New York state will sue the federal agency regulating gas drilling in the Delaware River corridor if it doesn't commit to a full environmental impact study of its proposed regulations within 30 days, state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman said. Such a study of the impact of more than 15,000 wells that could be drilled along the Delaware could take years and thus delay drilling for at least that long. The agency that's the target of Schneiderman's lawsuit, the Delaware River Basin Commission, has said its regulations could be ready by the end of summer. Those regulations primarily apply to the controversial horizontal drilling method of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, which critics say can pollute water. "Both the law and common sense dictate that the federal government must fully assess the impact of its actions before opening the door to gas fracking in New York," said Schneiderman. "New Yorkers are correctly concerned about fracking's potential dangers to their environment, health and communities, and I will use the full authority of my office, including aggressive legal action, to ensure the federal government is forced to address those concerns," he said. A cumulative impact study of more than 15,000 wells in the basin was a key demand of anti-drillers ...
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