On Tuesday, Pennsylvania’s Commonwealth Court ruled that Gov. Tom Wolf’s obscene carbon tax, called the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), will not go into effect until “pending further order of the court.” What further action from the court is necessary was not disclosed. What is obvious is that Wolf’s attempt to force the state to join RGGI is now on a very long pause, until more court cases are filed. The end game (for Republicans) is to run out the clock until a new governor is elected in November (hopefully a Republican). Either that, or convince the 5-2 liberal majority of the PA Supreme Court (which is likely where this will end up) to rule against Wolf’s unilateral attempt to force the state into the RGGI compact.
Analysis by S&P Market Intelligence notes that new shale drilling permits issued in Pennsylvania dipped in February 2022 when compared to February 2021 (and dipped compared with January of 2022). Fair enough. The question is, Why did permits dip in February? The article alludes to a possible reason–a dip in the Henry Hub NYMEX price in February, going below $5/MMBtu. While price may have played a role, we believe there’s another contributing factor to the permit dip in February.
Yesterday the Pennsylvania State Senate failed to override a veto of Gov. Tom Wolf of a resolution that would have stopped PA from entering the so-called Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), an obscene carbon tax scheme. The override failed by a single vote. Wolf’s patsy, Dept. of Environmental Protection Secretary Pat McDonnell, gushed that he was “pleased” with the failure of the override. What happens now? A lawsuit lingers that can still block RGGI, but if that doesn’t work, PA residents will begin paying MUCH higher rates (a new tax) for their electricity beginning July 1st.
The Pennsylvania Independent Fiscal Office (IFO) is highly respected by all of PA state government. IFO’s mission is to review state budgetary policy and render expert, nonpartisan opinion. The IFO, at the request of the Republicans in the state legislature, recently reviewed Gov. Wolf’s Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) modeling, presenting its findings to a joint hearing of the Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee and the Community Economic and Recreational Development Committee on Tuesday. The IFO report finds that the money PA will spend on emissions credits at RGGI auctions will result in most PA electric rates quadrupling. You read that right–get ready to pay 4X for electricity if RGGI goes into effect and you live in the Keystone State.
On Wednesday, Pennsylvania House Bill (HB) 637, which would block the PA Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) authority to limit carbon dioxide emissions (thereby blocking PA’s entrance into the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, or RGGI) passed by a vote of 126 to 72. Some 10 Democrats crossed the aisle to vote in favor of the bill. HB 637 now goes to the PA Senate for a vote. What then?
Two northeastern Pennsylvania State Senators, Gene Yaw and Lisa Baker, along with members of the PA Senate Republican Caucus (27 Senators in all, filed a lawsuit in January 2021 against the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) over its illegal ban on fracking (see PA 
Democrats are SO predictable. They use the same playbook they’ve used for the past 50+ years. The minute they can’t defend their indefensible, nonsensical ideologies, they resort to calling their opponents bigots and sexists. It happened again Tuesday when northeastern Pennsylvania State Senator John Yukichak, an Independent who used to be a Democrat (but couldn’t stomach the extremism in the party anymore), called out PA Democrats and their environmental “hysteria” for defeating both the PennEast Pipeline project and the New Fortress Energy LNG export plant (both located in northeastern PA). Two PA Senators who happen to be women from the Philadelphia area trotted out the “he’s attacking the girls, he’s a misogynist and sexist” false claim. Typical.
It’s about to get a lot harder to drill a well or build any kind of pipeline in Pennsylvania, if the swamp dwellers at the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) get their way. The DEP recently released a draft Environmental Justice Policy set of regulations that will empower the radical left to block new drilling and new pipelines by using claims of racism.
Last Thursday 