Archive for the ‘Blog’ Category

Sporting groups, conservationists and anti-drilling neighbors protest the large-scale gas exploration.

MICHAEL RUBINKAM Associated Press Writer

PLEASANT MOUNT, Pa. — A few hundred yards from Louis Matoushek’s farmhouse is a well that could soon produce not only natural gas, but a drilling boom in the wild and scenic Delaware River watershed.

Energy companies have leased thousands of acres of land in Pennsylvania’s unspoiled northeastern tip, hoping to tap vast stores of gas in a sprawling rock formation — the Marcellus Shale — that some experts believe could become the nation’s most productive gas field.

Plenty of folks like Matoushek are eager for the gas, and the royalty checks, to start flowing — including farmers who see Marcellus money as a way to keep their struggling operations afloat.

“It’s a depressed area,” Matoushek said. “This is going to mean new jobs, real jobs, not government jobs.”

Standing in the way is a loose coalition of sporting groups, conservationists and anti-drilling neighbors. They contend that large-scale gas exploration so close to crucial waterways will threaten drinking water, ruin a renowned wild trout fishery, wreck property values, and transform a rural area popular with tourists into an industrial zone with constant noise and truck traffic.

Both sides are furiously lobbying the Delaware River Basin Commission, the powerful federal-interstate compact agency that monitors water supplies for 15 million people, including half the population of New York City. The commission has jurisdiction because the drilling process will require withdrawing huge amounts of water from the watershed’s streams and rivers and because of the potential for groundwater pollution.

The well on Matoushek’s 200-acre spread in the northern Pocono Mountains in Wayne County is up first. The commission is reviewing an application by Stone Energy Corp. of Lafayette, La., to extract gas from the well — the first of what could be thousands of applications by energy companies to sink wells in an area roughly the size of Connecticut.

Stone Energy’s application has already generated more than 1,700 written comments to the DRBC. The company, which paid a $70,000 penalty for drilling the Matoushek well without DRBC approval in 2008, has already received a permit from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection.

Eager gas companies have leased more than 300 square miles of watershed land, conservation officials estimate.

“This is certainly just the start. There’s a lot of acreage out there, and a lot of people interested in leasing their land,” said Tracy Carluccio, deputy director of the anti-drilling Delaware Riverkeeper Network.

The Marcellus Shale is a rock formation 6,000 to 8,000 feet beneath Pennsylvania, New York, West Virginia and Ohio, including about 36 percent of the Delaware River basin. New drilling techniques now allow affordable access to supplies in the Marcellus and other shales in the U.S. that once were too expensive to tap.

Energy companies combine horizontal drilling with hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking,” a technique that injects vast amounts of water, along with sand and chemicals, underground to break up the shale and release the gas.

While gas companies refuse to identify the chemicals they use — claiming that is proprietary information — critics cite contamination problems in other natural gas drilling fields. They worry that unregulated fracking can taint drinking water, deplete aquifers and produce briny wastewater that can kill fish. In Dimock, Pa., about 40 miles west of the Matoushek well but outside the Delaware basin, state environmental regulators say that cracked casings on fracked wells have tainted residential water supplies with methane gas.

The Environmental Protection Agency announced last month that it will study the impact of fracking on the environment and human health. The EPA said in 2004 there was no evidence that fracking threatens drinking water quality, but critics, including a veteran engineer in the Denver regional EPA office, argued that report’s methodology was flawed.

The industry contends environmental concerns are overblown. It says the drilling techniques are safe and that there has never been a proven case of groundwater contamination caused by fracking — in part because fracking occurs far below the water table. Congress exempted hydraulic fracturing from federal oversight in 2005.

Dozens of people told the DRBC at a recent public hearing why they oppose the watershed drilling. A few supporters called it an economic boon and a property-rights issue.

Richard Kreznar, who owns property in the Pennsylvania riverfront community of Damascus, said gas drilling primarily benefits large landowners and exploration companies.

“After the Delaware River and the stream next to my house are messed up, what compensation will I get? Who will put it back together again?” he asked DRBC staff.

Lee Hartman, the Delaware River chairman for Trout Unlimited, worries that large water withdrawals required for fracking will create low stream flows in the Delaware’s tributaries, damaging fish habitat. For the Matoushek well, Stone Energy wants to take 700,000 gallons a day from the Lackawaxen River’s narrow west branch.

Hartman and others say the DRBC should first study the cumulative environmental impacts of drilling in the Delaware watershed, and pass drilling regulations, before it allows any gas extraction to take place. The agency has asked for $250,000 in federal funds for a study, but commissioners have not said whether they will wait before voting on Matoushek’s well.

Opponents say they will sue if Stone Energy’s application is approved.

Downstream communities that rely on the Delaware for drinking water are worried about the coming gas boom. New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg opposes any drilling in the watershed, while the Philadelphia City Council has asked the basin commission for an environmental study.

New York state regulators have put a moratorium on drilling in the Marcellus region, saying they won’t approve permits until they are finished drafting new regulations.

Back in northeastern Pennsylvania, Matoushek, 68, a semiretired farmer who signed a lease with Stone Energy three years ago, said he is counting on royalty checks from gas production to help fund his golden years and secure the land for future generations of his family. As far he’s concerned, the benefits far outweigh any theoretical harm.

Copyright: Times Leader

A lawyer offers sample laws to Back Mountain towns concerned about drilling.

By Rebecca Briarbria@timesleader.com
Staff Writer

DALLAS TWP. – The Back Mountain Community Partnership was advised Thursday afternoon to separately pass ordinances that may help protect against gas drilling issues.

The partnership is an intermunicipal group composed of Dallas, Franklin, Jackson, Kingston and Lehman townships and Dallas borough.

Attorney Jeffrey Malak, who is solicitor of the group, explained it would be better for each municipality to enact its own ordinances rather than to pass joint partnership ordinances because each municipality has its own unique needs.

Malak provided an example of an ordinance, created by the Pennsylvania State Association of Township Supervisors and the Pennsylvania State Association of Township Solicitors, which addresses height regulations of equipment, setbacks, access roads, wells, tanks and storage.

He also furnished sample dust, noise and light pollution ordinances and a sample road bond agreement. In addition, he provided a copy of Dallas’ zoning ordinance, which restricts drilling to certain areas of the borough and deals with screening and buffering and outdoor lighting issues.

Malak said such ordinances would take in all types of businesses but cannot be specific to natural gas drilling because the Oil and Gas Act of 1984 specifies the state oversees drilling. He stressed a lot of ordinances can be incorporated to help and that the municipalities are not limited to revising their zoning laws.

“We don’t know what’s allowed, what’s not, until we try some different things&hellip.” Malak said. “It’s a very, very complicated issue and like I said, it’s not a one size fits all.”

In other news, Tom Yoniski, a representative for state Sen. Lisa Baker, announced the senator’s office has arranged a meeting regarding gas drilling to be held from 6 to 8:30 p.m. on May 13 at Lake-Lehman Junior/Senior High School.

Yoniski said Penn State University officials will give a presentation on gas drilling. He said that officials from the state Department of Environmental Protection and the Susquehanna River Basin Commission will also attend.

Also, Gas Drilling Awareness Coalition members Karen Belli and Leeanne Mazurick, both of Dallas Township, gave a brief presentation on gas drilling and its impacts on the environment and the community.

Coalition member Audrey Simpson, of Kingston Township, showed a video she created of Dimock Township residents who were negatively affected by gas drilling.

Copyright: Times Leader

Before Marcellus Shale work, queries made over well water tests, roads and procedures.

EILEEN GODIN Times Leader Correspondent

LAKE TWP. — A gas company coming into the township in July caused residents to question procedures, well-water testing and road maintenance during Wednesday night’s supervisors meeting.

In July, Lake Township will begin a Marcellus Shale gas drilling operation by EnCana Oil and Gas USA of Denver, Colo. The site is owned by Supervisor Amy Salansky.

Salansky said the farm was previously owned by an older neighbor, who willed the gas and mineral rights to a nephew and gave Salansky and her husband the “first right to buy” the land.

“The agreement was already made when we purchased the farm,” Salansky said.

Residents within a mile radius of the site have recently received letters from EnCana stating a voluntary assessment of well water will be scheduled immediately. Salansky said the letter states a third-party environmental firm, Rettew, of Lancaster, will collect water samples.

Samples will then be sent to a state certified lab, at no cost to residents.

The letter stated that if residents wanted to use a lab of their choosing to test water, the sample will be split by Rettew and sent to a second lab. This would be at the residents’ cost.

With 75 percent of the township’s roads dirt, residents questioned supervisors on routes EnCana may use and who would be responsible for maintenance and repairing damages.

Chairman Lonnie Piatt said the township roads are not bonded yet, but the township does have an agreement with EnCana. He said it is a possibility that EnCana will hire a contractor for road maintenance. What routes will be used is still undecided.

Salansky said that officials have not sat down with EnCana to determine which routes will be used.

Barney Dobinick, the township’s emergency management coordinator, said it is possible that the gas driller’s trucks will run on a different schedule than school buses, so the two are not navigating roads at the same time.

Dobinick said EnCana has provided him with a list of chemicals to be used on site and a list of the firm’s safety guidelines. He also has the state Department of Environmental Protection’s regulations for gas drilling.

In other business, the annual spring cleanup will be 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. May 8, at the municipal building.

Residents must have proof of residency and pay $15 per pickup-truck load, $20 for large pickups and $6 per car load. An additional $6 fee will be applied for the following items: washers, dryers, carpets, overstuffed chairs, couches, dressers, TV sets, hot water heaters, boilers, furnaces, stoves and large appliances.

The following items will not be accepted: tires, hazardous wastes, chemicals, brush, tree stumps, cinder blocks, animal waste, shingles, sheet rock or other building materials, garbage, freezers, refrigerators containing Freon, and air conditioners.

For questions, call 629-2828.

Copyright: Times Leader

Industry may pay to upgrade plants that handle waste water from process.

By Rory Sweeneyrsweeney@timesleader.com
Staff Writer

The state is contending with a multibillion-dollar water-treatment problem, and the growing gas-drilling industry might be part of the solution.

A roughly $7.2 billion deficit exists for repairing or upgrading waste-water treatment facilities in the state, according to a task force created by Gov. Ed Rendell to solve water-infrastructure issues. Gas companies might help defray that cost as more wells are drilled because the companies will need treatment facilities for waste water.

The process to drill gas and oil wells, called hydraulic fracturing or simply “fracing,” involves shooting sand and water down a well to fracture the rock containing the oil or gas.

The contaminated water is separated out and can be stored and reused, but must eventually be treated. The state Department of Environmental Protection categorizes it as industrial waste, agency spokesman Mark Carmon said.

In western Pennsylvania, where many shallow wells exist, privately operated treatment facilities handle such waste, but none has so far in the northeast area, said Stephen Rhoads, president of the Pennsylvania Oil & Gas Association.

Exploring the Marcellus Shale, which runs from upstate New York into Virginia, including the northern edge of Luzerne County, generally requires far more water than shallow wells because the wells can be 8,000 feet deep

Companies working in this region have reused the water in multiple wells and then shipped it to the facilities out west, Rhoads said, but “obviously, moving it across the state with the fuel prices the way they are, is not economically” viable. The water can also be injected deep into the ground, but no one has sought such a permit in this region, Carmon said.

That leaves sending the water to public facilities, but since many of them are already near or at capacity, the industry is considering paying to upgrade plants. About 30 of the largest regional treatment facilities have been notified by DEP that they might be approached with the idea and that they’d first need to modify their liquid discharge permits and receive approval from the agency, Carmon said.

The idea hasn’t escaped the gas companies.

“We’ve talked about that in various areas throughout the state,” said Rodney Waller, of Range Resources Corp. “We’re investigating that, but … there’s nothing on the horizon.”

Upcoming events

• 10:30 a.m. today the state Department of Environmental Protection, Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission, Susquehanna and Delaware river basin commissions, and county conservation districts are meeting in Harrisburg with industry members to discuss environmental regulations.

• 7 p.m. June 23 the Penn State Cooperative Extension is holding a gas-lease workshop for landowners at the Lake-Lehman High School.

Rory Sweeney, a Times Leader staff writer, may be reached at 970-7418.

Copyright: Times Leader

Some residents oppose, but solicitor says only state can halt drilling operations in municipalities.

RALPH NARDONE Times Leader Correspondent

LEHMAN TWP. – Township residents will be getting a new neighbor when EnCana Oil and Gas USA begins drilling for natural gas in late summer.

Township officials voted unanimously Tuesday night to approve an ordinance allowing the company to start Marcellus Shale gas drilling operations near Peaceful Valley Road.

Board of Supervisors Vice Chairman Ray Iwanowski made the motion to enact the ordinance and Chairman David Sutton and Supervisor Douglas Ide voted yes.

Township Zoning Board Solicitor Jack Haley addressed a well-mannered crowd of about 70 people before the vote, essentially telling them the township was in no position to halt the company’s plans.

Some residents who expressed opposition wanted the supervisors to “send a message” by not enacting the ordinance, Haley said. That would have amounted to “civil disobedience,” he said.

According to Haley, all authority to halt drilling operations in any municipality in Pennsylvania lies in the hands of state agencies, not local governments. The township’s rules are “superseded” by the state Oil and Gas Act, he said.

The state Supreme Court already reviewed two similar cases, he added, and decided the only authority Lehman Township has applies to what roads EnCana can use.

Haley also addressed concerns raised that two of the supervisors, Ide and Sutton, have personal ties to gas drilling. Ide leased some of his own land for gas drilling, and Sutton consults property owners concerning drilling, Haley said.

Both members could only second the motion or vote yes but could not participate in any questions about the vote or make the original motion. The only supervisor who could make the motion was Iwanowski.

The state Ethics Commission checked into the potential conflict of interest involving the two supervisors.

Iwanowski outlined six conditions to the motion: that EnCana put up $13,540 to maintain Firehouse Road through the total time it is used; EnCana put up $32,192 to maintain Peaceful Valley Road similarly; all traffic related to the drilling traverse on Firehouse Road toward state Route 118; no traffic will go on Old Route 115 in the township (near the school); EnCana provide adequate insurance coverage for the township, and that a legally binding agreement be signed by EnCana holding it to its commitment.

No representatives from EnCana attended the meeting.

About 25 peaceful protesters were there greeting meeting attendees at the door with anti-drilling literature. Leanne Mazurick, 30, of Dallas Township, stressed the industry is essentially “unregulated.” She said residents in other communities of Northeastern Pennsylvania are having trouble with water contamination where there is drilling.

“We want safeguards put in place,” she said.

Karen Belli, of Dallas Township, and member of Gas Drilling Awareness Coalition, emphasized a long list of ills that arise from local gas drilling. She pointed to homeowners in one local community have to use “water buffaloes” for their water supply because of the contamination.

Belli also questioned how Supervisors Ide and Sutton could be involved in the vote knowing their connections to the industry.

Not all in attendance were opposed. Barry Edwards, of Lehman Township, said the concerns about water are just a “harangue.” He added that in Susquehanna County the drilling companies have made the roads “better than the ever.”

Iwanowski said fixed-income elderly residents and farmers facing large debt are finding the gas drilling a financial “godsend.”

He said the ordinance allows EnCana to drill only vertically. If it wishes to expand horizontally underground that will require another vote from the township.

Copyright: Times Leader

More than a mile beneath parts of Pennsylvania lies a mostly untapped reservoir of natural gas.

Geologists and energy companies have known for decades about the gas in the Marcellus Shale, but only recently have figured out a way to extract it from the thick black rock about 6,000 feet underground.

Now gas drillers are looking to lease local land in an attempt to find and remove the gas, whose value increases as energy prices soar.

In January 2008 leases were being signed for values near $100 per acre. By May that value had increased to over $2000 per acre.

With lease values changing so rapidly, landowners are unsure at what price to accept a lease offer.

Kenneth L. Balliet, a forestry and business management educator with the Penn State Cooperative Extension, recently took a trip to Fort Worth to see the economic impacts of those deposits. He said leases are being signed for $18,000 per acre in areas where production has proven strong.

Though there are only about 20 wells in Pennsylvania so far, Balliet expects local production to eventually rival Texas’ Barnett Shale. He said a gas company confided it plans to spend $1 billion this year in leasing agreements in Pennsylvania.

Northeastern Pennsylvania is Where the Thick Organic-Rich Shale Intervals are Located.

Copyright: Geology.com
Copyright: Timesleader.com

The board is still considering building a second plant.

By Steve Mocarskysmocarsky@timesleader.com
Staff Writer

HANOVER TWP. – The Wyoming Valley Sanitary Authority board has decided not to treat wastewater from the Marcellus Shale gas-drilling process at its current plant, but is still considering building a second plant for that purpose.

Fred DeSanto, executive director of the authority, informed the state Department of Environmental Protection last week that the board wanted to withdraw an application to revise its current permit to allow treatment of wastewater high in total dissolved solids from gas and oil drilling operations.

After meeting with DEP officials, who explained the requirements the authority would have to meet for a revision, authority officials decided it would be too risky to contract with an energy company to accept 150,000 gallons of wastewater per day and possibly exceed the limits of dissolved solids imposed by DEP, said Robert J. Krehley, the authority’s director of administration and planning.

“We just knew that a good majority of the time, we’d be over the limits,” Krehley said.

DeSanto said the board is waiting to hear from a consultant it hired to look into the feasibility of constructing a stand-alone plant.

John Minora, president of Pennsylvania Northeast Aqua Resources, said his staff is still researching some technical issues, but he expects to make a recommendation to the board at the next meeting on April 20.

Minora said he’ll likely recommend constructing a second plant because it would benefit the authority and ratepayers as well as energy companies; it’s just a matter of working out details based on data he is still waiting to receive.

Disposing of wastewater in Hanover Township would save energy companies in transportation costs, given that the closest treatment plant that can process drilling wastewater is in Williamsport, and the next closest is in Somerset County. The Williamsport plant doesn’t have the capacity for wastewater from all nearby drilling sites, he said.

Minora said a “closed-loop” treatment plant would remove solids from the water; the solids would be disposed of in landfills. The treated drilling water would be high in chloride and diluted with treated water from the authority’s current treatment plant; that blended water could be sold back to drilling companies to re-use in drilling operations.

Given that the current plant would be discharging less treated water into the Susquehanna River because it would be added to the treated drilling water, the authority would in turn discharge less nitrates and phosphates into the river. The authority could then sell credits to other treatment plants that discharge nitrates and phosphates in excess of state limits, Minora said.

The additional revenue could be used to stave off rate increases to customers.

Steve Mocarsky, a Times leader staff writer, may be reached at 970-7311.

Copyright: Times Leader

Elected official who held hearing in area last week on natural gas drilling says he was responding to pro-energy group attack.

By Steve Mocarskysmocarsky@timesleader.com
Staff Writer

A state representative says he was unfairly attacked in a press release by a pro-energy group after holding a public hearing in the Back Mountain last week.

State Rep. Camille “Bud” George, majority chair of the House Environmental Resources and Energy Committee, issued a rebuttal Friday, saying that “money and misinformation are the hallmarks of a gas industry attack titled, ‘Rep. George’s Fact-Free Fact-Finding Mission.’”

Energy In Depth sent the press release to media outlets on Thursday, a day after George convened a committee hearing at 1 p.m. in the Lehman Township Municipal Building to hear testimony on the impact of Marcellus Shale drilling and proposed legislation that would put more environmental safeguards in place.

State Rep. Phyllis Mundy, D-Kingston, invited George to have a hearing in her district, where EnCana Gas & Oil USA plans to drill the first natural gas exploratory well in Luzerne County in May or June. The well will be drilled in Lehman Township.

Area residents and lawmakers are concerned for many reasons, including the fact that the drill site would be less than two miles from the Huntsville and Ceaseville reservoirs, which supply drinking water to nearly 100,000 area residents.

Energy In Depth’s press release classified the hearing as a “pep rally staged by anti-energy activists and like-minded public officials in Northeast Pennsylvania.”

“Characterized as a ‘field hearing’ by … George, who held the event as far away as he could from his home in Clearfield County, the forum included representatives from the Sierra Club and Clean Water Action league, as well as testimony from a local podiatrist and someone describing himself as a ‘naturalopathic’ physician. The only thing missing? Anyone in possession of real, genuine facts related to responsible gas exploration in the Commonwealth,” the release stated.

In response, George said the most troubling aspect of “the attack by Energy In Depth, whose members include the Pennsylvania Independent Oil and Gas Association, is its slur of concerned lawmakers and citizens of Northeastern Pennsylvania as anti-energy activists.”

George noted that the committee had a hearing on Feb. 18 in Clearfield County, where the president of the Marcellus Shale Coalition and executives from some of the leading gas companies in Pennsylvania, including Range Resources and Chesapeake Energy, testified. He also participated two weeks ago in a House Democratic Policy Committee hearing in Ebensburg that included testimony from Chief Oil & Gas and Chesapeake. Ebensburg is in the Altoona area.

“The industry has not been an unwanted stranger at hearings,” George said.

Energy In Depth’s press release then listed quotes – pulled from a story in The Times Leader – of people who testified and rebutted them with quotes from gas industry representatives, a state Department of Environmental Protection fact sheet and Gov. Ed Rendell.

Energy In Depth pointed to testimony from Mundy in which she said she supports House Bill 2213 “which would among other things … require full disclosure of the chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing.”

The organization then pointed to a DEP fact sheet which states that drilling companies “must disclose the names of all chemicals to be used and stored at a drilling site … that must be submitted to DEP as part of the permit application process. These plans contain copies of material safety data sheets for all chemicals … This information is on file with DEP and available to landowners, local governments and emergency responders.”

But George said that “full disclosure of the chemicals – not just the trade names – and how they are used is not (now) required.”

“The precise chemical identities and concentrations and how and when they are employed can be crucial to emergency responders and remediation efforts after spills, and is at the crux of efforts to remove the infamous ‘Halliburton Loophole’ that exempts the industry from oversight by the Environmental Protection Agency,” George said.

“The gas industry can bloat campaign coffers with money, buy discredited and ridiculed studies and poison the debate by taking statements out of context. However, its ‘best management practices’ should never be taken at face value to be the best for Pennsylvania,” George said.

Steve Mocarsky, a Times leader staff writer, may be reached at 970-7311.

Copyright: Times Leader

County officials had been negotiating with EnCana Oil & Gas USA Inc. of Denver.

By Steve Mocarskysmocarsky@timesleader.com
Staff Writer

An energy company that plans to drill for natural gas in the Back Mountain has advised Luzerne County officials that the company will not pursue a lease for natural gas drilling at Moon Lake Park.

County officials had been negotiating with EnCana Oil & Gas USA Inc. of Denver to drill at the park and tap lake water needed to help fracture rock to release gas.

“The county informed us of their interest in entering into a lease for the development of natural gas resources on the Moon Lake property,” EnCana spokeswoman Wendy Weidenbeck said in an e-mail.

Weidenbeck said that as with any business opportunity, companies must evaluate multiple factors to help guide their decisions.

“We carefully considered the potential needs of our business and concerns over the development of natural gas resources on recreational property. After careful consideration, we have decided that we will not pursue a lease to drill for natural gas resources on the Moon Lake property,” she said.

Commissioner Chairwoman Maryanne Petrilla said she has been out of the office after knee surgery and had not yet been briefed on the issue.

Commissioner Thomas Cooney said he had not talked with EnCana officials and that Gibbons had alerted him to the news on Friday.

Cooney said other energy companies might be interested in exploration at the county-owned park and the development of a request for proposals was not out of the question. However, “there has been no conversation leading that way right now,” he said.

Cooney said he did not know how far along talks about selling water from the lake at Moon Lake Park have come. But if the county were to negotiate the sale of water, there would have to be appraisals and bidding and permits would have to be secured, he said.

The park’s 48-acre, spring-fed lake holds millions of gallons of water and is 13.5 feet in its deepest spot, county officials have said. All park water drainage pipes also feed into the lake.

Cooney said he thinks the reaction of the Sierra Club to drilling at Moon Lake probably influenced EnCana’s decision.

An official with the Sierra Club’s Northeastern Pennsylvania chapter said in February that county commissioners didn’t have legal authority to allow natural gas drilling at the park, which is located in Plymouth Township.

Frank Muraca, who sits on the organization’s executive committee, had said much of the park land was purchased with state and federal funds in the 1960s through a program known as the Project 70 Land Acquisition and Borrowing Act.

Lands acquired through the act must be used for recreation, conservation and historical purposes unless approval is granted by the General Assembly, the governor and the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources. Muraca had said he also found other legal and zoning stumbling blocks that would have to be met to allow drilling.

Muraca had initially presented the information to Commissioner Stephen A. Urban, who has said he couldn’t comment on Muraca’s assertions until he did his own research. He has said he is supportive of “responsible” drilling on county property to generate needed revenue.

Urban did not return a message seeking comment for this story.

The park officially closed Jan. 28 because commissioners stripped funding for staff and other expenses from the 2010 budget, saying that they could not justify non-essential expenses with a property tax increase.

Petrilla has said she is willing to consider any offer to generate revenue, as long as the park’s recreational atmosphere is not compromised. She also has said she would not support any offers that would drain or pollute the lake.

Steve Mocarsky, a Times Leader staff writer, may be reached at 970-7311.

Copyright: Times Leader

By Steve Mocarskysmocarsky@timesleader.com
Staff Writer

As energy companies and lease holders extol the benefits and safety of natural gas drilling in the state, and environmentalists and people who live near drilling operations point to chemical spills, water pollution and noise, a congressman last week called for an effort from opposing sides in the energy debate to work together for compromise.

U.S. Rep. Joe Sestak, D-Delaware County, who is running for the U.S. Senate, came to The Peace and Justice Center in Wilkes-Barre on Wednesday to host a forum on Marcellus Shale development.

Panelists included James Shallenberger, a Pennsylvania-licensed geologist and senior project manager at consulting firm Princeton Hydro who spoke on behalf of the gas drilling industry; David T. Messersmith, an extension educator with Penn State Cooperative Extension in Wayne County who is an expert on Marcellus Shale; and Dr. Thomas Jiunta, a Lehman Township resident with a podiatry practice in Kingston who founded Luzerne County Citizens for Clean Water.

“There was a lot of passion in that room. … One side is saying one thing, one side is saying another. I want to be a person who brings people together for a principal compromise, not a compromise of principles,” Sestak said last week in a phone interview.

“I personally believe this is a great economic opportunity for our state, particularly if we are able to benefit by a proper excise tax and if we put the proper protections in place,” Sestak said.

Sestak also said a priority should be enabling community and area colleges to train people for gas industry jobs to ensure Pennsylvanians are getting jobs associated with the drilling industry, rather than leaving energy companies with no choice but to hire experienced people from out-of-state.

Sestak said he learned much about the economic benefits as well as the environmental problems associated with natural gas exploration when he visited several counties in which Marcellus Shale drilling has been ongoing while he was on the campaign trail.

He noted that former Sen. Rick Santorum and Sen. Arlen Specter voted for “the Halliburton Loophole,” which exempts the gas and oil industry from complying with the Safe Water Drinking Act. And he said he supports the “FRAC Act” – Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals Act, which would amend the Safe Drinking Water Act to include the gas and oil industry.

Steve Mocarsky, a Times leader staff writer, may be reached at 970-7311.

Copyright: Times Leader