NAPE: Frac regulation Washington's 'worst threat'

By OGJ editors
HOUSTON, Aug. 26 -- A move to regulate hydraulic fracturing federally is the “biggest threat our industry has ever seen in Washington,” Bruce Vincent, vice-chairman of the Independent Petroleum Association of America, said Aug. 26.

Joel Noyes, IPAA director of government relations and industry affairs, expressed a low expectation for passage of most of the Obama administrations frenzied agenda, much of which contains negative provisions for oil and gas producers.

The atmosphere in Washington is one of “almost chaos,” said Noyes, and the environment is very partisan. The agenda is so congested because of the Democratic desire to push contentious legislation through before the 2010 election year, he said.

Ninety percent of wells are hydraulically fractured, some dozens of times, Vincent told the Summer NAPE E&P Forum in Houston. In the 60 years that the industry has been fracturing wells under state regulation, no case of fresh water contamination by the procedure has been documented, he said (OGJ Online, July 2, 2009).

Greater frac regulation is coming, predicted William Coates, president, Schlumberger Oilfield Services North America. The question is whether the industry can manage enough input that final rules are formed in a cooperative manner, he said.