New PA gas drilling fees

By TOM KANE

HARRISBURG, PA — Answering a request by the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), the Pennsylvania Environmental Quality Board (EQB) is imposing a 23-fold increase in fees that gas drilling companies must pay.

The new fees will help insure adequate funding to cover program expenses for permit reviews and well-site inspections. “The fee increase will also allow the department to hire additional staff in Meadville, Pittsburg and Williamsport to process permits and monitor drilling activities in the north central and north eastern areas of the Commonwealth, “ said EPA acting secretary John Hanger.

The ruling will increase the fees from the current $100 permit fee for oil and gas wells, which was established in 1984. The new fee will be $900 for all Marcellus Shale wells up to 1,500 feet deep, and will impose an additional cost of $100 for every 500 feet of depths past 1,500 feet.

The increase will take effect in early spring.

Due to technological advances in drilling and rising natural gas prices, gas exploration in the state has increased significantly with 40,000 new drilling permits anticipated during the next three years.

“With nearly 8,000 drilling permits issued so far this year and drilling taking place in areas of the state outside our traditional oil and gas regions, we need to make sure that we have sufficient personnel to properly manage development of Pennsylvania Marcellus Shale natural gas reserves,” Hanger said.

“The action taken by the EQB basically bypasses the public comment period, so the decision goes directly to the Independent Regulatory Review Commission and then to the Attorney General for final review,” said DEP spokesman Tom Rathbun. “If all goes well, we should be able to start collecting the fees in late March or April.”

In other actions taken by the EQB, the agency is strengthening public notification requirements for community water systems to notify the public of imminent threats and situations that may impact public health and the safety of water obtained from a public water system. Gas drilling requires from one to two million gallons of water, sometimes taken from public water systems, to drill one well in the Marcellus Shale field using the fracking method of drilling.