Wyoming County, PA well malfunction causes spill, evacuation

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The Blessing That is the Eagle Ford Shale

New York suffers while Texas celebrates!! A few years from now we can celebrate the casinos, Whoopee. JLCpulse

David Blackmon, Contributor in Forbes 3/13/13

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The good and mostly bad in New York's resistance to drilling

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JLCNY Starting to Collect Funds for Landowner Lawsuit Against NYS

Dear Friends, Coalition Leaders, Landowners, and Natural Gas Supporters,

The Joint Landowners Coalition of New York is finalizing plans for its lawsuit against New York State. Now we need your help with funding this effort. This memo is intended to give you some background into the takings claims and to provide you with information about this important effort. We will soon distribute another notice with instructions on where to send contributions.

Process So Far:

• On February 8, 2013, the JLCNY announced that it has been laying the foundation for a lawsuit against the State of New York for a constitutional taking of our property rights under the United States and New York Constitutions.
• On February 27, 2013, the JLCNY announced that it was seeking plaintiffs for its lawsuit who fit four categories of property owners. The response to the solicitation for plaintiffs has been overwhelming. Thank you to everyone who has offered to participate. We are in the process of narrowing down the final plaintiff candidates.
• At a meeting of the JLCNY membership on March 5, 2013, the JLCNY approved plans to move forward with fundraising for the lawsuit.

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The Axis of Ennui

By DAVID BROOKS Published: March 11, 2013 in The New York Times OP/ED

David Brooks            

Josh Haner/The New York Times

You’re hearing from, say, the brilliant technology entrepreneur Shai Agassi, who is starting a paradigm-shifting electric car company. You’re hearing from some wizard with a new solar-panel technology, or some new social-networking entrepreneur.

My main impression over the past five years is that the conference circuit capitalists who give fantastic presentations have turned out to be marginal to history while the...

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Goodell Fights Against Job-Killing Drilling Moratorium

Folks here is a 2011 news story that is going up because it makes it clear that nothing has changed in New York. A negative circle where nothing changes  over and over again. This legislator represents an area where there are thousands of  gas wells in service. JLCpulse

June 10, 2011

Assemblyman Andy Goodell (R,C–Chautauqua) is strongly opposed to a job-killing natural gas-drilling moratorium that would affect thousands of jobs in Western New York, while hurting local consumers and landowners.

The proposed legislation would shut down all natural gas drilling operations in Western New York by banning all hydrofracking, a process where water and a small amount of chemicals are injected into gas wells under high pressure to fracture the underground rocks and release the natural gas. The process has been used safely in Western New York for conventional wells for over 60 years.

Recently, hydrofracking has been questioned in connection with the proposed deep horizontal wells in Marcellus Shale in central New York, and the DEC has refused to issue any drilling permits for those deep wells while it develops comprehensive new regulations.

“Ironically, the proposed moratorium would shut down all conventional drilling in Western New York where the hydrofracking has been used safely, without having any practical impact on the deep-well hydrofracking that already is prohibited by the DEC pending its environmental review,” noted Goodell.

The moratorium also would have a devastating impact on the Western New York economy. The DEC

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Exclusive: Andrew Cuomo has some suggestions for pro-fracking groups

Posted by: Jon Campbell - Posted in Politics on the Hudson 2/11/13

Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Monday criticized the strategy employed by groups who favor hydraulic fracturing, saying their lobbyists should spend more time educating the public and less time focused on “hallway chatter.”

In an interview with Gannett’s Albany Bureau, Cuomo reiterated his position that an ultimate decision on whether to allow large-scale fracking in New York will be based on “facts and science.” But he suggested the pro-fracking groups aren’t using their time wisely as the state’s de facto moratorium on shale-gas drilling stretches beyond 4 1/2 years.

“I think the landowners’ consultants and the lobbyists for the pro-fracking groups would be better advised to spend their time actually getting out information to allay the fears of the people of this state than worrying about hallway chatter,” Cuomo said. “Their job is to communicate to the people of the state, to say that this is a safe process, to be open and available. And that’s what they should be doing.”

Cuomo’s decision-making process on hydrofracking has been in the spotlight over the past few weeks, with recent reports suggesting he may have been influenced by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.—his former brother-in-law—to hold off on allowing the natural-gas extraction process to proceed. Cuomo has acknowledged he discussed the issue with Kennedy, but denied that the discussions led him to put off a decision.

The governor’s comments came following a meeting of his...

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Skelos Says Republicans Will Block a Vote on N.Y. Fracking Ban

By Freeman Klopott   March 11, 2013 4:20 PM EDT in Bloomberg

“It’s unnecessary,” Skelos said today in an interview in Albany. “The governor has a process that’s been going on and I think that’s where we should leave it.”

Governor Andrew Cuomo has kept in place a four-year moratorium on hydraulic fracturing for natural gas until an environmental review is complete. That review hinges on an analysis by Health Commissioner Nirav Shah, who is considering two outside studies: one by Danville, Pennsylvania-based Geisinger Health System on thousands of people who live near wells and another by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Shah said he won’t wait until those studies are complete to make a decision. The Senate bill would require him to do so.

“I anticipate we’ll be done in the next few weeks,” Shah said today at press briefing. “We are learning more information as we go, and we want to make sure we cover all the ground and not rush through this.”

The Senate bill was introduced March 5 by the Independent Democratic Conference, a group of five breakaway Democrats who share power with Republicans. The next day, the Democratic- controlled Assembly passed a separate measure that would create a two-year ban. Cuomo, a Democrat, said today he doesn’t believe the legislature...

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NY health commissioner will make recommendation on gas drilling in weeks

By The Associated Press on March 11, 2013 at 3:30 PM, updated March 11, 2013 at 3:32 PM in Syracuse.com

Health Commissioner Nirav Shah also said he met with researchers from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Geisinger Health System in Pennsylvania within the past two weeks.

A person close to Gov. Andrew Cuomo had told The Associated Press in February that the governor discussed the Geisinger health study as key research for his decision and helped cool momentum toward making a decision to allow a limited number of test wells that would be closely monitored.

Environmental lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who had spoken to Cuomo about the study, said in an interview that he believes the Geisinger review is pivotal.

"Nobody ever said that we were waiting for the studies to be finished," Cuomo said Monday. "The Department of Health was going to be looking at those studies and see if there was anything constructive in those studies."

Instead, Cuomo said they would discuss early findings with some researchers. Preliminary results of the Geisinger study are expected within a year.

Cuomo will make a decision on whether to allow the potentially lucrative drilling in the...

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New labor stats: Unemployment up in every area of NY

Posted by John Campbell in Politics on the Hudson 3/1/13

The state released area unemployment rates today, and the numbers aren’t pretty.

No area of the state had a decline in unemployment between January 2012 and January 2013. It’s the second year in a row where not one area of the state had its unemployment rate drop.

State officials have argued that the unemployment is not a fair gauge of the state’s economy because as the economy improves, more people are looking for work, and thus the unemployment rate increases. In a report last week, the state Labor Department said the state created 29,600 jobs in January, a record 17 consecutive months of private-sector job growth.

The unemployment rate increases for some regions of the state were stark. The unemployment rate in the Elmira area increased from 8.8 percent in January 2012 to 10.5 percent last month.

The area had an economic boom after hydraulic fracturing occurred across the border in Pennsylvania, but it has been stung by a slow down in drilling, no decision by Gov. Andrew Cuomo on whether to proceed in New York with fracking and the closure of Sikorsky Aircraft Corp. last December, which axed 570 jobs.

Between December and January, New York unemployment rate rose from 8.2 percent to 8.4 percent.The national average was 7.9 percent.

In January, 35 counties had unemployment rates above 10 percent, compared to 25 that did so in January 2012, the labor statistics show. The highest...

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