Wednesday, April 20, 2011

Pa. agency OKs more gas drilling on game lands

MARC LEVY, Associated Press
Updated 07:27 p.m., Wednesday, April 20, 2011
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — The Pennsylvania Game Commission has expanded the scope of leasing state-owned hunting lands for harvesting natural gas from the lucrative Marcellus Shale formation, this time netting more than $18 million.
The money helps a financially strapped agency that has cut back programs, such as raising pheasants for small-game hunting, while going a dozen years without an increase in the hunting license fees that are its primary source of support.
About two-thirds of the lease money is payment for the extraction of natural gas from beneath game lands in Bradford and Lycoming counties in northern Pennsylvania by way of wells that would be drilled on adjacent, privately owned land. Another lease on game lands in adjoining Tioga County will allow up to three well pads — each of which can host multiple wells — and pipeline construction.

No comments:

Post a Comment