Joseph Pettey is the owner of Pettey Oilfield Services Inc., and the 2003 Virginia Oil and Gas Festival Man of the Year. Thomas E. Stewart is a third-generation driller who lobbies the government on behalf of energy companies. Both sit on the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission, which is increasingly positioning itself as an authority on drilling-related issues like hydraulic fracturing.
The 38-state commission was created in 1935 to promote the efficient harvesting of oil and gas. Its mission was later expanded to acknowledge the need to protect health, safety and the environment while accomplishing that goal. It is funded by government grants and fees from the states. The commission members are appointed by the member governors. Most are state regulators who oversee gas and oil drilling, but at least seven states have representatives who are either lobbyists or energy executives.
Pettey is the official representative for West Virginia; Stewart is an associate representative for Ohio; lobbyist Robert W. Harms is an associate representative for North Dakota; James R. Daniels, the general manager of Murfin Drilling Company, is an associate representative for Kansas; William S. Daugherty, CEO of natural gas company NGAS, is Kentucky's official representative and D. Michael Wallen, also of NGAS, is its associate representative; Rick Calhoon of Pruet Oil and Charlie Williams Jr. of oil and gas production company Vaughey & Vaughey are associate representatives for Mississippi; and Steven C. Agee of Agee Energy LLC is an associate representative for Oklahoma.
Both official and associate representatives participate in committees, said commission executive director Mike Smith, although associate representatives vote on policy recommendations only if the official representative isn't available.
The governors can also appoint as many committee members as they choose. The agency denied ProPublica's request for a list of committee members; a spokeswoman said the list has been confidential since 2008.
Although the organization meets biannually, most of its activities -- conducting research, developing resolutions and communicating that information to public officials -- take place in small committee meetings throughout the year. The commission's recommendations have enjoyed substantial credibility in the debate over hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, the controversial natural-gas extraction technique that the commission has deemed to be safe. The IOGCC authored an oft-cited 2002 survey that determined that nearly 1 million wells had used fracking "with no documented harm to groundwater" in its member states.
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