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Natural Gas in East Coast

This could really be big to the local communities if drillers find enough natural gas. It is one of the three largest potential onshore resources of natural gas in the United States, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

Marcellus shale, named after the town in New York where it was found, is mostly in western New York and Pennsylvania and much of West Virginia. The area also dips down into Maryland’s Garrett and Allegany counties, as well as a few others. There’s reports of small towns’ hotels filling with drillers and speculators hoping to dip into this. It was originally found 25 years ago, but set aside as the gas crisis the US had passed.

Even if no very large discoveries are found in this region, drilling activity here could have a great impact on our local economy, as well as to those to the east of us. It would produce many jobs, raise paychecks of workers, tighten labor supplies, and hopefully result in lower energy costs. And since our energy cost has gone up so much in January, I’d love to see drilling. It’s rumored that drillers are paying local farmers $1500-2500 an acre for drilling rights, then royalty on top of that if gas is found.

So we’re really going to keep an eye on this, seeing that it’s our area!