Fox joins 3 others to dispute fracking rules

HELENA (AP) — Attorney General Tim Fox says Montana is joining Alabama, Alaska and Oklahoma in protesting Bureau of Land Management plans to regulate hydraulic fracturing on federal land.

Fox said Thursday he and the attorneys general from those states sent a letter last week to U.S. Department of the Interior Secretary Sally Jewell.

They argue that BLM fracking rules will duplicate existing state programs and cannot be justified.

Jewell has said federal rules are needed to reconcile a patchwork of state fracking rules. The proposed rules would establish standards for the wells and a way for companies to disclose the chemical ingredients in fracking fluids.

Fracking boosts production from oil and gas wells by pumping pressurized water into the wells to fracture open deposits.