New York Waits, Learns from Pennsylvania, West Virginia Shale
Drilling
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review
25 August 2010
By Andrew Conte
New York's moratorium on Marcellus shale drilling allowed regulators
there to learn from experiences in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, a
top official said Tuesday.
New York state has not allowed gas well drilling into the shale for two
years and plans to issue strict rules before doing so, said Jack Dahl,
director of the Bureau of Oil and Gas Regulation in the New York
Department of Environmental Conservation.
Since early 2008, Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection
has issued 3,800 Marcellus shale well permits and more than 1,400
violations against drillers. Regulators cited drillers for blowouts at
gas wells here and in West Virginia, and dozens of violations include
discharges of industrial waste and poorly constructed impoundment ponds.
"We have learned from the other states, and what may be done in a
different way if we don't have it covered," Dahl said during an
industry conference in Cecil, hosted by West Virginia University, that
drew about 100 participants.
Regulators in New York would require companies to disclose chemicals
they use in hydraulic fracturing -- which Pennsylvania does not -- and
to hold flowback water in closed containers, rather than the open pits
allowed in Pennsylvania, Dahl said. New York would not issue permits
for more wells than it could routinely inspect, Dahl said.
Environmental groups and regulators need time to catch up with the
fast-moving industry, said Shanda Minney, executive director of the
West Virginia Rivers Coalition, a nonprofit organization that advocates
for clean water.
"Without some kind of slowdown or moratorium like New York put in
place, we're going to be cleaning up rather than playing catch up,"
Minney said.
Gas companies have been fracturing rock formations to release gas
safely for 60 years, said Jim Cannon, spokesman for Range Resources, a
Fort Worth company with an office in Cecil. No proof exists of
groundwater contamination from hydraulic fracturing, he said.
"There's no point in having a moratorium if we're doing things safely
and efficiently," Cannon said.
"The more wells you drill, the more information you get," said Jaime
Kostelnik, senior geologic scientist with the Pennsylvania Geological
Survey, a state agency that studies but does not regulate gas drilling.
Any advantage from regulatory delay comes with a price from lost
investment, said Doug Patchen, director of the Appalachian Oil and
Natural Gas Research Consortium at West Virginia University.
"They've lost a lot of money that they could have had," Patchen said.
The number of permits for conventional gas wells in New York dropped to
552 last year from 744 the previous year, Dahl said, and likely will
not break 500 this year. Gas companies are investing instead in states
that permit Marcellus shale drilling, he said.
Andrew Conte can be reached at andrewconte@tribweb.com or 412-320-7835.