Colorado’s Garfield Becomes Ninth County to Oppose Federal Fracing Legislation
Indep Nat’l Gas Expert: “People aren’t aware of how safe and common gas drilling is”
William Kapell, a hydrologist with the US Geological Survey (USGS), addressed a League of Women Voters crowd last night on a wide range of issues surrounding safe, heavily-regulated natural gas production in the Marcellus shale. Today’s Ithaca Journal, under the headline “Expert: Drilling catastrophe unlikely with gas,” reports this:
Kapell said he’s spent 30 years working with black shale gas in upstate New York. He characterized some risks — of drilling triggering seismic activity, or a gas company fracking all the way to the surface — as small.
Kappel noted that oil and gas drilling have been going on in New York state since 1849.
Accidents with those wells are rare and people aren’t aware of how safe and common gas drilling is, because only the accidents “make it in the news,” he said.
Kappel said the contamination in Dimock came from improper well casing in a shallow gas layer, not from fracking in the Marcellus Shale.
George Will highlights the recent technological breakthroughs in shale gas development (ie hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling) in a recent Washington Post column, citing a top State Department energy advisor to President Jimmy Carter. In his column “Awash in fossil fuels,” Will writes:
Edward L. Morse, an energy official in Carter’s State Department, writes in Foreign Affairs that the world’s deep-water oil and gas reserves are significantly larger than was thought a decade ago, and high prices have spurred development of technologies … for extracting them.
Morse says new technologies are also speeding development of natural gas trapped in U.S. shale rock. The Marcellus Shale, which stretches from West Virginia through Pennsylvania and into New York, “may contain as much natural gas as the North Field in Qatar, the largest field ever discovered.”
Rattie says that known U.S. reserves of natural gas, which are sure to become larger, exceed 100 years of supply at the current rate of consumption.
Shale Gas: Creating Jobs, Economic Activity, Prosperity and Affordable Energy in a Town Near You
Dense, tight rock formations thousands of feet below the ground holding decades of clean-burning natural gas reserves are now being unlocked. How? With 21st century horizontal drilling technologies – coupled with hydraulic fracturing, a 60-year old technique – enormous amounts of homegrown, domestic energy previously out of reach are now being realized. And so are the economic benefits and jobs associated with this safe, responsible and well-regulated production.
With unemployment at a 26-year high, and expected to continue to climb for some time, natural gas production continues to serve as an economic and job creation engine.
Here’s a quick sampling of a few recent headlines:
Shreveport Times: “Haynesville Shale has protected area from recession. Northwest Louisiana residents repeatedly have heard over the past year or so how fortunate this region is to have the Haynesville Shale and its financial fortunes act as somewhat of a buffer against the national recession. Energy specialist Loren C. Scott echoed that Friday during a luncheon speech before 560 attendees of the second annual Haynesville Shale Expo inside the Shreveport Convention Center. The first to release a comprehensive evaluation of the oil and gas industry’s impact on the region, Scott put the shale into perspective, first through a detailed look at the national economic picture. “This has been a stinker,” he said of the recession that started in January 2008. “But there’s every indication we are out of it now, and we’re starting to grow again.” … For example, in 2008, when the shale was just a “baby,” more than $4.5 billion in new revenue was generated … Of that, about $3.1 billion was in lease payments. Tax receipts amounted to $153.3 million and more than 32,000 jobs were created.”
Arkansas News: “Officials to commemorate five years of drilling in Fayetteville Shale play … “’We’ve known there was natural gas in these shales for decades,’ said Ed Ratchford, senior petroleum geologist and fossil-fuel supervisor for the Arkansas Geological Survey. But tapping the reserves was not economically feasible until service companies like Halliburton and Schlumberger developed hydraulic fracturing technology to pull gas from “unconventional” wells, such as Fayetteville Shale, Ratchford said. … A well near Jerusalem produced the first gas for an energy boom that a 2008 University of Arkansas study estimated will generate $19.9 billion and more than 11,000 jobs for the Arkansas economy through 2012. … SWN Sand Co. is expected to produce more than 2 billion pounds of sand per year for Southwestern Energy’s drilling operations. SWN Sand plans to hire about 30 workers initially and up to 45 at full capacity.”
Shreveport Times: “Haynesville Shale activity creates job opportunities … There are a lot of options when it comes to job opportunities in the oil and natural gas industry. … The Haynesville Shale natural gas deposit has kept companies in northwest Louisiana. And they all need qualified employees. This area has become a haven for oil and natural gas professionals from throughout the country, said Angie White, vice president of North Louisiana Economic Partnership. “We have more oil and gas people in the area from all over because they have been laid off.” … Local colleges have announced several new programs in the oil and natural gas field. Among them is Bossier Parish Community College in Bossier City, which has started a petroleum technology program. … And Diesel Driving Academy is yet another option for job seekers. Its program trains people to obtain a commercial driver’s license. Many of its new graduates can earn up to $40,000 a year plus benefits.”
Unable to move the needle with conventional attacks, ProPublica digs deep for assault on Marcellus aimed explicitly at scaring the public
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