More like an earthquake-inducing enema:
"States play catch-up amid boom in drilling; Regulation not pleasing anyone" by Nicholas Riccardi | Associated Press, February 28, 2013
DENVER — Colorado regulators grappling with a historic energy boom that’s pushing oil rigs to the very doorsteps of suburban schools and homes were among the first in the nation to require companies to disclose the chemicals they use in their new drilling techniques.
Now, the regulators have issued what they tout as the country’s toughest energy drilling regulations, requiring that rigs to be at least 500 feet away from occupied buildings and that their owners take other steps to limit pollution.
But few are pleased, underscoring the difficulties that governments across the country are facing as they try to regulate an industry that is moving ever closer to people’s neighborhoods but also contributing jobs and millions of dollars to local economies....
Environmentalists complain the new regulations have too many loopholes, while the energy industry frets they will create more hoops to jump through before it can hire people to extract the oil or gas from the ground.
‘‘There is so much energy in the ground that we can access, that it’s coming into more people’s backyards than ever before,’’ said Julia Bell, a spokeswoman for the Independent Petroleum Association of America....
Colorado is one of many that has dealt with the explosion in energy extraction that analysts say may enable the United States to overtake Saudi Arabia as the world’s top energy producer in a decade.
Then we need to attack and invade them now.
The same boom has brought drilling rigs, and the fears of air and water pollution that accompany them, into densely populated urban areas.
When they began lighting water on fire was when I became concerned.
Innovations like hydraulic fracturing, known as fracking, have made it easier to extract oil and especially natural gas from energy-rich geological formations such as the Niobrara shale, which stretches from Wyoming to beneath the densely populated Front Range of Colorado’s Rocky Mountains....
In Pittsburgh, the cradle of the American energy industry in the 19th century, new drilling projects were banned within city limits in 2010, but the state is challenging the authority of cities to issue such bans.‘‘We understand the necessity of drilling for oil and gas,’’ said Marc McCord, an activist who has fought against energy extraction in Dallas. ‘‘But drilling in a densely populated urban area is about as insane as anything on the face of the earth.’’
Anything in the service of energy resources.
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"Governor Andrew Cuomo awaiting study on fracking" by Michael Gormley | Associated Press, March 03, 2013
ALBANY, N.Y. — Governor Andrew Cuomo came as close as he ever has to approving fracking last month, laying out a limited drilling plan for as many as 40 gas wells before changing course to await the findings of a new study after discussions with environmentalist and former brother-in-law Robert F. Kennedy Jr., according to several people familiar with his thinking.
Related: Cuomo on Casinos
Also see: Sunday Globe Special: RFK, Jr. on the JFK Assassination
Has he woken up to global warming yet?
The turning point, which could delay a decision for up to a year or longer, came in a series of phone calls with Kennedy. The two discussed a new health study on the hydraulic fracturing drilling method that could be thorough enough to trump all others in a debate that has split New York for five years. ‘‘I think the issue suddenly got simple for him,’’ said Kennedy, who went on to paraphrase Cuomo in their discussions: ‘‘ ‘If it’s causing health problems, I really don’t want it in New York state. And if it’s not causing health problems, we should figure out a way we can do it.’ ’’
Kennedy and two other people close to Cuomo who spoke on condition of anonymity confirmed the outlines of the plan the governor was considering to allow 10 to 40 test wells in economically depressed southern New York towns that want drilling and the jobs it promises.
The plan would allow the wells to operate under intense monitoring by the state to see if fracking should continue or expand. They all said it was the closest Cuomo has come in his two years in office to making a decision on whether to green-light drilling.
The state has had a moratorium on the process since 2008 while other states in the gas-rich Marcellus Shale formation have seen local economies boom as drilling rigs have sprouted up.
Cuomo issued a brief statement Saturday saying that the state departments of environmental conservation and health are ‘‘in the process of making a determination with respect to the safety and health impacts of fracking....
The governor continues to refuse to talk about his internal process and wouldn’t comment directly for this story. He has been repeating that ‘‘science, not politics’’ will rule.
Kennedy, brother of Cuomo’s ex-wife, Kerry, described a governor who is intensely involved in the emotion-charged issue, which Cuomo privately likened to taking on the National Rifle Association over gun control laws....
See:
The Globe and Gun Control
I filled it back up again.
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"Anti-fracking group not registered" Associated Press, March 19, 2013
ALBANY, N.Y. — Dozens of celebrities may be running afoul of a law requiring lobbyists to register with the state as they unite under the banner of one group seeking to prevent a method of gas drilling in New York.
Artists Against Fracking opposes hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, and boasts members including Yoko Ono and actors Mark Ruffalo and Susan Sarandon.
The group says forcing water and chemicals deep into shale deposits to extract gas threatens drinking water and the environment.
The group’s website implores, ‘‘Tell Governor Cuomo: Don’t Frack New York.’’
But the group and nearly 200 entertainers who are gaining attention and support in the dispute, which is splitting New Yorkers, aren’t registered lobbyists, according to a search of the database of the state Joint Commission on Public Ethics.
So everyone was for fracking first? Or is the paper pro-oil?
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"N.Y. ‘fracking’ case tests home rule law; Appeals panel hears challenge by gas industry" by Mary Esch | Associated Press, March 22, 2013
ALBANY, N.Y. — Backers of natural gas drilling and environmental advocates wrangled Thursday over whether New York’s towns have the legal right to ban oil and gas development in a fight that could ultimately be decided by the state’s highest court.
A four-judge appellate panel heard arguments over the local bans in Dryden and Middlefield, two central New York towns among dozens in the state that have passed zoning laws prohibiting drilling. Opponents say state rules supersede such local restrictions.
The Dryden law is being challenged by drilling company Norse Energy, and the Middlefield ban by a dairy farmer who said the town’s action prevents her from making money from gas wells that had been planned for her land.
The cases are being closely watched by other towns across the state as a test of their constitutional right of ‘‘home rule.’’ They’re also of keen interest to the industry, which has said it can’t operate profitably in a state with a patchwork of local regulations that may shift with each town board election.
In the past few years, more than 50 New York municipalities have banned gas drilling, and more than 100 have enacted moratoriums on drilling activities. The bans stem from concerns about potential harm to the environment if the state lifts its five-year moratorium on gas drilling that uses high-volume hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. The process frees gas from deep rock deposits by injecting wells with chemical-laced water at high pressure.
Trial-level state Supreme Court judges have already upheld bans in Dryden, Middlefield, and the Livingston County town of Avon.
At the heart of the cases is the interpretation of a state law passed in 1981 that says regulation of the oil and gas industry rests solely with the state Department of Environmental Conservation, which ‘‘supersedes’’ local ordinances.
‘‘Our argument is that the towns of Dryden and Middlefield are not trying to regulate the industry; they recognize that regulating the industry is a matter for the state,’’ said Deborah Goldberg, a lawyer with an environmental group, Earthjustice, who is representing Dryden. “The town of Dryden is exercising its constitutionally protected local power to regulate land use through zoning.’’
Tom West, representing Norse, said the oil and gas law seeks to prevent waste of the resource and protect the mineral rights of multiple landowners.
The panel is expected to take six to eight weeks to rule.
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NEXT DAY UPDATE:
"The Environmental Protection Agency has dramatically lowered its estimate of how much of a potent heat-trapping gas leaks during natural gas production. The EPA revisions show emissions from the fracking boom can be managed."
I care more about the poisoning of drinking water and earthly pollution, sorry.
