Marcellus Special Session Planned Starting December 12th with Calls for Many Changes (Improvements)

December 2, 2011

Julie Archer of the West Virginia Surface Owners Rights Organization has provided the following material: In November the legislature’s Joint Select Committee on Marcellus Shale recommended a bill to regulate Marcellus Shale drilling in West Virginia. Now the committee has completed its work (see coverage here, here and here). A special session to adopt new [...]

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GASTAR Planning to Spend $200 Million in Marshall County on Road Repairs & New Drilling

December 1, 2011

Gastar Exploration plans to invest about $200 million in West Virginia’s Marcellus shale field in 2012, with virtually all of the money directed to Marshall County. Gastar is a Canadian company with revenues last year of $42.76 million. With about 79,000 acres leased in WV, the company will drill about 20 Marcellus wells on the [...]

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Speculation Increasing and Hope Decreasing for an Ethane Cracker Plant in West Virginia

November 29, 2011

The State Journal reports that Shell Chemicals continues to study a possible chemical plant for cracking ethane to ethylene, to be located in Pennsylvania, West Virginia or Ohio.  Since the ethane would come from the northern panhandle of West Virginia, as well as adjoining lands in Pennsylvania and Ohio, it seems reasonable that such a [...]

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Legal Conflicts May Exist between Mortgage and Gas Lease

November 29, 2011

Getting ready to sign a gas lease?  Better check with your bank or mortgage lender first.  They may have something to say about it.   The mortgage holders recognize that there is risk of negative impacts to property value associated with fracking.  The idea of an acre-sized pit that holds toxic frack water situated on [...]

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Call for Marcellus Special Session Petition Started

November 28, 2011

Attention West Virginia residents.  To sign onto a petition urging Governor Earl Ray Tomblin to call a Special Session of the Legislature to consider the proposed Marcellus shale legislation , click here. You will be redirected to a webpage set up on Change.Org.

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A Historical Perspective on the Bad Blood between WV and Chesapeake CEO

November 23, 2011

It must be karma of some kind.  West Virginia and billionaire wildcatter Aubrey McClendon, CEO of Chesapeake Energy Corporation, have been involved in a dance that has been fraught with tensions since they met.   This history bodes poorly for the chances of a cooperative and respectful partnership going forward, and recent events reinforce this pessimistic [...]

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What do West Virginia Unions and an EQT Scholarship Program Have in Common?

November 19, 2011

West Virginia unions have united to voice their concerns about out-of-state workers being employed by the gas drilling industry before locals.  They have launched a campaign to pressure companies into hiring locally first, especially in northern West Virginia.  One of the points raised is that Wetzel County, experiencing an abundance of gas industry activity, has [...]

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Select Committee on Marcellus Shale Approves Bill

November 16, 2011

After months of hard work, the Select Committee on Marcellus Shale finished its draft bill today.  A voice vote approved its passage, with only Senator Karen Facemyre speaking in opposition.  The next step is for Governor Earl Ray Tomblin to call a special session, but one of his aides has already spoken doubtfully of this. [...]

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Gas Regulation in West Virginia has been Understaffed for Two Decades

November 16, 2011

Ken Ward, Jr., in an article in the Charleston Gazette, sheds a new light on the Oil and Gas Inspector shortage faced by West Virginia in light of the Marcellus gas boom.  Certain public figures have tried to say that the current 18 inspectors are enough to regulate the entire state.  However, reports dating as [...]

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University of Texas Study Says Fracking Has Not Contaminated Groundwater

November 14, 2011

A nine-month study began in May at the Energy Institute of the University of Texas in Austin is to include an analysis of reports of groundwater contamination attributed to fracking in several shale plays: The Barnett in Texas, the Haynesville in Texas and Louisiana, and the Marcellus. Professor Charles Groat, a geologist, has said that [...]

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