Interactive: How 'fracking' works

  1. Above: Interactive How 'fracking' works
  2. Interactive Fracking in Pennsylvania, across US
  3. Timeline Shale oil news services
updated 6/30/2011 5:19:51 PM ET 2011-06-30T21:19:51

Gov. Andrew Cuomo is expected to lift a moratorium on the controversial natural gas extraction technique known as hydraulic fracturing, The New York Times reported Thursday.

Such a move could open the state to a gas drilling boom similar to what is happening in neighboring Pennsylvania, and it would certainly raise opposition from environmentalists who believe "fracking" or "hydrofracking" pollutes drinking water.

A spokesman for Cuomo, Joshua Vlasto, called the report "baseless speculation and premature."

But the state's Department of Environmental Conservation later Thursday announced it would recommend allowing fracking in certain areas, while preventing it in the watersheds that serve New York City and Syracuse.

Drilling also would be banned within primary aquifers and surface drilling prohibited on state-owned land, including parks, forest areas and wildlife management areas.

"This report strikes the right balance between protecting our environment, watersheds, and drinking water, and promoting economic development," DEC Commissioner Joseph Martens said in a statement.

A moratorium imposed by former Gov. David Paterson was due to expire on Friday.

The Democratic-led state Assembly voted earlier this month to extend the moratorium for another year, but the Republican-led Senate never passed the measure.



Critics say leaks of the chemicals at the surface endanger groundwater and that escaped gas and drilling operations pollute the air.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is studying its impact on groundwater.

Story: Fishermen, hunters suspicious of fracking


New York is home to a large piece of the Marcellus Shale, a 400-million-year-old rock formation that geologists say holds the nation's largest reservoir of natural gas and perhaps the second-largest in the world.

Two unexpected gushers in northeastern Pennsylvania are helping to illustrate the enormous potential of the Marcellus Shale field.





Interactive: Fracking in Pennsylvania, across US (on this page)









Timeline: Shale oil (on this page)





Reuters and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Video: The importance of natural gas


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