Tagged: Natural Gas

The U.S. Forest Service says the shale drilling technique for natural gas known as hydraulic fracturing can take place in a national forest in southeast Ohio.

The Forest Service released its report Monday after a study of a land and resource management plan drafted in 2006 for the Wayne National Forest.

Forest Supervisor Anne Carey says that plan can adequately address any damage and risks to the forest from the gas extraction method also known as fracking.

She also says a new environmental impact study is not needed.

Clean energy advocates are announcing the opening of the state's first liquefied natural gas fueling station, aimed at long-distance truck travel.

Clean Fuels Ohio says the station is part of a planned network of such stations along U.S. interstates.

The Clean Energy LNG Truck Fueling Station will open April 4 in Seville in northeast Ohio near Interstate 76.

The station is one of four being opened in Ohio by Seal Beach, Calif.-based Clean Energy. It will be available for all trucks using liquefied natural gas.

As natural gas prices continue to drop, the recent nationwide boom in drilling is slowing.

Several companies have said in recent weeks they plan to cut back production, but experts say the low prices are also opening up new markets.

Kathryn Klaber, president of the Marcellus Shale Coalition, says there will be fewer natural gas wells drilled in 2012.

Yet Klaber says that even as drillers are pressured by low prices, the cost creates opportunities for more people and industries to use the product.

The Dayton Daily News reports that natural gas trapped in two shale formations beneath Ohio could mean thousands of new jobs, if activity in other states is any indication.

Pennsylvania,which sits on one of the same shale formations as Ohio, saw gas and oil industries hire 72,000 new people from the fourth quarter of 2009 to the first quarter of 2011.

The newspaper reports that a series of announcements in the last week, including $750 million in land leasing by the Hess Corp. for possible drilling, shows that Ohio is on the cusp of an oil and gas boom.