The following Article was originally published in the Ohio Capital Journal and republished on News5Cleveland.com under a content sharing agreement.
At the Ohio Oil and Gas Land Management meeting on Monday, a Texas-based energy company was selected as the highest bidder to lease the Keen Wildlife Area for fracking.
In four other parts of the state, in Belmont, Monroe and Harrison counties – all lands owned by the Ohio Department of Natural Resources and the Ohio Department of Transportation – fracking permits have also been granted by the highest bidder.
These areas were approved for fracking during Monday’s meeting:
- Gulfport Appalachia, LLC made the highest bid for five lots in Flushing Township, Belmont County, for $18,666 ($6,000 per acre).
- Gulfport Appalachia, LLC had the successful bid for 1,370 acres in Fisher’s Grove Park in Summit Township, Monroe County for $5,480 ($4,000/acre).
- Gulfport Appalachia, LLC made the winning bid for 2,846 gross acres in Wayne Township, Belmont County for $17,076 ($6,000/acre).
- Texas-based Tiburon Oil and Gas Ohio, LLC made the highest bid for three parcels of land in Somerset Township, Belmont County, for $6,545 ($5,500 per acre).
- EOG Resources, Inc. – also based in Texas – made the highest bid of $211,650 ($2,500 per acre) for 84.66 acres in the Keen Wildlife Area in Washington Township, Harrison County.
Fracking is a process in which fluids are injected into the ground under high pressure to extract oil or gas. According to the Center for Biological Diversity, this process has been documented in over 30 states.
The commission put the nominated lease parcels up for bid on July 10, and Friday was the deadline to submit bids. Each lease includes a 12.5 percent royalty paid to the state for production under state law, plus an additional financial incentive paid to the state by the successful bidder, according to the ODNR.
According to ODNR, the lease premiums for the nominations selected by the committee are $47,767 for ODOT properties and $211,650 for ODNR properties.
Notably, 40 properties in Salt Fork State Park and Salt Fork Wildlife Area were removed from the committee agenda by the nominator last week and were voted on to advance in the bidding process.
According to ODNR, commissioners declined to proceed with the bidding process for less than one acre of land in Guernsey County “due to a condition in the nomination that could result in the economic benefit being too small to warrant approval under the Ohio Revised Code.”
Fracking opponents
About a dozen anti-fracking protesters held signs in the back of the room during the meeting that read: “Keep parks as parks, not oil and gas fields,” “Enjoy God’s creation, don’t destroy it,” and “Hands off our parks.”
During the meeting, activists shouted various phrases and questions at the commissioners, including “rubber stamps”, “A place where fracking is carried out is no longer a nature reserve” and “Have you considered all the accidents that happen in connection with gas and oil?”
The commission members continued the meeting and did not directly respond to the activists’ interjections.
According to the FracTracker Alliance, a nonprofit that collects data on fracking pipelines, there were more than 1,400 fracking incidents involving oil and gas wells in Ohio between 2018 and September 2023.
About 10% of these incidents were reported as fires or explosions. 64 of these incidents occurred in Belmont County, 59 in Monroe County, and 26 in Harrison County.
Jenny Morgan of Save Ohio Parks said after the meeting that she was afraid for Ohio’s children.
“Our children need nature on a regular basis and they need it clean and healthy,” she told the Capital Journal. “I care about our environment, which affects our health and the health of our children, and we need those spaces clean.”
