The Mining Rights And Environmental Torts Of Shale Gas-Research On American Marcellus Shale

With the rise of shale gas, a non-conventional energy, which also lead to some environmental problems because of horizontal well and hydraulic fracture skills used in exploration. United States of American as the most well-developed shale gas management country, is also more outstanding than other country in the legislation of private right protection. Aiming at solving the environmental and other legal dispute that is possible occurred, government enacted ’Mining Right of Lease’ and ’Environmental Impact Assessment’ System. In that way, there can be a unified legal norm in shale gas exploration market. Also, when the interest of public are injured, they can have means to ask compensation. However, China is just a beginner in these legal norm, and the torts is still needed to improve. In recent years, Chinese government paid more attention to shale gas exploration. Since shale gas has been the main means of energy revolution in several countries, the effect is importation all around the world. Especially United States, as the first country which began to explore shale gas energies, and Marcellus shale gas area as the nation’s largest shale gas is the key to develop the shale gas. With the improvement of exploration skills in China, the content of shale gas can be ranked in the first all around the world which has a considerable exploration prospect. So, it is significant for China to set up the standard as to shale gas.The environmental matters came along with the population of shale gas industry by the horizontal well and hydraulic fracturing technologies used in the exploration of shale gas. American is the most mature country in development and management of shale gas exploration. Meanwhile, the legislation in regard to private rights are also better protected when compared to other countries. Aiming to solve the environmental disputes and legal issues, there raised a mining right of lease, the system of environmental impact assessment and so on. Not only can bring a unified legal norms, but also to meet the demand of public interests. However, our policies and legislation in this field are in the initial level-the existing tort liability regulations are still defective, and thus the contradictories between shale gas mining interests and public interests cannot be effectively avoided. Therefore, it is significant to establish the regulation and legislation as to shale gas exploration as soon as possible. Chinese government realize the importance of shale gas industry and put more efforts to develop it in recent years. Like other energy exploration, the civil rights might be infringed by the environmental matters and other damages brought by the exploration. The current mainstream of confirmation in environmental torts theory is divided into "two elements theory" and "three elements theory". The principle of proof is inverted responsibility, but there are still a lot of defectives when it comes to the practice for the uncomprehensive in the detailed rules and regulations. Also, the characteristic of common law is the element for this problem. Another issue we should pay more attention is the mining right system, since our mining rights as the usufruct are not reflected in other regulations. Improve the legislation of mining rights system not only can boost the process of shale gas exploration, but also protect the interests of mining rights owners.This article will base on the U.S. shale gas extraction current status, analyze the environmental and legal issues which are emerged in the exploration process and summarize the legislative measures and management programs, which focus on the part about the registration system for the mining rights and infringement procedures when dealing with environmental remedies and environmental impact assessment system. Secondly, by overviewing of the strategic significance of the status quo of China’s shale gas exploration and development, illuminating the value of shale gas exploitation and objective evaluating the defective of legislation system. Then, through a comparison and analysis of U.S and China shale gas regulation and management, to find the differences between two countries, refining the advantage in order to learn from it by combining with China’s real situation. In that way, China shale gas resources management, mining rights and environmental tort liability legislation can be improved effectively within the exiting legal system. And thus, we can achieve the goals of private rights protection when explore the energy.