The debate over natural gas development nationwide is all about New York State and the debate in New York State is all about the Natural Resources Defense Council and its goals.  Those goals are contrary to the interests of landowners and ordinary New Yorkers.

We got a fair amount of reaction to our post on Cuomo’s Choice: Blue Collars or Blue Bloods and the consolidated version in the New York Post.  Kate Sinding, one of the three senior NRDC attorneys mentioned in the post, even commented, with no evidence, to assert our information was false.  We ruffled some feathers for sure; as my daughter the horse-lover used to say, “the ears were back, the nose was flared.”  But there’s actually much more.

What we noted in that story was the pervasive role of the NRDC leadership in fighting natural gas development in New York State because it threatens their interests in the Catskills.  It’s not a new subject for us, but one that needed to be put into perspective.  It appears the NRDC folks are working, at the highest levels in New York State government, to make a deal — some deal, any deal.  Otherwise, there is no basis for their actions in other states, where they have actually acted with more pragmatism (comparatively speaking, of course). They are looking to protect their own interests before the state of New York acts.

What kind of deal might that be?  Well, we have addressed that before as well when we wrote a post called Seven Miles to Nowhere.  It would involve keeping natural gas development as far away as possible from lands they might want to acquire on the cheap — so they can buy it.  Is this what’s already happening, though?  There is a very strong possibility.

http://eidmarcellus.org/marcellus-shale/deal-or-no-deal-on-natural-...