PA DEP Not Releasing Report on Franklin Forks Contamination
If you thought (like we did) that the matter of potential water well methane contamination in Franklin Forks, PA was put to rest with the recent announcement by the state Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) that drilling is not to blame, you would be wrong. In December 2011, three families in the Franklin Forks (Susquehanna County) area complained their well water had gone bad. Nearby drilling by WPX was to blame, according to the homeowners. But after an exhaustive 16-month investigation, the state DEP announced earlier this week that WPX’s drilling is not to blame (see PA DEP Says Drilling Did NOT Contaminate Water in Franklin Forks). The DEP said the same natural conditions that closed down a nearby trailer park more than a decade ago was the cause. Case closed, right?
No. And here’s why… According to at least one news source, the DEP refuses to release a copy of the report that discloses their findings and the methodology they used to arrive at the conclusions they did. You can bet that anti-drillers will attack this like vultures picking over a dead carcass. Here is what the Epoch Times is reporting about the “missing report”:
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The Pennsylvania Supreme Court has just ruled on a case with huge consequences for the natural gas drilling industry in the state. We won’t keep you in suspense: the ruling is favorable to the drilling industry.
The following article was written by MDN friend and prolific contributor of links and story ideas, Chris Acker. Chris splits his time between Montrose, PA (in Susquehanna County) and Savannah, GA. Here is his biography from the Seeking Alpha website:
When was the last time you heard about a country bank that had so much money, it was having problems finding enough people and businesses to lend it to? Yeah, we’ve never heard of that either.
Last week energy analyst Richard Zeits posted a terrific piece on Cabot Oil & Gas on the Seeking Alpha website (see
Another post from energy analyst Richard Zeits on the Seeking Alpha website—this time about the tremendous amount of natural gas Cabot Oil & Gas is mining in Susquehanna County, PA. Zeits says the gas Cabot is finding and selling “may be material to the U.S. supply.” You read that right. One “little” oil and gas driller’s efforts in rural Susquehanna County, PA may well end up influencing the entire U.S. energy picture.
The 2012 reports continue to roll in. Cabot Oil & Gas has just reported its 2012 report and the results are extraordinary. Cabot joined two different “1 billion” clubs in 2012. First, they surpassed $1 billion in revenues for 2012, earning $1.2 billion. Second, they became the first (and so far only) company to achieve 1 billion cubic feet of natural gas production per day in the Marcellus Shale (see