Health and Safety
In Albany, New York, the New York State Assembly has included an independent health impact study of hydraulic fracturing for natural gas in an upcoming budget proposal.
The Department of Environmental Conservation has been criticized by physicians, health organizations, and environmental groups for not disclosing the comprehensive health impact hydraulic fracturing can have.
The Assembly bill would set aside $100,000 for a study by a school of public within the state university system. The study would include research into other states’ experience with fracking, estimated costs of any health impacts to the state, insurers, and employers. Lastly, it would include a plan for monitoring health impacts.
With many concerns about health safety, the New Yorkers feel this study would be very beneficial to them. They have been wanting a formal health impact assessment that is extensive and detailed. Residents feel as if some major health issues have not been looked at during the hydraulic fracturing process.
“We have county medical societies throughout upstate and downstate that are very concerned that the health impacts have not been studied,” said Pat Clancy, the medical society’s vice president for public health and education.
The state of New York will be forced to take a look at the health impacts of fracking and take any necessary steps to make informed decisions about the drilling process.
So does this imply that oil companies got hosed? I thghout these guys were “evil billionairs”. I’m not able to follow how gas prices had to do with the tech bubble yet Amazon and google has nothing to do with it.Most of the oil in the world comes from conventional sources that are quite profitable. And oil companies are only evil in the eyes of political operatives on the left or right and the fools who believe their misrepresentations. My point is that Amazon and Google can make profit. So can conventional oil companies. The shale gas players that Mark was hyping were unable to do so because they sold most of their production at below cost. That may be fine for consumers but not for investors. Lack of storage. If you have to produce because stopping means writing down your leases and going bankrupt the prudent thing to do is to keep adding debt and selling gas at a loss for as long as possible. If the public buys it you can reposition yourself as a ‘shale liquids’ company and issue new equities as you add more debt and do it again until reality overtakes you.And ya, its sounds like people are crossing their fingers they strike their wells in a “core area”. No shit. That’s the risk. There’s no guarantee of any sort that dropping millions on a well is going to pay off.Companies know where the core areas are and could be profitable working them. But they can’t grow as big if they stick to such small fields so they went all out and leased unproductive formations. If you are the CEO and can get another $80 million or so before you go bust it certainly beats working another 30 years and only earning around $3-$5 million during that time.I understand your pessimism of this so called “bubble” if your worried that Obama writes them off too (assuming he steals a second term). other than that, big whoop. The Dakota peoples are pigs rollin in shit right now.I am not worried about the people who have gotten rich by getting decent jobs when the rest of the country is hurting. The trouble for them will come after the bubble ends, particularly if they are counting on the same income level and are leveraged.