Month: January 2015

Michigan group helps local governments control fracking

While townships and counties are preempted by state law on many aspects of oil and gas development, including hydraulic fracturing, they can focus on some ancillary activities of the practice and enforce police powers to give local residents some say. Midwest Energy News, United States. 30 January 2015.

http://midwestenergynews.com/2015/01/30/first-michigan-townships-find-ways-to-regulate-oil-and-gas-development/

Wolf restores fracking ban in state parkland

Fulfilling a campaign promise, Gov. Wolf on Thursday reinstated a moratorium on natural gas drilling on state parklands. It came less than a year after his predecessor lifted the ban. Philadelphia Inquirer, Pennsylvania. 30 January 2015. 

http://articles.philly.com/2015-01-31/news/58629505_1_natural-gas-drilling-new-drilling-wolf

After years of study, deep divisions over fracking’s risks remain

For more than three years, a state commission has been studying whether to allow hydraulic fracturing beneath the mountains of Western Maryland. Now, the commission is done, state agencies have proposed rules, but commissioners still don’t agree on whether we can frack safely. National Public Radio. 29 January 2015.

http://news.wypr.org/post/after-years-study-deep-divisions-over-frackings-risks-remain#stream/0

Did Alberta just break a fracking earthquake world record?

Hydraulic fracturing, a technology used to crack open difficult oil and gas formations, appears to have set off a swarm of earthquakes near Fox Creek, Alberta, including a record-breaking tremor with a felt magnitude of 4.4 last week. Vancouver Tyee, British Columbia. 29 January 2015.

http://thetyee.ca/News/2015/01/29/Alberta-Fracking-Earthquake/