Two months ago, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo was reported to be considering a plan to allow fracking for natural gas in five counties near the Pennsylvania border . But the state’s moratorium, imposed in 2010, is still in effect. Why?

DEC Chief Joe Martens

A major reason is that the state’s much-anticipated environmental report on high-volume hydraulic fracturing has grown to about 4,000 pages, according to Department of Environmental Conservation Commissioner Joe Martens. 

Martens told Gannett’s Albany News Bureau on Tuesday that there is still more work to be done and there is no firm timetable on when a final report may be released. 

A September draft weighed in at about 1,537 pages, including appendices. Since then, Martens’s staff has been reviewing and preparing responses to every public comment.


“It’s almost hard to comprehend, but when I tell people that we’ve been working nonstop and working really hard, people have been,” Martens said. “But all of that has to be reviewed and reviewed by executive staff who are administering the agency day-to-day, doing all of the other responsibilities they had before hydrofracking even started.”



See the full Democrat and Chronicle story here.

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