On December 17th, Governor Andrew Cuomo announced his decision to ban fracking in New York, a major victory for the environmental movement.

Gov. Cuomo’s decision comes on the heels of November’s voter decisions to ban fracking in local communities in California, Texas, Colorado and Ohio, and Obama administration decisions just in the past few weeks to limit fracking in Virginia’s George Washington National Forest and Colorado’s Roan Plateau.

The debate over fracking is far from over, but New York State just put a thumb on our side of the scale.