Laws

A number of states that have laws requiring utilities to use renewable fuels to produce a specific amount of electricity are considering scaling back their mandates — or even repealing them altogether — given the prolific supply of natural gas that has caused prices to plunge.

A number of states that have laws requiring utilities to use renewable fuels to produce a specific amount of electricity are considering scaling back their mandates — or even repealing them altogether — given the prolific supply of natural gas that has caused prices to plunge.

Wyoming Gov. Matt Mead on Wednesday signed two laws that are designed to help advance the use of natural gas for transportation in a state rich in gas reserves. The measures, Senate Files (SF) 23 and 52, were less than the industry originally requested.

The San Francisco-based Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit in a California Superior Court Thursday, seeking to get the state to enforce existing laws governing hydraulic fracturing (fracking) when it is used in oil and natural gas production. The nonprofit conservation organization alleged that the state is shirking its responsibility.

Gas pipeline safety laws continue to swirl around in the current session of the California state legislature, with several bills still active, although at least a couple of proposals were declared dead in committee earlier in May. A new bill (AB 478) in the lower house Assembly was introduced Tuesday to redirect fines paid by natural gas utilities to help pay for pipeline upgrades mandated in the wake of the San Bruno, CA, pipeline rupture and explosion nearly two years ago.

Ohio’s laws addressing old leases and conservation issues could pose some unique challenges to proponents of energy development in the state’s portions of the Marcellus and Utica shales, two attorneys with the law firm Steptoe & Johnson LLP said during a presentation Wednesday.

Ohio’s laws addressing old leases and conservation issues could pose some unique challenges to proponents of energy development in the state’s portions of the Marcellus and Utica shales, two attorneys with the law firm Steptoe & Johnson LLP said last week.

A series of legislative proposals that would allow hydraulic fracturing (fracking) and enact several other changes to North Carolina’s energy policies within two years have cleared an important hurdle and could come to a vote this summer.

Coordinated regulation of oil and gas development is needed in Colorado, but no new laws are needed to achieve such an approach, according to a report from a task force created earlier this year by Gov. John Hickenlooper.