Posted on 10/27/2010 2:42:28 AM PDT by Erik Latranyi
HARRISBURG -- Gov. Ed Rendell has carried out an executive order placing 1.5 million acres of state forest land off-limits for natural gas drilling, getting praise from environmental groups but sharp criticism from Senate Republican leader Joe Scarnati.
Brickbats were flying Tuesday between Democrat Rendell and Republican Scarnati over the moratorium order, which bans any more drilling pads from being located in state forests, other than on the 700,000 acres of forest land already designated for gas drilling by the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources.
Penn Future's leader Jan Jarrrett and Sierra Club Director Jeff Schmidt applauded the decision.
"More [drilling] leases would fragment the habitat and destroy the very essence of the forests, along with our valuable outdoor tourism industry that attracts hunters and anglers from across the nation," Ms. Jarrett said.
The leasing moratorium resulted in part from an ongoing feud between Democrats and Republicans over the failure to enact a severance tax on natural gas pumped from underground Marcellus Shale, much of which lies deep below state forests.
(Excerpt) Read more at post-gazette.com ...
The BARF ALERT line from the article is the representative from Sierra Club claiming they wish to protect hunters!
Follow the money. Bet it has nothing to do with protecting the environment and everything to do with increasing demand for anthracite coal instead.
Instead, I expect McCain and his girlfriend Lindsay Graham to regularly run to 1600 Pennsylvania and offer to do a Gang of 14 Lewinsky for Obama on drilling and most other things he wants. These will be the greatest two years of McCain's life as he is celebrated by the Washington media and his RAT friends for consistently undermining conservatives.
Cui bono - the key to all environmental actions. Mother Earth is just a tool.
The Demoncrats do hate America.
In the face of an enormous defeat next week the commies are
in full desperation mode. A scorched earth policy.
In the latest issue of Ward's Automotive, Chesapeake Energy has a full page add's about Natural Gas, the various Shale Gas deposits, and consider it. By that I think they meant your next automotive design project since the magazine is an inside the auto beltway rag.
IMHO the promise of Shale Gas and it's finds and what it can do to make us energy independent is huge.
Tangent to this, I got to see some college girl on TV a week ago and they were asking them about this election cycle and this skull full of mush was adamantly against Shale Gas. Why? Which College Professor, which group and their hidden Soro's money filled her cranium with this crap?
This is the same MO that killed Nuclear Power. Battle Royal brewing as to whether we will be living in mud encrusted Yurt's and eating twigs or living the American Dream. I think the Greenies sense they may loose this battle, big time.....
Way to go, Rendell - like Obama, you are taking action that limits jobs - AND IN THE WEEK BEFORE AN ELECTION.
Well, we now know what will be Governor Tom Corbett’s first executive action - lifting this ban.
Hope you are wrong, but fear you are right.
No, it has everything to do with imposing a.39 tax on every cubic hundred feet of gas taken out of the ground. Rendell needs to close a 700 million dollar budget shortfall, pay off unions, get more money for public transportation and line the pockets of his cronies.
“In the face of an enormous defeat next week, the commies are in full desperation mode.”
Your forgetting the undead who vote democrat and the radio-controlled voting machines.
IMHO
Sue the commie.
LLS
A "gang of forteen" won't help 0bama if the GOP decisively wins the House of Representatives. McCain and Graham are in the Senate...not the House.
Executive orders can be rescinded.
Pennsylvania is sitting on a vast natural gas reserve that needs to be exploited to the benefit of the state and the country.
**** the environmental wackos and their tools in the Rat party.
Predictable......
After the Democrats lose control, we will suddenly be thrust back into the greatest depression known to the Universe with over 30% unemployment. The numbers are already there, all the media needs to do is reverse their propaganda methods for defining unemployment. We can expect the “underemployed”, all self employed and those who have given up looking, as suddenly part of the statistics again, desperate and angry with Republicans for having caused this mess.
Food prices, gas, electrical, commodities, etc, will all go through the roof in the coming months. To coin a phrase from Jimmie Durante; “WE AIN’T SEEN NUTTIN’ YET!”
Why do We the People allow a political hack like Rendell have anything to do with an issue as critical as energy? His only interest is a shakedown.
“These will be the greatest two years of McCain’s life as he is celebrated by the Washington media and his RAT friends for consistently undermining conservatives.”
Do you mean the Maine gals are his friends too?
I love anthracite as much as the next guy but it’s sure not interchangable with natural gas.
I think the bottom line is over revenue envy. If the State wants to pass a reasonable extraction tax, they should do that and let the chips fall where they may. They should already be getting a royalty on gas production from State-owned lands, and if they aren't, someone didn't do their homework.
Those revenue streams can make drilling regulation revenue neutral (pays for regulatory, state records, sample, log, and core library and ongoing library upkeep--providing a tremendous wealth of geological data for the future as well) Those same data sets can be maintained in downloadable form and access to the data provided as a subscription service--revenue neutral at worst.
I'll point them to North Dakota's Oil and Gas Commission as an example.
If they need to take a breather to do it right, so be it, but they would shoot themselves in the foot to just stop drilling in the future for the sake of stopping drilling.
And yes, lost jobs, royalty revenue, spinoff jobs, and sales/extraction tax revenue, et cetera could become a campaign issue in a heartbeat if the coffers are empty.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.