Help

The Railroad Commission of Texas (RRC) has about $700,000 available in grants to help public fleet operators, such as school districts, cities and counties, buy new natural gas vehicles. The grant funding, which the RRC originally received to use for propane-fueled vehicles, has now been expanded to natural gas vehicles and can be used to offset some or all of the incremental costs of a natural gas fuel system on a new or retrofitted vehicle. Matching funds for the purchase of the vehicles must come from non-federal sources. Public fleets statewide are eligible to apply for the grants, regardless of the fleet location’s air-quality classification. More information is available at the RRC website.

A regional approach to siting drilling infrastructure in Pennsylvania’s Marcellus Shale is needed to help minimize development in core forest and productive agricultural lands and to decrease potential risk to waterways, according to researchers at Pennsylvania State University. A study conducted by the university’s College of Agricultural Sciences found that shale gas development is causing rapid landscape change. “The development of new roads to support drilling could affect forest ecosystem integrity via increased fragmentation,” said Patrick Drohan, assistant professor of pedology. Drohan estimated that slightly more than half of the well pads in Pennsylvania are on agricultural land and most of the rest are on forestland. The study found that drilling is competing with food production for space on the landscape.

Based on the state’s latest statistics as of the end of February, North Dakota’s oil production has doubled in the past two years, and with the help of increased rail transportation it is being marketed nationwide.

The Pennsylvania Public Utilities Commission (PUC) said Monday it plans to conduct a public forum on electric (EV) and natural gas vehicles (NGV) to help the five-member PUC and other state agencies determine how they can best foster stepped up investment in alternative fuel vehicles.

RegScan, a developer of regulatory compliance products, and the Independent Petroleum Association of America (IPAA) have jointly come up with a system to help oil and natural gas operators comply with the different well stages in the Marcellus Shale basin.

Wyoming state lawmakers last Friday passed legislation to help bring a permanent solution to potential drinking water problems in the Pavillion, WY, area. This is where two U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) test wells have sparked concerns among residents and environmental activists who are opposed to hydraulic fracturing (fracking).

Although Pennsylvania could eventually lease additional state forest land for natural gas drilling, it will likely be in small doses, according to the state’s top land manager.

Revisiting his initiative to repeal the $4 billion in subsidies that taxpayers provide the oil and gas industry each year, President Obama on Thursday reiterated part of his State of the Union address that there’s only one real path forward for America’s future: an “all of the above” approach that develops every source of energy available.

In response to continued low natural gas prices and “as an effort to help bring U.S. natural gas supply and demand into better balance,” Chesapeake Energy Corp. said late Tuesday it has now upped its curtailments to about 1 Bcf/d of gross operated gas output, or about 1.5% of U.S. Lower 48 gas production, primarily in the Haynesville and Barnett shale plays.