North Dakota tribe asks Congress to block fracking proposal

Friday, March 30, 2012  

The Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation is asking Congress to prevent the Obama administration from issuing new rules that affect hydraulic fracturing, a controversial energy-processing technique that's commonly known as fracking.

The Bureau of Land Management is considering rules that would regulate fracking by oil and gas companies. The tribe says the proposal will hinder energy development on reservations.

"Indian energy development would be hit particularly hard," Chairman Tex Hall said in testimony this week to the House Appropriations Committee. "It already takes 5 to 20 times longer to get an oil and gas permit on Indian lands."

Hall said Congress should bar BLM from using federal funds to move forward with the rules until tribes are consulted and until a separate federal study on fracking is completed.

Get the Story:
Tex Hall: Proposed fracking regs will hurt energy development on reservations (The Minot Daily News 3/30)

Blackfeet Nation brings fracking technology to reservation (3/28)