Natural gas industry expects major growth, new infrastructure

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During an event this morning at Lehigh Career & Technical Institute in Schnecksville, Bill desRosier, external affairs coordinator at Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. of Susquehanna County, said that the company is working with career and trade schools and regional high schools to enroll students in programs related to the natural gas industry.

“We’ve invested in a number of career and technology centers, the first of which was in Susquehanna County,” desRosier said. “We started funding scholarships, donating equipment, volunteering in the classroom … and we’ve expanded into eight different counties since we first started.”

He said that students hail from 13 counties.

Since implementing these programs, Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. has invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in new equipment for these programs while providing funding to more than 1,000 students who otherwise would not have had the financial resources to attend the schools and their programs.

“We have to make sure that we have properly educated people to fill these jobs as the older generation retires and more jobs becomes available,” he said.

Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. is the top producer of natural gas in Pennsylvania, and seventh in the country. It entered the Pennsylvania market in 2006 and today produces more than 2 billion cubic feet of natural gas per day. All of its wells are in Susquehanna County in northeast Pennsylvania, just north of the Scranton region.

David Taylor, president of the Pennsylvania Manufacturers Association, said that his organization works closely with companies such as Cabot to improve Pennsylvania’s competitiveness.

“We want manufacturers to see Pennsylvania as the smart business decision to invest, hire and expand here in the state … and this is where energy can be the key differential that opens up a century or more of prosperity, growth and job opportunities,” Taylor said.

Panelists at the event emphasized that activists and others against projects such as the proposed PennEast Pipeline in eastern Pennsylvania need to reconsider the benefits and safety of exporting natural gas through such pipelines.

It was reported by industry professionals that more than 51 percent of homes in Pennsylvania rely on natural gas for heating, and that there are already more than 2 million miles of pipeline run throughout the state.

“Being afraid of pipeline is like being afraid of railroad or highways,” Taylor said. “Building new infrastructure using highly trained and skilled professionals with the most advanced technologies assures the safest means of transmission for natural gas.”

Taylor said that everyone involved in the productive sector, from the people who are harvesting the resource, to the people who build the pipelines to the end users such as manufacturers, need to come together and say “we want the growth, we want the investment and prosperity that’s going to come from this sector.”

The event was presented by Cabot Oil & Gas Corp., UGI Energy Services and Borton-Lawson and included a breakfast buffet and question-and-answer session following the presentations.