Colo., NY Reps Want Regulation of Gas 'Fracking'

The push to put a widely used oil and gas drilling process under federal oversight could gain ground with a new administration in place and concerns about the development of huge gas fields in the East.

In this photograph taken on Wednesday, April 15, 2009, a worker heads to a tractor-trailer owned by...

In this photograph taken on Wednesday, April 15, 2009, a worker heads to a tractor-trailer owned by Halliburton being used in the drilling of a well for natural-gas producer Williams in Rulison, Colo. The push to put a widely used oil and gas drilling process under federal oversight could gain ground with a new administration in place and concerns about the development of huge gas fields in the East. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski)

(AP)

Democratic Reps. Diana DeGette of Colorado and Maurice Hinchey of New York plan to reintroduce a bill that would repeal a ban on regulating the process, called hydraulic fracturing, under the federal Safe Drinking Water Act.

The exemption was part of the 2005 energy bill and followed an Environmental Protection Agency report that found there was little or no threat to underground drinking water from the process.

Critics blame the process, popularly known as "fracking," for health and environmental problems in oil and gas fields in the Rockies and elsewhere. The industry insists fracking is clean and crucial to energy development.

The bill, expected to be introduced next week, also would require companies to disclose what's in fracking fluids. Rep. Jared Polis, D-Colo., is a co-sponsor.

Fracking involves injecting liquids, sand and chemicals underground to force open channels in tight sand and rock formations so that oil and gas will flow. The provision exempting it from federal oversight is called the "Halliburton loophole" by foes.

Halliburton, an oil services company, pioneered hydraulic fracturing. Former Vice President Dick Cheney, who once ran Halliburton, tightly guided the George W. Bush administration's energy policy.

The Obama administration has bolstered environmentalists' hopes that the oversight ban will end. EPA administrator Lisa Jackson said during a May 21 tour of a gas field in southwest Wyoming that the government must be sure it's doing all it can to ensure that fracking is safe.

California Democratic Rep. Henry Waxman, selected to head the House Energy and Commerce Committee, has long backed tougher oversight of fracking.

The industry reads the same signals. Trade groups representing independent oil and gas producers formed a coalition, Energy in Depth, to respond to calls for more regulation. They've lined up support from lawmakers in energy-producing states. Legislators in Wyoming, a major gas producer, passed a resolution this year asking Congress to maintain the exemption for fracking.