STRONGER Issues Final Report Regarding its Follow-up Review Of Pennsylvania Oil And Gas Regulatory Program
As we reported back in May of this year, a review team assembled by the State Review of Oil & Natural Gas Environmental Regulations (“STRONGER”) completed an in-state review of Pennsylvania’s Oil and Gas Regulatory Program. STRONGER’s review team recently published its final written report regarding its May 2013 review on its website that highlights the strengths of Pennsylvania’s program and identifies several recommendations for the program to consider moving forward. Some strenths of Pennsylvania’s program included its increase of “staff levels to address additional permitting, inspection, and enforcement activities related to increased unconventional well development,” as well as its initiation of a “comprehensive evaluation of radiation levels specificially associated with unconventional gas development” (generally referred to as the “TENORM Study”). In addition to recommending that Pennsylvania complete its TENORM Study, the STRONGER report also included a recommendation that Pennsylvania “maintain consistent standardized data for tracking vioaltions and enforcement actions.” According to the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection’s press release, the Department will work to implement these recommendations in addition to other recommendations made in STRONGER’s final report.