A State Booms with New Energy

Celebrate Good Times
Photograph by Scott Goldsmith, National Geographic
For decades, since the demise of the steel industry and other manufacturing that provided a middle class living to their forebears, young people growing up in Pennsylvania have had to look out of state for good blue-collar jobs.
But the natural gas industry's foray into the region holds out hope for more employment, at higher wages. “I have never seen an opportunity like this, ever,” says Larry Michael, executive director of workforce and economic development at Pennsylvania College of Technology, who spearheaded a study on the new industry's need for workers. “Words absolutely cannot describe what is going on.”
Read article: "A Drive for New Jobs Through Energy"
Published October 22, 2010
A Better Tomorrow?
Photograph by Scott Goldsmith, National Geographic
Steady early-evening truck traffic in the small town of Houston, Pennsylvania, is a sign of the natural gas boom in the surrounding farmland.
Energy companies have drilled more than 900 new wells so far this year in the drive to produce natural gas from shale rock found a mile or more below the surface in Pennsylvania. An industry-funded study said the new business created 44,000 jobs in the Keystone State last year, but the impact is hard to discern amid the slow economy. Pennsylvania actually lost jobs last year and the unemployment rate remains only slightly below the national average. Counties where drilling has been most active, however, have seen an uptick in wages, and a drop in unemployment.
Published October 22, 2010
Hats Off to New Business
Photograph by Scott Goldsmith, National Geographic
Worker Samantha Salata fixes a hard-hat display in Sunnyside Supply Store in Slovan, Pennsylvania, a small business that has retooled to service the growing natural gas industry.
The store, about 30 miles west of Pittsburgh, has been in business for 28 years, and specialized in selling equipment to local manufacturers. But sales have doubled and inventory tripled since the owner Paul Battista switched the store's focus. The store never had a storefront, but now has a display room. Because the gas companies are always on the move from one drilling site to another, Sunnyside decided to give them a place to pull in and do business.
Published October 22, 2010
A Piece of the Action
Photograph by Scott Goldsmith, National Geographic
Sunnyside Supply store owner Paul Battista, here meeting with his staff, decided to do some research when he saw the natural gas business growing around him.
“It’s calling people in Oklahoma and asking them, ‘Well, what do you do for these guys?’ and ‘What is it that they look for?’ and “How do they operate?’” Now he stocks fire-resistant clothing, filters, valves, measuring tools, and other items needed in the natural gas drilling industry. Because the natural gas in southwestern Pennsylvania is "wet," mixed with other products like ethane and butane that have to be separated at gas processing facilities, Battista says he has found a niche focused on serving this "midstream" part of the business.
Published October 22, 2010
Sometimes on Sunday
Photograph by Scott Goldsmith, National Geographic
Sorting out priorities is important these days at Sunnyside Supply, where owner Paul Battista learned that gas industry clients present challenges, different from the clientele he had serviced for years in the manufacturing industry.
Now, urgent calls for supplies sometimes come on Sundays or at odd hours, and he has adjusted his business to the industry's 24-7 schedule. “In this business, they don’t think about when the day is done, but when the job is done,” he says
Published October 22, 2010
A Driving Force
Photograph by Scott Goldsmith, National Geographi
Trucking is one way that Pennsylvanians have found immediate jobs in the shale business.
The industry relies on rigs to haul pipes, equipment, sand, chemicals, water, and wastewater. It takes 300 to 1,400 truckloads to bring an average well to production, according to an estimate by the National Park Service’s geologic resources division, which has tried to assess the potential impact of the Marcellus shale development.
Published October 22, 2010
Taking the Wheel
Photograph by Scott Goldsmith, National Geographic
Lee Zavislak thought she'd work until she retired as a machine operator at a Dasani water bottling plant, but now, at 46, she is learning to drive an 18-wheel truck.
She lost her job at the plant last year, when bottled water sales dropped and The Coca-Cola Company shut down the production line. With trucking jobs much in demand due to natural gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale, Zavislak's caseworker in Pennsylvania's workforce development program suggested she try training for a commercial driver's license.
Published October 22, 2010
Hitting the Road
Photograph by Scott Goldsmith, National Geographic
Lee Zavislak (second from left) and her classmates learn the ins and outs of driving a tractor-trailer at the Western Area Career and Technology Center in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania.
The school, in the heart of the booming shale gas business in southwestern Pennsylvania, will do $1 million of business in its trucking training program this year—a 15-fold increase since the natural gas industry arrived. The school also has began a specialized program to prepare students to work on rigs. When he approached the gas companies that are now sponsoring the program and providing equipment, “they said we were a little bit ahead of them,” says Principal Joe Iannetti. “And I think that’s good—we believe we should be producing people before they need them, not after they need them.”
Published October 22, 2010
Looking to the Future
Photograph by Scott Goldsmith, National Geographic
Alexandra Caumo, a member of the Chartiers-Houston High School marching band, leans out the bus window to cool off after a performance in the Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, Memorial Day parade.
The new natural gas industry has given many in the region cause to celebrate, but most of the iconic jobs on drilling rigs go to experienced workers from states like Texas and Oklahoma, who live in trailers for two-week stints at well sites. “They’re skilled and good people and we like them because they spend their money here. But we want to see some Pennsylvania license plates at those work sites," says Joe Iannetti, principal of the local vocational school, the Western Area Career and Technology Center. "I think that’s our duty, to make sure we can provide people who can work those jobs.”
Published October 22, 2010
Growing a Business
Photograph by Scott Goldsmith, National Geographic
Beverly Romanetti uses the dining room table of her home in Hickory, Pennsylvania, to keep track of the family's new business serving the natural gas industry.
The Romanettis, a longtime farm family, leased their land to allow gas drilling, and a well now takes up about three to five acres (1.2 to 2 hectares) of the family's approximately 150-acre (60-hectare) property. Watching the gas business up close, they saw there was plenty of work to be done. So starting with just one truck hauling stone, they now have a crew of 10 people, including two of Romanetti's adult sons, who do the numerous small jobs that crop up around the gas sites—building fences and dikes, and road repair.
Published October 22, 2010

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