Activist won’t face fines, jail time in ongoing fight with gas company
Marie Cusick/StateImpact Pennsylvania
Vera Scroggins talks with reporters on the steps of the Susquehanna County courthouse in Montrose.
A Susquehanna County judge ruled Wednesday that 63-year-old anti-fracking activist Vera Scroggins will not be fined or jailed for violating a court order designed to keep her away from sites operated by Cabot Oil & Gas.
The ongoing feud between the activist and the gas company made international news earlier this year when Cabot got a sweeping court injunction against her– effectively barring her from nearly half the county. In March, the court order was revised to be much less restrictive. She is currently barred from Cabot sites and its access roads and must observe a 100 foot buffer zone.
Scroggins, a self-described “gas tour guide,” frequently brings visitors by Cabot sites and takes photos and videos. The company claims she has repeatedly trespassed on its property, and her activities pose a safety risk.
Judge Kenneth Seamans found Scroggins technically violated the 100 foot buffer zone, but she will not be punished. Much of the hearing focused on whether a road off of State Route 3023 leading to Cabot’s Costello wellpad constitutes a driveway for the Costello family or a Cabot access road– in fact, it is used as both.
PA Congressman launches frack waste investigation
Scott Detrow / StateImpact Pennsylvania
A truck delivers fracking wastewater to a Susquehanna County recycling center.
The state’s new acting secretary for the Department of Environmental Protection, Dana Aunkst, has lots of questions to answer regarding how the state oversees frack waste disposal and transportation. On Wednesday, Congressman Matt Cartwright, a democrat from Schuylkill County, sent Aunkst a 3-page letter seeking information as part of an investigation into how states monitor waste generated by shale gas drilling. The states have responsibility for the waste because it’s exempt from federal oversight. The investigation comes on the heels of a report released by the Pennsylvania Auditor General’s office in July, which criticizes the DEP’s role in protecting drinking water from contamination by gas drillers.
“The audit concluded that Pennsylvania’s current system for oversight of fracking waste “is not an effective monitoring tool” and “it is not proactive in discouraging improper, even illegal, disposal of waste,” wrote Cartwright in the letter.
Cartwright is leading the investigation through the Economic Growth, Job Creation, and Regulatory Affairs Subcommittee of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee. Aunkst was just recently appointed acting secretary after former secretary Chris Abruzzo resigned in the wake of the porngate scandal. Aunkst has until November 12 to respond. Read the letter and Cartwright’s questions below. Continue Reading
Energy companies donate more than $1 million to Corbett’s campaign coffers
Scott Detrow / StateImpact Pennsylvania
Governor Corbett speaks to the Shale Gas Insight conference in September 2011.
With the election less than a week away, Tom Corbett is way ahead when it comes to support from energy interests including coal, natural gas and power companies operating in the state. The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette has tallied up campaign contributions for the governor’s race and Tom Corbett’s campaign took in $1,148,351 in energy donations. That’s almost ten times the amount of energy dollars going to his opponent Democrat Tom Wolf. The Post-Gazette reports Wolf raised $192,985 from energy companies, including coal, wind and pipeline operators. Three of Wolf’s top individual energy contributors seem to have hedged their bets by also donating to Corbett.
Corbett’s highest individual donors are shale executives. Terrance Pegula from East Resources donated $250,000 to the governor, while John Monk of Energy Corporation of America gave $100,000. Third in line is Kelsey Warren, CEO of Energy Transfer Group, which has plans to build a pipeline to transport Marcellus Shale gas.
Wolf and Corbett differ when it comes to taxing the natural gas industry. Corbett wants to maintain the status quo by charging $50,000 a well. But Wolf wants to impose a five percent tax on the market value of the gas produced. Even as the race tightens, it’s unclear what this money will mean to Corbett. Today’s Franklin and Marshall survey has Tom Wolf still leading in the polls.
Election 2014: Corbett and Wolf differ on approach to Obama’s carbon rules
Keith Srakocic / AP Photo
The Homer City Generating Station, Homer City, Pa.
Election day is just a week away. And whoever ends up winning the race for Pennsylvania’s governor will have climate change on their agenda. That’s because states now have to implement new EPA rules decreasing carbon emissions at power plants. But the two candidates are far apart on their approach to reducing the state’s carbon footprint.
The Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed rules would make Pennsylvania reduce its carbon emissions by 32 percent. And that means burning less coal.
Governor Corbett has criticized the EPA’s proposed rules.
“Those are aimed directly at the coal industry,” Corbett told StateImpact. “Right now [the rules are] going to cost Pennsylvanians 6200 miners jobs, tens of thousands of jobs beyond that, but also [they're] going to cause energy costs to go up because right now in Pennsylvania 40 percent of our electricity today is obtained through coal.” Continue Reading
Philadelphia City Council kills deal to sell gas utility
Nathaniel Hamilton/for NewsWorks
Philadelphia Gas Works offices on Broad Street in South Philadelphia.
The $1.86 billion deal to sell Philadelphia’s natural gas utility to a private company is off, the City Council announced on Monday.
When the Nutter administration chose UIL Holdings as the winning bidder for PGW, City Council hired a consultant to review the entire process. Council President Darrell Clarke says after the extensive evaluation, council has decided not to move forward with a bill to sell the gas utility.
“As a result of those documents, the City Council through it’s process met with and talked to members and decided we could not endorse the deal as proposed,” he said.
Clarke says council will hold hearings in December to figure out what to do next with PGW, the largest city-owned utility in the country.
Constitution pipeline clears major regulatory hurdle
A proposed interstate gas pipeline designed to bring Marcellus Shale gas to markets in New York and New England has cleared a major regulatory hurdle.
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), which oversees interstate pipelines, concluded in an Environmental Impact Statement Friday that the project would have “some adverse environmental impacts” but that they would be limited.
The proposal now goes to FERC’s Commissioners for final approval, which could come as early as the end of November.
The Constitution project involves construction of 124 miles of new 30-inch-diameter pipeline, connecting gas production in Susquehanna County to the existing Iroquois and Tennessee transmission lines. It would be jointly operated by subsidiaries of Williams Partners, Cabot Oil and Gas, Piedmont Natural Gas, and WGL Holdings.
Courtesy: FERC
The dotted black circle shows the gas supply area in Susquehanna County. The red line is the proposed path of the Constitution Pipeline. It could be approved by federal regulators by the end of November.
DEP extends comment period on policy to address oil and gas violations
Marie Cusick/ StateImpact Pennsylvania
Natural gas wells in Lycoming County.
The state Department of Environmental Protection is extending the public comment period on a draft policy to update how it responds to and tracks oil and gas violations.
The previous six-page policy was last updated in 2005. The new draft document is more than three times longer and includes a new section related to documenting and resolving water supply investigations. In August the DEP released its accounting of how many water supplies had been adversely impacted since the shale gas boom began. The list includes 243 incidents.
Pink drill bits for breast cancer draw protestors to Sunday’s Steelers game
Katie Colaneri/StateImpact Pennsylvania
Dana Dolney was among the protestors who gathered in front of Heinz Field in Pittsburgh where oil and gas services company Baker Hughes presented a large donation to the Susan G. Komen breast cancer organization.
A controversy surrounding a major oil and gas services company’s breast cancer awareness campaign drew protestors to downtown Pittsburgh on Sunday.
Football fans packing into Heinz Field for the Steelers-Colts game were met by a handful of people handing out flyers and holding up signs warning passersby to “think before you pink.”
At half time, Baker Hughes CEO Martin Craighead planned to hand over a $100,000 check to Susan G. Komen, the world’s largest breast cancer organizations which funds screenings, treatments and research. The company is also giving out 1,000 hot pink drill bits to its customers around the world, along with breast cancer awareness and screening information.
Over the last few weeks, the backlash has brought together anti-fracking activists and health advocates who object to campaigns that they say “pinkwash” the serious impacts breast cancer brings on those with the disease and their families.
“It’s the biggest slap in the face,” said Dana Dolney, director of Friends of the Harmed. The group works with Pennsylvania residents who say their health has been impacted by nearby oil and gas development.