The Gray Lady vs. the natural gas industry. Politico. The fight between The New York Times and the natural gas industry is going nuclear. A series of critical articles in the paper of record has the natural gas industry fuming as it struggles to persuade the public that hydraulic fracturing is a safe, clean, inexpensive and reliable way of securing the nation’s energy supply for decades to come. The stories from reporter Ian Urbina have spurred federal investigators and caused falling stock prices. They’ve questioned the environmental impacts of gas drilling on drinking water as well as the economic health of the industry, casting doubt on rosy federal projections of gas’s future and using anonymous quotes to compare the shale gas boom to Enron and the dot-com stock bubble.
Five Ideas to Kick-Start Job Creation. Wall Street Journal, Op-Ed. The revolution in natural-gas extraction, driven by hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking" of America's huge shale deposits, has boosted shale gas to 25% of America's gas supplies from 1% in 2001. But environmentalists are pushing to close down this booming industry due to concerns over contamination of water supplies. Here's a solution: Declare all hydraulic fracturing legal with the caveat that drillers put up a bond equal to the potential cleanup cost of environmental damage. This will force large players to consolidate what is mostly a "wildcat" market.
Criticism of Shale Gas Articles, and of the Critic. New York Times. Two columns on articles by Ian Urbina about the development of shale gas drew strong responses. Here’s what some readers said in response to my July 17 piece discussing Mr. Urbina’s June 26 article about gas producers’ allegedly exaggerated claims.
M&A by US energy utilities at four-year high. Financial Times. Mergers and acquisitions by US energy utilities rose to their highest level for four years in the first half of this year, emphasising how consolidation is being driven by low prices for natural gas, demand for heavy investment and more willingness by regulators to accept deals. … The shale gas boom, which has caused a rise in US natural gas production as the industry has opened up reserves in shales and other rocks previously unviable economically, has driven down prices for both gas and electricity.
Gas memo sparks investigation in rural Ohio town. Associated Press. A memo that appears to coach buyers of oil and gas drilling leases to use deceptive tactics on unsuspecting landowners has provoked a state investigation and spirited debate in rural Ohio, the latest frontier in America’s quest for new energy resources. … Attorney General Mike DeWine could find no evidence it belonged to Jim Bucher, a landman for West Bay Exploration Co., based in Traverse City, Mich., or that it was used to mislead area residents.
INTERNATIONAL
Don't believe fracking scare stories. The Press (New Zealand), Op-Ed. The New Zealand gas industry is facing a medieval witch hunt over fracking. Perhaps, we are at fault. We believe fracking (hydraulic fracturing) is a tried and reasonable technology, after 40 years of experience in New Zealand without incident, using our methods, and under our laws. But we haven't come out and said so in these words. Now it is clear a lot of people do not agree.
Coal seam gas industry under the microscope. Manning River Times. The environmental, social and economic impacts of coal seam gas mining and exploration in NSW will be examined by a wide-ranging parliamentary inquiry. The inquiry, by the upper house committee responsible for resources and energy, is expected to hold public hearings in October and November to examine the environmental impacts of coal seam gas mining, including the use of hydraulic fracturing, or ''fracking''.
Let’s heed these protesters’ concerns. The Guardian, Editorial. Obviously our politicians are well aware of the controversy over fracking. Conservative Leader Olive Crane says she would ban it if her party forms the government after the next election, and Environment Minister Richard Brown has stressed that companies with exploration permits would still need approval to begin fracking - something the province wouldn't give until studies on the impact of the process are completed by the U.S. EPA and the Canadian government.
COLORADO
Erecting barriers instead of oil rigs?
Denver Post, Op-Ed. Recently, there seems to be a continuous stream of press reports about impacts of oil and gas development, and hydraulic fracturing specifically. The environmental community invokes fear by using terms to describe fracking like "toxic," "known carcinogens," "radionuclides," "endocrine disruptors" and "unknown wastes." And reports imply the oil and gas industry is "unregulated." But the truth is the fracking process is highly regulated and is no different than any other industrial or manufacturing process — it is highly engineered and is supervised on many levels.
LOUISIANA
DeSoto police jurors to vote on taxpayer relief. Shreveport Times. DeSoto Parish's taxable assessed valuation was $168 million in 2001 and grew by $21 million in 2006. The oil and gas boom picked up in 2007, pushing the assessed value up 25 percent to $237 million. It's grown each year since and in 2010 was set at $432 million.
Alan Offner, of Foley & Judell LLP, recommended police jurors pay off the balance — estimated at just more than $2 million — in September, which will relieve property taxpayers of the millage.
NORTH CAROLINA
Fracking: Promise--and Peril. Southern Pines Pilot. “Are you lost?” That was how Jeffrey Reid of the North Carolina Geological Survey (NCGS) was greeted in Pittsburgh three years ago before making a presentation at the annual conference of the Association of American Petroleum Geologists (AAPG). Reid’s presence at the group’s annual conference came as a surprise to other participants because North Carolina has not traditionally been thought of as an oil and gas state.
Fracking: Leases Are Very Complex. Southern Pines Pilot. Ted Feitshans has a four-page handout riddled with bullet points for landowners to consider before signing a mineral rights lease that would allow fracking on their property. “The real bottom line is that you need an attorney to sort through it,” is the word from Feitshans, an attorney and Extension Service associate professor at N.C. State University. “The issues are so complex, and there’s not a lot known nationally about fracking and its effects.”
NORTH DAKOTA
Interest grows in Blackfeet Reservation oil and gas exploration. Great Falls Tribune. A small spill from an oil collector pipeline in June that went unreported for weeks gave the Blackfeet Tribe a black eye at a bad time, just as a flurry of oil exploration is leading to good-paying jobs for tribal members such as Sutherland, said Grinnell Day Chief, the Blackfeet Tribe's director of oil and gas. The tribe, he said, hopes the exploration will lead to recoverable oil. Production would lead to even more local jobs in the oil industry, and the possibility of millions of dollars in royalties.
In a reversal, dependence on oil imports falls. McClatchy Newspapers. The US was so dependent on foreign oil that by 2008 it imported two-thirds of what the country’s refineries needed to produce enough gasoline, diesel and the other petroleum products to meet the country’s needs. … But recently the federal EIA reported that in 2010 imports had fallen far more than many realized — to 49 percent of the country’s needs. And on the supply side, U.S. oil production, after languishing for years, is on the upswing. One example is North Dakota. Perhaps within a year the state is expected to supply more oil for domestic use than the 1.1 million barrels a day that Saudi Arabia now exports to the United States.
2011 RANKINGS: North Dakota is Jobs Leader. Business Facilities. North Dakota is the top-ranked state in the Employment Leaders category of Business Facilities 2011 State Rankings Report. Nebraska, South Dakota and New Hampshire finished second, third and fourth, respectively. More than 4,000 active oil wells are now producing oil from the Bakken Shale Formation in North Dakota, which is believed to hold reserves totalling at least 3.65 billion barrels of oil. The oil boom has created a surge of jobs in Dunn, Montrail and Mercer counties.
NORTHEAST
DEP boss: We won't leave scars. Hazleton Standard Speaker. Michael Krancer, the secretary of Pennsylvania's Department of Environmental Protection, who opened the conference on Friday at Best Western Genetti Inn and Suites, said he will police gas drilling so companies don't pollute air and water. "We're very sensitive to leaving a legacy," Krancer said, while adding that public sensibilities are different now than a century ago when coal mining left its mark. "People today won't tolerate scars on the land" or pollution in the air, he said.
11 Percent of Water Wells Contain Methane Before Drilling. WVNS-TV. Chesapeake Energy–funded laboratory tests find dissolved methane in about 11 percent of northern panhandle drinking-water wells before drilling for gas in the Marcellus shale ever begins. Two wells of 1,312 tested in Brooke, Ohio, Marshall and Wetzel counties turned up with potentially dangerous levels of methane. Chesapeake released its data to the State Journal as follow-up to a May study that showed methane contamination of drinking-water wells in northeast Pennsylvania and nearby NY state.
The Marcellus shale has huge potential. Charleston Daily Mail, Editorial. Cal Dooley, president and CEO of the American Chemistry Council, recently laid out in a letter to the Wall Street Journal the impact that shale gas could have on the U.S. chemical industry. In a word, huge. Production from the Marcellus shale already has turned a $100 million deficit in the U.S. balance of trade for chemicals to a $3.7 billion surplus last year. "Plastic exports alone were up 10 percent last year," he said. "Industry leaders such as Dow Chemical and Eastman Chemical have re-started plants idled by the recession. Other companies are expected to announce expansion plans in the U.S."
Why Pa. mustn't levy new tax on gas drillers. Philadelphia Inquirer, Lt. Gov. Jim Cawley. What if there was an industry that had 70,000 Pennsylvanians working in it - or providing supplies to it - and that industry was being lobbied to move to West Virginia? Wouldn't Pennsylvanians rightly demand that our leaders do everything possible to keep these jobs here? From loans for capital improvements to tax incentives, wouldn't everything be on the table? What if there was a new industry - one projected to hire 200,000 Pennsylvanians over the next decade - that was debating whether to set up a corporate headquarters in Edmonton, Alberta (Canada), or Williamsport, Pa.?
N.J. revising its energy policy. Asbury Park Press. New Jersey is overhauling its energy policy for the second time in three years as states make more-frequent rewrites to keep up with technology changes and ideological shifts. Northeast states have been responding lately to the abundance of natural gas drawn from the Pennsylvania section of the Marcellus Shale, a geologic formation in the Appalachian basin. It has dropped gas prices to a third of 2008 peaks. “Shale gas is a game-changer,’’ said David Solan, director of the Energy Policy Institute at Boise State University.
Argall: Economy showing plenty of 'good signs'. Standard Speaker. Argall said a good example is the natural gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale. "Think of the most rural parts of Schuylkill County," Argall said. "Bradford County looks like the Lewistown Valley. It has maybe half, or a third of the population of Schuylkill County, but it now has the lowest unemployment rate in the state. We believe 70,000 new jobs have been created in the last few years. Bradford County has created more new jobs because of (natural) gas than Philadelphia, Pittsburgh or Allentown. We believe we can create jobs and still protect the environment."
DEP Wants Nine More Gas Well Inspectors for State. WV Metro News. Officials with the West Virginia DEP want to add to the number of inspectors to keep an eye on the anticipated increase in gas well sites across West Virginia. Those with the agency say they're hoping lawmakers will include funding for those additional inspectors in an legislation dealing with statewide regulations for natural gas drilling in the Marcellus shale.
Fracking water netting revenue. Centre Daily Times. They can’t collect an impact fee, but at least one community in Centre County has found a way to bring in revenue from Marcellus Shale drilling activity. Hydrofracking a Marcellus well to free the gas trapped deep underground requires millions of gallons of water, and drillers have been willing to pay top dollar to ensure an ample and steady supply. The Bellefonte Borough Water Authority has sold its water to drillers and gas well service companies “for years,” according to assistant borough manager Don Holderman.
Public will soon have chance to comment on fracking-rule plan.
Times Herald-Record. Better start reading those 1,095 pages of the proposed state regulations for fracking. Your time to comment on the draft rules for the horizontal gas drilling process of high volume hydraulic fracturing — fracking — could begin in just a few weeks, or by the end of August, says a spokeswoman for the state DEC. All that's needed for the public comment period to start is the completion of a final section of the proposed regulations — on the socio-economic impacts of drilling the gas-rich Marcellus shale, which sits beneath Sullivan County and much of the Southern Tier.
N.Y. gas producers aim to extend expiring leases on state forests as they await hydrofracking permits. Gannett. One of the country's largest natural-gas producers and the state of New York appear headed for a battle over a soon-to-be-expiring contract for the natural-gas rights on state forestland. Chesapeake Energy contends that the company's gas leases on 15,472 state-owned acres in central New York and the Southern Tier should be extended as the state decides how to regulate the hydraulic-fracturing method to extract natural gas.
Gas land pooling discussion revived in Harrisburg. Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Gov. Tom Corbett has said he won't sign it. Top lawmakers call it a "deal breaker" and have cautioned that firearms should be taken away from the citizenry before it is approved. And yet, with six short bullet points, the Marcellus Shale Advisory Commission has revived debate over whether to allow land to be gathered into a larger drilling unit, even against a property owner's wishes.
Tech makes tracking well sites even easier.
Towanda Daily Review. A Conyngham Borough native is posting public information about the location of gas wells in Pennsylvania, their production statistics and violations, if any, on a website he has developed. The website at www.fracktrack.org is a project undertaken by Jamie Serra to spread public awareness about the drilling activities that are changing both the economy and the environment in the Marcellus Shale formation that covers much of Northeast Pennsylvania. Mr. Serra is a staffer for the Democratic chairman of the House Environmental Resources and Energy Committee, but his website is a non-profit sideline venture that's separate from his job.
Facts on drilling show a different view. Ithaca Journal, LTE. For two years, concerned people in the Town of Dryden, including some who signed gas company leases, have been educating themselves and others about the costs and benefits of hydraulic fracturing. They have studied scientific reports, gas industry statistics, the draft Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Statement issued by DEC, and facts from communities where fracking has taken place.
Scientific facts don’t back gas companies’ Marcellus shale claims. Bluefield Daily Telegraph. Members of an organization aiming to preserve Monroe County maintain that hydrofracture drilling on the Marcellus shale will be harmful to their way of life. In a previous article run in the Bluefield Daily Telegraph last Monday, Dr. L. Zane Shuck, a retired professional engineer who worked early on with the development of hydrofracture technology, discussed the safety and implementation hydrofracture drilling.
Backpedaling on methane migration. Centre Daily Times. Since residents of Dimock, Pa., were first videotaped lighting their tap water on fire, methane migration has become one of the most central issues in the debate on the merits and drawbacks of Marcellus gas drilling in the state. For a long time, industry representatives have denied their drilling into the Marcellus formation could have anything to do with methane making its way into water supplies. They have claimed the fracking process occurs thousands of feet beneath aquifers, and that it was impossible for methane to make its way up through that much thick rock.
Clean water trumps gas in importance. Philadelphia Inquirer, Editorial. Pennsylvania's experience with shale-gas drilling has given the Delaware River Basin Commission plenty of reason to take a long and careful look before letting the rigs set up shop in the region's most important watershed. Gas wells bring up millions of gallons of water that carries high levels of radioactivity. Air pollution builds up as drilling rigs and diesel trucks and huge gas-pumping compressors proliferate. Pipelines spread across the land, even where landowners don't want them to cross.
Don't let frack proposal go unchallenged. Oneonta Daily Star, Op-Ed. What a frackin' mess. The state Department of Environmental Conservation's revised recommendations for regulating hydraulic fracturing raise enough issues to plug a gas well, which is what opponents of drilling are hoping for. A review of the DEC's proposals tells me that the agency realizes how risky and potentially disastrous fracking is.
TEXAS
Fracking Drought Hits Texas. KUHF Houston. Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking for short, is widely touted as the key to unlocking vast reserves of oil and natural gas trapped in underground shale formations. The problem is that the “hydro” is in short supply. Peter Zeihan is an analyst with Austin-based private intelligence firm Stratfor. “This is a very water intensive process. You don’t get a particularly high percentage of the water back even if you’re being very conservative with its use. This has really delayed developments in, for example, the Eagle Ford Shale.”
Higher optimism among San Antonio businesses. San Antonio Express. Three area companies — Mission Restaurant Supply Co., Health by Design and Heartland Enterprises, a customized machine shop in Fredericksburg — foresee significant growth if current trends hold. “We're booming,” said Dave Campbell, Heartland's owner. “We've added 10 people this year, and we need more.” Oil and gas work associated with the Eagle Ford shale formation is helping his business and others. “All of South Texas is real healthy right now,” said Jack Lewis, owner of the restaurant supply company, which has added 25 employees this year and will hire more when a McAllen outlet opens later this summer.
How do you avoid nat gas drilling accidents? Tillerson and Hackett have a debate. Fuel Fix/Houston Chronicle. Think the oil and gas industry marches in lock-step when it comes to all things energy? Think again. During a meeting of the National Petroleum Council in The Woodlands last week some of the disagreements were on clear display as the CEOs of ExxonMobil and Anadarko Petroleum debated the best way for the industry to make sure it operates safely. First, a primer on the National Petroleum Council: it’s a collection of industry, academic, government and other officials who gather to give advice and issue reports on topics for the Secretary of Energy.