US Forest Service takes no stance on fracturing in national forest

Dec. 12, 2014
The US Forest Service has dropped a proposal that would have banned hydraulic fracturing in the George Washington National Forest.

The US Forest Service has dropped a proposal that would have banned hydraulic fracturing in the George Washington National Forest. The ban was outlined in a preliminary land management plan released in 2011 for the 1.1-million-acre forest in Virginia and West Virginia.

Virginia Petroleum Council (VPC) Executive Director Michael Ward lauded the forest service on its final management plan for the forest.

The Forest Service did not stipulate drilling technology. The federal government agency decided instead to stop leasing additional land for oil and gas activities.

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe has opposed fracturing in the National Forest. No drilling permits are pending for the forest near the Marcellus shale.

Oil and natural gas companies already lease about 10,000 acres within the forest and own underground mineral rights for another 167,000 acres. That land will remain open for extraction.

The new policy, expected to become effective in early 2015, would limit the forest acreage available for drilling to about 16%.

Ward said, "The success of domestic natural gas production depends on our ability to produce energy from shale through hydraulic fracturing." He said industry is committed to safe and responsible business practices.

Fracturing first was used commercially 65 years ago, and has been used in 1,800 wells in Southwest Virginia since the 1950s, said information from the Virginia Department of Mines, Minerals, and Energy (DMME).

More than 5,600 coalbed methane wells are producing gas by hydraulic fracturing or other extraction methods in the commonwealth, DMME said.

"The industry is creating jobs throughout the supply chain in Virginia and throughout the country that pay about double the average salary for all industries," said Ward. "Thanks to innovations in horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing…businesses of all types in the Commonwealth are growing."

Fracturing is regulated under a number of federal statutes, including the Clean Water Act and the Safe Drinking Water Act. In addition, fracturing also is regulated at the state level. State regulations vary from state to state. The VPC is a division of the American Petroleum Institute.

Robert Bonnie, undersecretary for natural resources and environment at the US Agriculture Department, said the Forest Service received thousands of comments from community residents about oil and gas on the national forest, which is near Washington, DC. Concerns involved possible contamination of ground water.

Bonnie said the Forest Service tried to balance those concerns with interests of oil and gas companies.