NORWICH – An advisory committee on natural gas development in Chenango County took no action Tuesday on a request to officially endorse the findings of New York’s updated permitting rules and to discourage municipal moratoriums on drilling from superceding them.

Armed with a map showing that the majority of the county’s landowners are in favor of responsible gas development, Central New York Landowners Coalition President Brian Conover asked for the committee to support its members.

“The overwhelming majority of this county is in the coalition or leased. Our responsibility is to our landowners. We should be at the forefront of this train rather than its caboose,” he said, referring to the permitting process once it begins.

Environmental regulators have been compiling and composing safe drilling procedures since 2008 when concerns were raised about high-volume hydraulic fracturing, the method which made it economically feasible to extract oil and gas from the Marcellus Shale. Fracking, as it’s called, unlocks trapped gas by injecting a well with millions of gallons of highly pressurized water mixed with a solution of soap, sand and chemicals that some worry has the potential to contaminate drinking water.

“I would rather do so after the SGEIS is finished,” Chenango County Natural Gas Advisory Committee Chairman Peter C. Flanagan, D-Preston, said, referring to the 900-page document that is anticipated sometime this year.