December 6, 2009

Talk to anyone in the industry about the Marcellus Shale and the conversation is likely to turn to its potential economic impact -- not just the money that a company hopes to make, but the jobs that could be created and the tax revenues that could be generated.

According to a report released in July by Penn State's College of Earth and Mineral Sciences, the Marcellus Shale helped create more than 29,000 new jobs in Pennsylvania in 2008. Of those, about 14,000 were directly related to Marcellus development. The remainder were created by what the study calls "indirect and induced impacts," such as a restaurant near a drilling site hiring more staff because it is serving a larger lunchtime crowd.

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