Drilling Eeforms Expected to Get Legislative Attention
Charleston Gazette
8 January 2011
By Ken Ward Jr.
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Oil and gas lobbyists and environmental groups are
both offering cautious reactions to a Department of Environmental
Protection proposal for a wholesale rewrite of the way West Virginia
regulates drilling operations across the state.
Citizen groups are hoping to persuade lawmakers to strengthen the
legislation, while industry officials are still suffering "sticker
shock" from a permit fee increase intended to help pay for improved
regulation of their operations.
"It's a start," said Don Garvin, lead lobbyist for the West Virginia
Environmental Council. "It's significantly better than the current
program."
DEP officials, after months of talks with groups on both sides, have
put together a 141-page bill in response to growing citizen concerns
about the boom in horizontal drilling, especially for gas reserves in
the Marcellus Shale formation.
Among other things, the bill aims to get a handle on how much water
drillers use and how they dispose of their polluted wastewater, and on
the increased surface footprint required for the larger drilling sites
and wells.
Companies would have to submit water management plans that list the
chemicals used in drilling and describe how they would dispose of
drilling wastewater. It includes a new set of performance standards,
and would require any well sites greater than five acres in size to
submit formal designs put together by a professional engineer.
DEP Secretary Randy Huffman said his agency got the approval of Acting
Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin to seek a sponsor for the bill, but that the
legislation is not among Tomblin's own legislative priorities.
The bill rewrites entire sections of oil and gas law and creates
several major new regulatory requirements. A $10,000 permit fee on all
horizontal wells would help DEP double the size of its 32-person Office
of Oil and Gas.
"What we have here is not a new twist on the same industry," Huffman
said last week. "In my view as a regulator, we have a whole new
industry and we don't have a regulatory program to deal with that
industry."
In their push for more natural gas, drilling operators are increasingly
using a process called hydraulic fracturing, which shoots vast amounts
of water, sand and chemicals deep underground to break apart rock and
release the gas. More frequently, this process also involves drilling
down and then turning horizontally.
"It's part of being responsive to the public," Huffman said of the
bill. "We need to give the public a sense of confidence."
Corky DeMarco, lobbyist for the state Oil and Natural Gas Association,
said his group has some concerns about the legislation, but is willing
to continue working with DEP to work something out.
"We had a bit of sticker shock with the permit fees," DeMarco said.
"The fees are a bit of a problem and we need to hear why they need to
go up at that level.
"[But] we need to have the DEP in a position where they have the
confidence of the citizens of this state," DeMarco said. "We need to
work with them on this."
Garvin said his group is concerned that DEP did not address potential
air pollution issues related to gas well facilities, and is also upset
that the bill continues to allow operators to bury drilling pit wastes
on site.
All sides are also just beginning to compare the DEP's language to an
oil and gas proposal put together previously by a legislative
subcommittee.
"What's important is what comes out of the legislative sausage
grinder," Huffman said.
Reach Ken Ward Jr. at kw...@wvgazette.com or 304-348-1702.