A Marcellus Shale gas drilling company has filed a lawsuit against the Penn Township commissioners, challenging their decision last month to have the company delay drilling in the township because of another pending legal challenge involving the operation.

In its suit, Apex Energy is seeking more than $50,000 in damages, estimating in court documents that it is losing roughly $70,000 each day its operation remains on hold.

The suit, filed this month in Westmoreland County Common Pleas Court, asserts that the commissioners erred in attaching conditions to their approval in May of the company’s site plan, particularly the condition that the company wait to begin drilling until an appeal by a citizens group is resolved. That appeal, also filed in Common Pleas Court, challenges the township zoning board’s approval of the operation in April because the board gave its approval before the company provided required environmental studies and an emergency response plan.

In refraining from granting Apex the zoning and building permits needed to begin the operation, the board of commissioners both “usurps the power of the courts and exceeds its own authority …,” the company’s lead lawyer, Jeff Wilhelm, said in court documents.

The Wexford-based company is seeking a court order to obtain those permits so it can begin drilling at the nearly 90-acre site near Route 22 and the intersection of Mellon and Walton roads. It was nearly finished setting up a well pad there as of late last month, according to a township official, and had planned to begin drilling two unconventional wells.

The township was notified of the suit last week. In addition to the five-member board of commissioners, the suit names township zoning officer Mike Stack, who Mr. Wilhelm said is responsible for issuing the permits.

Days after filing a request that the court force the board to reverse its decision, Apex filed a peremptory challenge, which asks the judge to make an immediate ruling. That is scheduled to go before Judge David Regoli next Friday.

Among the main arguments by the plaintiff is that the township mistakenly based its conditional approval of the company’s site plan on a proposed zoning ordinance the township has yet to adopt. Unlike the special exception permit the zoning board issued in April, the site plan is subject to the township’s existing zoning laws, not the proposed ones, Mr. Wilhelm says in the suit, citing the state Municipalities Planning Code.

The suit states that by approving the company’s site plan, “the board admits that Apex’s development satisfies all the objective criteria” of a township ordinance governing such matters. It added that the board’s decision also violates a state law giving only courts the power to halt such operations and that Apex has the legal right to drill at its own expense.

Township solicitor Les Mlakar, however, contended at the May 18 meeting that the township has the authority to do so. As for the pending zoning laws, although the township has yet to adopt them, they have been in effect since it started revising them late last year, township manager Alex Graziani has said.

Mr. Mlakar is reviewing the lawsuit and is expected to meet with commissioners in a closed-door session this week.

As for the appeal by the Protect PT citizens group, among the possible outcomes is that the case would go back before the zoning board for additional testimony, said Oday Salim, senior attorney for Fair Shake Environmental Legal Services, a Lawrenceville nonprofit law firm representing the group.

The Apex application for unconventional drilling is the first such application since the township started overhauling its zoning laws.The legal challenges have created uncertainty for the township.

“We’re in uncharted waters,” said Paul Wersing, chairman of the commissioners.