Tom Wolf

HARRISBURG — Fulfilling a campaign pledge, Gov. Tom Wolf on Thursday signed an order banning new drilling leases on public land, ending a short-lived effort by his Republican predecessor to expand the extraction of natural gas from rock buried deep beneath state parks and forests.

The new Democratic governor signed the executive order before a small group of people who braved frigid temperatures to witness the event at Philadelphia’s Benjamin Rush State Park. He said the moratorium was rooted in a “deep-seated and profound respect” for state parks.

“This is a beautiful state and this is one way we can promote that and protect it,” he said.

Wolf, who also campaigned on a pledge to impose a 5 percent extraction tax on natural gas drilling to raise money for public schools and other programs, reiterated that he wants the gas industry to thrive in the state but with appropriate environmental safeguards.

“I absolutely want to do natural gas,” he said. “If we do it right, we can create really good jobs and a great industry.”

Wolf’s order supersedes an order that GOP Gov. Tom Corbett signed in May and reinstated the ban that Democratic Gov. Ed Rendell instituted in 2010.

Environmentalists praised the action, saying it reflects Wolf’s support for strong environmental regulation.

“The governor has wisely chosen to protect the people of Pennsylvania over the profits of drillers,” said John Norbeck, CEO of Harrisburg-based PennFuture.

The Marcellus Shale Coalition, an industry trade group, sharply criticized the move.

“This deeply misguided and purely political action to unnecessarily ban the safe and tightly-regulated development of natural gas from beneath taxpayer-owned lands flies in the face of common sense,” said the coalition’s president, Dave Spigelmyer.

Corbett’s order authorized state officials to negotiate new leases for gas extraction through horizontal wells drilled from adjacent, privately owned land or areas previously leased for drilling in state forests.