Greens Want to Shut Down Few Bright Spots in US Economy

More: Here is a brief DOE PDF report providing a primer on shale gas. A short but sweet introduction, with some excellent graphics.

Obama's EPA is currently focusing on finding excuses to shut down profitable operations in the Marcellus Shale, despite extensive testing showing the operations to be safe. If EPA policies of energy starvation are successful in the Marcellus, expect Obama's shock troops to spread out across the US to shut down other areas of similar prosperity.

The North American boom in shale oil and shale gas has helped to provide a few bright spots in an otherwise dour economic picture. Regions from Pennsylvania to Louisiana to Ohio to Texas to North Dakota are booming, with jobs a'plenty. Here's a look at one such region in Ohio:

The Utica deposit lies below sections of eight states, from Tennessee to New York, as well as parts of Canada. But drilling companies believe eastern Ohio has the most concentrated oil reserves that are the easiest to extract. The companies are in the testing and exploratory stage now. Hydraulic fracturing processes have been used to recover oil and gas from rock formations for decades through traditional vertical drills.

Hydraulic fracturing combined with horizontal drilling techniques has allowed producers to retrieve vast quantities of natural gas from shale formations. The techniques were more recently adapted to coax crude oil from deeply buried rocks in states including Texas, North Dakota and now, potentially, Ohio.

In Portage County, home to Windham, dozens of researchers on Chesapeake's payroll have crowded the recorder's office since September, poring over land records. Normally, Portage County records about 20 mineral leases a year; in 2010 there were 1,226.

Local oil and gas attorney Eric Johnson says some of his clients have already reaped life-altering rewards from the leases. One farmer in Ohio's poverty stricken Appalachian region pocketed nearly $1 million for selling drilling rights to his land. If the play pans out, even more money could pour into Ohio via royalties, typically 12.5% per barrel of oil." _WSJ_via_MJPerry

This article focuses on the boom in oil and gas leases, which benefits local land and homeowners. But the employment provided to skilled workers is likely to provide the greater long-term boon to any given region, as long as the boom is allowed to continue.

Faux environmentalists are flocking to the anti-fracking banner. Propumentaries such as "Gasland" provide a focus, and big green lobbies provide the funding and activists-for-hire. Others who have a vested interest in shutting down a resurgent US energy industry include Russian and MENA interests, as well as those invested in Brazilian energy -- such as G. Soros.

US environmental regulations are enforced by multiple agencies at multiple levels of government. They comprise overlapping layers of constrictive sheets and bands, of a suffocating nature to business. It is the assertion of the green lobbies that the energy industries are not regulated enough. That is probably true, if one's intent is to kill these industries outright.

If the lefty-Luddite greens of the dieoff.orgy persuasion -- of whom there are many within the Obama administration -- decide that shale energy should be regulated out of existence, that would be simply too bad for these few remaining American boom towns.

More on Obama's lack of seriousness in meeting America's crucial energy needs.