A federal judge in Wyoming has struck down the Obama administration's regulations on

[ducks]

A federal judge in Wyoming has struck down the Obama administration's regulations on hydraulic fracturing, ruling that the U.S. Bureau of Land Management doesn't have the authority to establish rules over fracking on federal and Indian lands. In the ruling on Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Scott Skavdahl said Congress had not granted the BLM that power, and had instead chosen to specifically exclude fracking from federal oversight. Skavdahl made it clear what he was — and wasn't — considering in his ruling. "The issue before this Court is not whether hydraulic fracturing is good or bad for the environment or the citizens of the United States," he wrote. The question, instead, is "whether Congress

http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/06/22/483061014/federal-judge-strikes-down-obama-administrations-fracking-rules

[RandomGuy]

A federal judge in Wyoming has struck down the Obama administration's regulations on hydraulic fracturing, ruling that the U.S. Bureau of Land Management doesn't have the authority to establish rules over fracking on federal and Indian lands. In the ruling on Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Scott Skavdahl said Congress had not granted the BLM that power, and had instead chosen to specifically exclude fracking from federal oversight. Skavdahl made it clear what he was — and wasn't — considering in his ruling. "The issue before this Court is not whether hydraulic fracturing is good or bad for the environment or the citizens of the United States," he wrote. The question, instead, is "whether Congress

http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/06/22/483061014/federal-judge-strikes-down-obama-administrations-fracking-rules

Saw that.

That means it is left to the states to say whether or not they want unknown carcinogens and other unknown things percolating into their aquifers.

Not a very good track record on keeping up with good regulations.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/mary-anne-hitt/big-news-on-coal-ash-poll_b_10225650.html


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/pennsylvania-fracking-water_us_576b7a76e4b0c0252e786d5e



AVELLA, Pa. — Sixty years after his service in the Army, Jesse Eakin still completes his outfits with a pin that bears a lesson from the Korean War: Never Impossible.

That maxim has been tested by a low-grade but persistent threat far different than the kind Eakin encountered in Korea: well water that’s too dangerous to drink. It gives off a strange odor and bears a yellow tint. It carries sand that clogs faucets in the home Eakin shares with his wife, Shirley, here in southwestern Pennsylvania.

The Eakins told the state environmental agency about their bad water nearly seven years ago and hoped for a quick resolution. Like thousands of others who live in the natural gas-rich Marcellus Shale, however, they learned their hopes were misplaced.

Today, the state is still testing their water. The results of those tests will dictate whether a gas exploration and production company is held responsible for providing them with a clean supply. Meanwhile, the Eakins drink donated bottled water and in late 2014 began paying for deliveries of city water to avoid showering in contaminants such as lead and manganese.

Since 2007, at least 2,800 water-related complaints have been investigated by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection’s Oil and Gas Program. Officials found ties to the drilling industry in 279. Another 500 or so cases, including the Eakins’, are open. While regulators try to catch up to natural gas exploration, some residents of the state have gone months, even years, without access to clean water at their homes.

Responding to a public-records request by the Center for Public Integrity, the Department of Environmental Protection, or DEP, provided data on 1,840 complaints lodged since 2010. More than half took longer than the agency’s target of 45 days to resolve. Almost one in 10 took more than a year.

The state’s often-plodding response has left hundreds of rural Pennsylvanians in a sort of forced drought, scrambling to pay for water deliveries, seek remedies in court, take out second mortgages or even abandon their homes.

[boutons_deux]

"had instead chosen to specifically exclude fracking from federal oversight"

yep, dickhead, blackheart Cheney made sure fracking's poisonings were exempted from the Clean Water Act, because he knew the poisoning was predictable, inevitable.