The Rural Blog

A digest of events, trends, issues, ideas and journalism from and about rural America, by the Institute for Rural Journalism, based at the University of Kentucky. Links may expire, require subscription or go behind pay walls. Please send news and knowledge you think would be useful to benjy.hamm@uky.edu.

The Rural Blog

PAGES

Permian Basin is fueling continued rise in U.S. oil exports, set to overtake Saudi Arabia's by end of 2019

China Energy's interest in W.Va. natural gas may not necessarily turn into big investment

U.S. about to become a net exporter of natural gas for the first time in 60 years

House passes bills to streamline permitting process for some oil, gas and electric lines

Horizontal hydraulic fracturing for oil is running into old-style oil wells and damaging them

ExxonMobil to test new type of fracking on Colo. oil shale; soda firm plans to try another method

Drug ring sprang from oil and gas boom in N.D.; leader found guilty of ordering hit on fellow dealer

Studies find shale-gas wells leak less methane than expected, but wells aren't the whole story

Pa. attorney general brings charges against Marcellus Shale production company for spill

After earthquakes, Ohio governor orders new regulations on deep injection wells

New York landowners win right to negotiate pre-fracking oil and gas leases with Chesapeake Energy

Western states seek U.S. land for its resources

Governor goes to Ohio's booming gas fields for his State of the State address, touts new jobs

Pa. court will decide if Marcellus gas should be redefined as a mineral, voiding leases

Lease payments from natural-gas frackers increasingly offset school districts' budget cuts

Interior resumes oil-shale research, probes last-minute Bush-era decision to freeze low royalties

Interior Dept. withdraws Bush-era oil-shale leases

Salazar, Vilsack will be Cabinet's rural voices

Bailout bill boosts coal, oil shale and tar sands, but slashes a tax credit for biodiesel from animal fat