Thomas J Shepstone's Blog (1,194)

Pavillion Pile-Up by EPA

Pavillion – The name of this Wyoming town became an Alamo-like rallying cry of the anti-frackers in their Quixotic attempt to prove hydraulic fracturing just might be able to pollute a water supply, but it’s all over now and no windmills were captured.

Just last year all we heard from mainstream media (promoting the anti-drilling viewpoint) was how fracking pollutes water. Just look at Pavillion, WY! they said. MDN analyzed the Pavillion potential “fracking contaminates groundwater”…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 15, 2013 at 12:52am — No Comments

Delaware Riverkeeper Shenanigans

The Delaware Riverkeeper is one of the most arrogant organizations imaginable and a little research demonstrates how it consistently talks out of both sides of its mouth, while chasing foundation money from anti-development special interests.

When it comes to sheer unadulterated gall it’s hard to top the hypocrisy and cynicism of the Delaware Riverkeeper, an elitist group of nannies funded by some of the wealthy foundations around, that spends its time and energy supposedly defending…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 14, 2013 at 12:55am — No Comments

Steingraber Shameless Supports Sham Health Clinic

Sandra Steingraber and other anti-fracking true-believers have built careers around promoting junk science of the “it’s a fact that it’s a possibility” sort, a variant on the old guilt by association trick. They’re at it again.

An anti-fracking guest viewpoint article appeared the other day in the Elmira Star-Gazette and other Gannett newspapers upstate. It was authored by Sandra Steingraber (a well known commodity in these parts who uses natural gas to heat her home and then preaches…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 13, 2013 at 6:12am — No Comments

Kathleen "Ellie" Kane vs. XTO

Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane, described as being on a “high-speed political train,” may be angling to run for governor already. Regardless, her attempt to attach criminality to a limited impact incident that was either an innocent error, or a case of vandalism, is shameless.

Kathleen Kane is described in a Philly.com piece as a “high-speed” politician, one whose campaign slogan, ironically, was ”I’m a prosecutor, not a politician.” That article details a long list of…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 12, 2013 at 11:14am — No Comments

Pipeline Will Be A Jobs Machine

The Constitution Pipeline represents a very special job opportunity for upstate New York, one that dwarfs all those trendy schemes planners and supposed visionaries keep floating. It’s time to get practical, drop the fantasy agendas and do some real economic development.

If you’re looking for a job in Otsego County, prepare for the worst. Opportunities in the classified ads are limited. The “Big Box” stores will take your application, add it to the pile. The jobs are mostly part time,…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 12, 2013 at 3:01am — No Comments

Drill Now While We Still Own It

Vic Furman says all manufacturing is not equal and we’re not going to see a revival of it that actually produces good jobs unless we focus on oil and natural gas, the one bright sector of the economy producing both blue and white-collar employment.



I keep hearing arguments that jobs are returning from foreign countries back to America’s soil but I don’t hear too many people explaining why we’re still falling…
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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 11, 2013 at 2:39am — No Comments

Youngstown Held Hostage

Youngstown is being held hostage by a band of radicals forcing it to vote over and over again on an extremist measure called a “Community Bill of Rights” that is aimed at frustrating capitalism, jobs and development of natural gas that 88% of the city uses.



Less than four months ago, the voters of Youngstown, Ohio soundly rejected a “Community Bill of Rights” that would have banned natural gas development in that city of 65,000 people.  The referendum margin, at…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 10, 2013 at 3:12am — No Comments

Yes, Virginia, "Water Is Life" But...

Ammonia? One cannot attend an anti-fracking event without seeing one of those simplistic, moralizing “Water Is Life” signs ignoring the reality we can’t live on water alone either. Nick Grealy offers some much needed perspective on other things that make for life these days – things made with natural gas, things like ammonia.

As gas opponents repeat the simple mantra “keep all fossil fuels in the ground”, few of us realize the world fertilizer industry has been putting natural gas…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 8, 2013 at 1:08am — No Comments

An Open letter to the DRBC

Grace Wildermuth asks "Why is it the Delaware River Basin Commission takes note of the needs of everyone but those who actually in the upper Delaware River basin, the folks who actually have to make a living there?"

Delaware River Basin Commission,

You might be thinking what special title or wisdom do I have that makes me think that you, the Commissioners of the Delaware River Basin Commission, will care what I have to say. And the answer is none. But you seem to have taken…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 6, 2013 at 11:40pm — No Comments

Cornell Survey Biased

Some residents of Pennsylvania’s Northern Tier and New York’s Southern Tier received an opinion survey from Cornell University this week regarding “fracking.” It was constructed to appear unbiased, but is far from it.

A questionnaire distributed by Cornell University this week illustrates the subtle bias found in so much of academia and in superficial public opinion surveys. I have no doubt the researchers are sincere and believe they have constructed an objective research tool, but…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 6, 2013 at 1:02am — 1 Comment

NGL - The Future

Natural gas liquids (NGL) holds the potential to revive American manufacturing and achieve American energy independence with economic benefits that are distributed nationwide to both rural and urban residents.

Many people, including me, have, in the last few days, been quoting from the recently released IHS report entitled America’s New Energy Future: Manufacturing Renaissance Report, which produced some pretty astounding data regarding the impact of unconventional oil and gas…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 5, 2013 at 12:58am — No Comments

One Pennsylvanian's Take on Natural Gas

Natural gas development does affect the real lives of real people and in largely positive ways, as this Bradford County, Pennsylvania landowner relates in telling her experiences.

"I would like to take this opportunity to thank the people involved with the natural gas industry for coming to Northeastern Pennsylvania and providing our local people with jobs, more income and great opportunities for education, not to mention its donations to local organizations."…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 4, 2013 at 2:20pm — 1 Comment

Shale Gas Changes Everything but Minds of Cynics

Nick Grealy suggests shale gas cynics and pessimists such as Art Berman are latched onto by green ideologues as straws to be grasped in a last desperate struggle to forestall the change, but what cannot be stopped won’t be.

It’s been a theory of mine for a while that the industry should present the sudden emergence of shale gas and oil as a product not only of horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing, but also as a tech issue. That could be one way of raising people’s hopes and…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 4, 2013 at 12:42am — No Comments

How NIMBY Opponents Cost Us All

Contributor, Jim Willis, at Marcellus Drilling News (MDN), has laid out over time just how the NIMBY world was able to temporarily deny UGI and cost us all. Here are four excerpts from his continuing coverage of what should have been a non-issue.

PA Utility Announces Second NatGas Rate Cut This Year

May, 2012: On March 1, a little over two months ago, UGI Penn Natural Gas, a utility which serves approximately 158,000 customers in 13 counties in northeastern and central…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 3, 2013 at 6:42am — No Comments

Gov. Cuomo: Running Scared of Big Liars Is No Way to Lead

Bryant LaTourette says Governor Andrew Cuomo has surrendered New York State’s future out of fear of big fracking lies being told by a combination of amateur and professional propagandists, demonstrating he’s a leader unwilling to lead.

Not even Snake Plisskin could save our governor today. He’s an incurable appeaser. And, he’s running scared of big fracking lies; sacrificing our pride, our land, our youth, our spirit and the greatest economic opportunity New York State ever had in a…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on September 1, 2013 at 11:34pm — No Comments

Outdoor Life Goes Rogue

Outdoor Life Magazine has done something completely inexplicable, signing on with the Delaware Riverkeeper, an organization that attacks gun clubs and the owners of hunting land who are its readers and the customers of its advertisers. It’s suicide by self-strangulation.

Last week the collective world IQ dropped a few points after former “child star” Miley Cyrus introduced “Twerking” to the general public on national TV. This week John Haughey, Blog Editor at Outdoor Life Magazine,…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on August 31, 2013 at 1:14pm — No Comments

The Pied Piper

Piped Piper Vera Scroggins has now led several New York State Senators throughout Northeastern Pennsylvania to see natural gas development, as they have relied upon a vile-mouthed individual, with some very strange revolting ideas, to help make the case for their own anti-fracking crusades. Do they know who they are dealing with or what they are seeing? Jim Willis wonders.

A small group of anti-drilling New York State lawmakers from Westchester County and New York City came to…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on August 30, 2013 at 12:59am — No Comments

Methane Leakage Not What It's Hyped to Be

Shale gas opposition hyperbole of the sort generated by Cornell Professors Bob Howarth and Tony Ingraffea doesn’t get as much play in the U.S. as elsewhere these days, but our friend Nick Grealy reaches back to the U.S., to the very same university, to find the answer from their Cornell colleague Larry Cathles.

Green purist opponents to shale, quite rightly reject the cherry picking of data by climate change deniers, but are often only too happy to be selective in their choice of…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on August 29, 2013 at 1:07am — No Comments

SWPA Environmental Health Project Just A Community Organizing Event

The Southwest Pennsylvania Environmental Health Project is no objective research organization and its recently announced health study isn’t anything of the sort. Rather, it’s a community organizing project – against natural gas development.

If I issued a research report proclaiming that natural gas development only rarely resulted in cases of methane migration, what do you think the chances are the news media would report the results without mentioning my long-standing role as an…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on August 28, 2013 at 6:18am — No Comments

Fractivist Mob-ocracy

Bob Tiberio says fractivists have been practicing what is, in effect, mob rule in their attempts to impose their will on towns and states. They don’t always win but where they it is a corruption of what our nation’s founders wrought.

Anti-gas activists (fractivists) have claimed hard-working town boards across the Southern Tier that support natural gas development, or wish to wait for state guidance, are ignoring the wishes of the “majority.” I have witnessed them lecture my elected…

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Added by Thomas J Shepstone on August 28, 2013 at 12:23am — No Comments

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