New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo says a health study of hydrofracking will make it impossible to meet a looming deadline for regulations on the drilling process, which would pushing a much-delayed decision on the contentious issue into 2013.
The Department of Environmental Conservation has been studying and drafting regulations for fracking since 2008, and shale drilling has been on hold since then.
The deadline for finalizing regulations is November 29. But an expert panel was named last week to review the state's health impact study of fracking. Cuomo told a radio interviewer today he sees no way the panel's work can be completed by then.
Environmental and other groups opposed to fracking have wanted more information about the health impact study. Oil and gas drillers wrote a letter to the governor yesterday saying they are exhausted with the four-year process, and the delay in concluding it is unnecessary.