Ordinance

An appeals court sided with EQT Corp. this week, affirming a district court’s decision to strike down a West Virginia county’s ordinance banning oil and natural gas wastewater injection wells.

A Pennsylvania appellate court once again has affirmed a key 2015 decision that found natural gas drilling is compatible with residential/agricultural (RA) zoning districts, rejecting a challenge from residents and environmental groups that argued the areas are not suitable for such development.

A small Northwest Pennsylvania township’s nearly four-year fight with Seneca Resources Corp. appears to be over after supervisors there overturned an ordinance banning underground injection wells that dispose of oil and natural gas wastewater.

A federal judge last week ruled that an ordinance passed by a Southern West Virginia county banning the disposal of oil and natural gas wastewater in underground injection wells violates state laws and is preempted by the state’s regulatory primacy over the practice.

West Virginia’s first county-wide injection well ban has been put on hold by a federal judge, raising questions over whether the local ordinance will survive a legal challenge.

Five environmental and community organizations on Thursday asked a local state court to set aside a Kern County, CA, ordinance passed last month to fast-track oil/natural gas permits, alleging that it violates state laws related to environmental protection, planning and zoning.

A U.S. District Magistrate Judge has dealt a blow to a southwestern Pennsylvania township’s more than year-long fight to stop an underground injection well from operating inside its borders, striking down an ordinance it passed in June 2014 to ban oil and gas waste disposal wells.

Oklahoma earlier this year enacted a law reiterating its primacy in regulating drilling activities, but the city council in the university town of Stillwater, OK, on Monday passed an ordinance setting rules for oil and natural gas drilling within the city limits.

Bills recently introduced in the Texas legislature intended to thwart local municipality interference with oil and gas drilling have raised the ire of the Texas Municipal League (TML), but an industry trade association said the proposed changes would strengthen the relationship between the state and cities in oil/gas regulation.