House

The Texas Senate has passed HB 2767, which is intended to encourage the recycling of wastewater from drilling and hydraulic fracturing operations for reuse rather than injection of the waste into disposal wells. The legislation aims to clear up legal ambiguities around responsibility for transferred drilling waste.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was put in the hot seat Friday as House lawmakers took the agency to task for its flawed reports on hydraulic fracturing (fracking), most notably the December 2011 report that found groundwater in Pavillion, WY, to be contaminated. That report was later retracted. And before directing any more funds to the EPA for reseach into fracking, the lawmakers demanded that the agency provide Congress with more information on their reseach activities so far.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was put in the hot seat Friday as House lawmakers took the agency to task for what they said are flawed reports on hydraulic fracturing (fracking), most notably the December 2011 report that found groundwater in Pavillion, WY, to be contaminated. That report was later retracted. Before directing any more funds to the EPA for reseach into fracking, the lawmakers demanded that it furnish Congress with more information on reseach activities so far.

Officials with the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources (DCNR) will participate in an online forum this week to discuss potential Marcellus Shale gas drilling in the Loyalsock State Forest.

The House Natural Resources Committee sent a letter to the Interior Department Thursday expressing concern about the scientific integrity of and the imposition of what it said were arbitrary deadlines on a decision to potentially list the sage grouse under the Endangered Species Act (ESA)

A Pennsylvania official said royalties from Marcellus Shale natural gas drilling on public lands will add about $60 million to state coffers this year.

A Quebec government official said Wednesday that legislation will be introduced next week to formally enact a moratorium on shale gas development in the province, a ban that would be in effect until the results of a two-year study on potential impacts are fully vetted.

Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lisa Jackson said Thursday she will resign from that position after President Obama’s State of the Union speech next month, bringing to an end a sometimes tumultuous four-year tenure.

The bill (H.R. 4606), which cleared the House by 286-10, was sponsored by Rep. Denny Rehberg (R-MT), whose term expires at the end of the year, and was supported by Montana Democratic Sens. Max Baucus and Jon Tester. It allows maintenance work on a 3 1/2-mile section of pipeline, which was built in the 1950s, that runs through Glacier National Park lands. It is part of an 118-mile pipeline system that serves about 25,000 people and runs parallel to U.S. Highway 2 along Glacier’s southern boundary.