New York state's top environmental official presented plans to allow drilling in one of the world's richest natural gas deposits on Friday, but said he is unlikely to review drilling applications before 2012.
The head of the Department of Environmental Conservation has recommended that New York allow hydraulic fracturing in most of its share of the massive Marcellus Shale formation. Environmental and public health activists have said the high-volume gas extraction method can pollute drinking water supplies, so the state would ban drilling in the New York City and Syracuse watersheds and within 500 feet (152 meters) of public water supplies.
"We can protect the environment and reap some of the economic and energy benefits of drilling," Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) Commissioner Joe Martens said at a news conference.
The natural gas industry says drilling will create up to 37,000 jobs and funnel much-needed revenue to local governments in the state's depressed Southern Tier, an upstate region hurt by a manufacturing exodus.
Rules would permanently ban fracking in the New York City watershed, located north of the city, and the Syracuse watershed. Aquifers in other parts of the state would also be off limits.
The rules would also prohibit drilling in state parks and on other public land, and establish what the DEC called strict rules for drilling in all other areas.
But the DEC would allow fracking in other parts of the state, leaving 85% of New York's Marcellus Shale, the vast formation laying under New York and much of the Appalachian Mountains, open for drilling.
"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.
The rules are now subject to a 60-day public comment period, set to begin in August. They will likely be modified before any drilling permits are issued.
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