The Marcellus Shale is a layer of rock that lies under Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio, New York, Maryland and other Northeastern states, crossing the border over into Canada as well. The size of the Marcellus shale, in terms of the portion from which natural gas can be recovered, is approximately 95,000 square miles. Compared to the productive portion of the Barnett shale, which is approximately 5,000 square miles, this is an incredibly large reserve of natural gas. The Marcellus formation lies under over sixty percent of the entire state of Pennsylvania alone.

The economic value of the Marcellus Shale has been overlooked until now because the technology to recover the gas did not previously exist. Now gas exploration companies such as Chesapeake, EOG, Devon, Petrohawk and others can use directional drilling to drill across the bed of rock sideways and allow more gas to leach out and come to the surface.

The massive Marcellus shale formation is believed by some to hold as much as 500 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.

Shale is a dense but relatively soft rock that was formed millions of years ago when the Northeast was covered by shallow seas. These seas were full of marine life, such as plankton, fish, etc, all of which died and settled into mud at the bottom of these shallow seas. Over millions of years this sediment was compacted into the dense rock known as shale. Only after the shale was buried deeper underground and covered with layers of dense rock, did gas from the decayed organic matter get trapped inside.

This amount of natural gas contained in the Marcellus Shale could supply the entire east coast for the next fifty years or more according to some geologists.

Proponents of domestic sources of fuel for vehicles, such as oil man T. Boone Pickens believe that we can use this natural gas, as well as more from other shale formations such as the Barnett Shale and Haynes Shale to produce "gas to liquids" fuels such as clean diesel.

The Marcellus shale holds the possibility of freeing us of a portion of our imported oil not to mention help one of the most economically depressed areas of the United States by providing jobs and tax revenue for governments.

In the case of a similar shale formation, the Barnett near Fort Worth Texas the impact has been as great as five Boeing Jet factories in terms of impact on the local economy.

There are obstacles to be overcome. Shale gas is recovered from the Marcellus formation using a process known as "hydraulic fracturing", or a "frac job". In a frac job, thousands of gallons of water and chemicals, some dangerous, are pumped underground at extremely high pressure. In normal circumstances this water only does it's intended job, which is to fracture the shale and allow gas to be recovered.

When proper safeguards are not followed there is the chance that the frac fluid can contaminate zones that contain groundwater. This has caused some environmental groups and landowners to question whether the practice should be allowed.

Once the environmental hurdles are overcome there is no doubt that most of the area of the Marcellus shale will be developed and this rich source of domestic energy will help us kick the foreign oil habit. For more about the Marcellus shale formation see Marcellus Facts