Marcellus gas wells generate an amazing bounty for landowners

[RamboLiberal]

Rich Bednarski is a farmer but hasn't milked a cow in a year. The eight Marcellus shale gas wells Range Resources put on his Washington County land help feed the family now.

"It's better than any milk checks we ever got," said Bednarski, 52, of Avella, whose family has owned the farm since 1932. Today, he sells hay and breeds heifers. "It made farming more fun."

Bednarski sold his 50 dairy cows when his family began receiving royalty checks in January 2010 from a lease his mother signed 11 years ago. He declined to say how much money he's made, but this year, he had the time — and the money — to go to his first Daytona 500 race.

Say hello to Pennsylvania's nouveau riche — the Marcellus "shalionaires."

Read more: Marcellus gas wells generate an amazing bounty for landowners - Pittsburgh Tribune-Review http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/s_724934.html#ixzz1F8cdinSG

Guess I can't blame the farmers for taking the money - but at what cost to the environment & the rest of us.

[eilen]

1. What is given can be taken away. Contracts seem to be enforced in one direction-to the wealthy

Norse Energy unexpectedly changes terms of lease that provided landowners with gas from wells drilled on their land

http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2011/02/norse_energy_unexpectedly_chan.html

Lebanon dairy farmer Nelson Wedge came in from his barn to find a message on his answering machine from Norse Energy, which had drilled four natural gas wells on his 400-acre property over the past decade.

The developer was calling landowners to terminate a provision in its contracts allowing the landowners to use the natural gas from company wells to heat their homes and barns. The deal saved Wedge between $8,000 to $10,000 a year in fuel costs, or about $660 to $830 a month.

A certified letter followed, laying out the changes. The company was promising to replace the free gas with a payment and make arrangements to convert the heating system to propane. Landowners were asked to sign the letter and return it, acknowledging “that Norse will no longer be providing free gas to our premises.”

The news came as a shock to Wedge and at least 16 other landowners in rural Madison County, who were among the first in Central New York to sign leases when natural gas developers arrived in the late 1990s.

[tech9413]

2. This sounds like a propaganda piece

Pittsburgh recently ruled to not allow any gas drilling within the area. There just trying to manufacture perception. I'm sure we'll see tons more of these in the Trib and a bunch of positive spin news stories and commercials on TV and radio. They'll do anything to convince people to help destroy the environment. I wish more people knew of Alex Carey, he did wonderful work studying the use of propaganda to shape public opinion. I just listened to a reading of some of his work the other day. If you're interested, it's available at tucradio.org.

[enough]

3. Watching the movie, GASLAND, it's clear that a lot of this drilling goes on in rural areas where

people are very far from affluent. If they are small farmers, it's barely viable as a way to make a living (plus being a hard life). Their economic situation makes even a modest offer from a drilling company literally irresistible.

[Paladin]

4. Up-Front Bonus Payments In The Marcellus Shale........

....are trending upwards to $5000--$6500 per acre, extraordinary levels by industry standards. If the energy company drills a producing well on the property, the mineral owner also gets from 12.50% to 25% of the revenues produced, cost-free, as royalty. Huge amounts of money being dumped into PA, NY and W.VA, these days......

[we can do it]

5. Yes Assholes Take Some Money Now Ruin Everyones Water Supply

then cry about how your land is worth nothing......also remember it doesn't matter if you screw up your neighbors water forever as long as you get to go to the fucking dayona 500.......IDIOTS

[ThoughtCriminal]

6. What do Marcellus wells look like?

What?

[farmbo]

8. At the wellhead they look like any other well...

...But they drill down about 2500 feet further than a typical Clinton or Rose Well, then drill horizontally for as much as an additional mile. Thousands of gallons of hydraulic fluid are then pumped down under pressure to displace embedded natural gas in a process called "fracing". It is the content of this fracing fluid-- and its' effects on the existing water tables-- that has made this process controversial.

Since they're drilling and harvesting NG horizontally, up to 8 separate wells can be drilled from a single wellhead. This requires a much larger leasing pool-- usually as much as 1000 acres.

The drill sites would differ from conventional wells in the amount of water storage (and truck traffic) required for managing the hydraulic fracing fluid.

[1776Forever]

7. Ah yes but when they can't drink the water I hope they have enough money to get out like this family

Mayor Calvin Tillman Leaves Dish, Texas Fearing 'Fracking' Effects On Family's Health
Zelman Huffington Post

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/24/mayor-calvin-tillman-leav_n_827478.html

...According to the Associated Press, residents of Dish have complained of nosebleeds, pain, and poor circulation since the first compressor station was built in their town in 2005, though there is no hard proof linking the health problems to the natural gas drilling. The air over the Barnett Shale near Dish was found to contain high levels of the toxic chemical benzene, shown to cause cancer. The town's mayor is leaving it all behind.

Last Memorial Day was the final straw. Tillman's 5-year-old son awoke in the middle of the night with a severe nosebleed. As Tillman describes to HuffPost, "He had blood all over his hands, blood on the walls -- our house looked somewhat like a murder scene." In the weeks prior, both of Tillman's sons had experienced severe nosebleeds. At the same time, the town was surrounded by a strong odor from their natural gas facilities.

(more at link)

..............

This is going on all over the country.