XTO Gets PO’d At Big D

Dallas is being much more cautious than Fort Worth when it comes to dealing with the natural gas drilling industry.

The drillers came first to Fort Worth, where a powerful and persuasive mayor with deep ties to the oil and gas industry threw down the red carpet, resisted attempts to study hydraulic fracking’s impact on urban areas, and warned that any attempts to reign in drilling would result in expensive lawsuits against the city.

Problems soon arose, but it was late in the game for Cowtown residents to fight back effectively.

Other cities, including Big D, learned from our mistakes.

This Dallas Morning News article by Rudolph Bush describes how Fort Worth-based XTO Energy paid $14 million to Dallas for the rights to drill on city property.

But Dallas is being methodical as it considers drilling’s environmental impacts, and XTO officials are impatient.

“XTO Energy has withdrawn its zoning application with the city of Dallas as a result of continued uncertainty surrounding local regulations governing gas well drilling,” a company spokesman emailed to The Dallas Morning News. “If successful, this project would have provided a boost for the local economy. The city of Dallas would have benefited from royalties and tax revenue on gas produced from these sites.”