Westmoreland
Marcellus Citizens’ Group Updates June 6, 2013
To see photos, please sign up for newsletter at: janjackmil@yahoo.com
* For articles and updates or to just vent, visit us on facebook;
* To view permanent documents, past updates,
reports, general information and meeting information
http://westmorelandmarcellus.blogspot.com/
* To contact your state
legislator:
For email
address, click on the envelope under the photo
* For information on the state gas legislation
and local control: http://pajustpowers.org/aboutthebills.html-
Calendar of Events- June is
Busy
***Fracktracker Training-Sign
Up Now
To follow
what is going on with gas operations/violations near you. We will learn how to track permits, wells, and violations via the Fracktracker
computer program.
June 26- two sessions 3-5pm or
6-8pm
ST
Vincent College Dupre Science Pavilion, West Building, Room WG02
Presented
by Mt Watershed Assoc and FracTracker Alliance
Also sponsored by Westmoreland Marcellus Citizens’ Group
To RSVP for one of the 2 hour sessions contact Kathryn
Hilton at Kathryn@mtwatershed.com
or 724-455-4200 ext. 4
***Westmoreland County Commissioners Meeting-
2nd and 4th Thursday of the month at the county
courthouse at 10:00
***WMCG Steering Committee Meetings 2nd
Tuesday of every month at 7:30 pm
***Gasland Part II Coming to
Pittsburgh June 20, 7:00 pm-Organized by Marcellus Protest (WMCG is a supporter)
As part
of a national ‘preview’ tour, Gasland Part II will be shown free to the public
at the Soldiers and Sailors Hall in Oakland. Doors open at 6 pm with live music and the screening begins at 7 pm.
Director Josh Fox will be present.
***Grassroots Summer Summit-Mountain Watershed
MWA is proud to announce the Grassroots Summer Summit - June 21st and 22nd 2013 – the first in
a series of events MWA plans to hold twice per year for grassroots community
and environmental advocates and citizens to come together for organizing and
rejuvenation. We aim to nurture a network of support for those in the ‘Good Race’
to protect themselves, their families, and their communities. Featured speakers
include Lois Gibbs (of Love Canal), Simona Perry, and Elliot Adams (Veterans
for Peace). A tentative schedule is available for download.
Registration
is only $10 and includes bunk accommodations (you may also bring a tent if you
prefer) and meals. Participation is limited and is filling up quickly! To save
your spot, contact Melissa at 724-455-4200 ext. 6# or Melissa@mtwatershed.com.
TAKE ACTION!!
***Berks Gas Truth Will Push for
Resolution on Fracking at PA State Democratic Committee-Sign Petition
Berks Gas Truth is coordinating an action at the PA State Democratic
Committee meeting on June 14th and 15th in Lancaster. The State Committee will
be considering a resolution for a moratorium on fracking. At their last
meeting, the resolution didn't make it to the floor for a vote. We want to make
sure that doesn't happen again. You can find lots more information on our
website: http://www.gastruth.org/?p=1328. We hope you'll join us! If you can be
there both days, great! If not, we'll be happy to see you either day. The main
event is on the 15th, but there's plenty to be done both days!
Please
sign and share this petition we'll take with us! http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/tell-pa-dems-stop-fracking?source=c.url&r_by=160982
Any questions? Let me know! You can always
reach me at 610-678-7726. If you can't make either call, but would like to be
involved, let me know that too!
Thanks!
Karen Feridun Berks Gas Truth
*** Tell Obama: Don't frack our parks. Without
your help, our national parks and forests could be opened to fracking.
“For months, we’ve been urging the Obama administration to protect our
parks and forests from fracking.
Unfortunately, it looks like the President isn't listening.
Instead, they proposed very weak rules that would leave our forests
and parks vulnerable to the damage of dirty drilling. Now, we have to make our
voices heard more than ever to protect our forests from fracking.
Across the country, fracking has been an environmental disaster --
contaminating drinking water sources and turning rural landscapes into
industrial zones. Yet the oil and gas industry wants to bring its dirty
drilling to places like:
Delaware River
Basin, which is home to three national park areas, and provides drinking water
to 15 million people.
George Washington
National Forest, threatening the streams that feed the James and Potomac
Rivers, which provide drinking water for roughly four million people;
Glacier National
Park, putting its wildlife, air quality, and scenic views at risk; and
Otero Mesa in New
Mexico, putting perhaps the largest untapped freshwater aquifer in this parched
southwestern state at risk. And that’s just a few of the places at risk.
Take action and help us keep our parks and forests free from fracking.
More than a year ago, the Obama administration’s own advisory panel on
fracking recommended “preservation of unique and/or sensitive areas as off
limits to drilling. . .” So how could the President propose a rule that would
let fracking into these places?
Clearly, we need President Obama to step in protect our forests and
parks from fracking.
Let’s stop this dirty drilling now.
Yours,
David Masur
PennEnvironment Research & Policy Center Director”
***TELL YOUR
SENATOR TO OPPOSE SB 739 That Subsidizes the Gas Industry
SB 739
represents a lose - lose proposition for the environment. It takes money away
from already limited energy efficiency funding while it subsidizes a natural
gas industry that is already very profitable.
The gas industry is trying to expand the
markets for natural gas, while having taxpayers fund the construction of gas
delivery infrastructure. If they are successful, not only will they be able
to sell more gas, but the price of gas will increase, due to increased demand.
The natural gas industry doesn't need additional subsidies paid for by the
public.
Campaign Compiling Water Contamination by Shale Gas Drilling
Science Studies/Reports
***Theoretical and Observational Assessments of Flare Efficiencies by
Douglas Leahey, Kathering Preston, and Mel Strosher 12/01
This 2001 analysis of pollutants emitted by
flaring indicates that the data still used by EPA to assume that flares emit
relatively innocuous byproducts such as CO2 and H2O is faulty. Incomplete combustion due to the
effects of wind and stack exit velocity results in more complex molecular structures
such as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and VOCs being released. Measurements of complex chemical species
such as benzopyrene, naphthalene, and phenythiophene are included in the report.
Journal of Air and Waste Management Association
FRACK LINKS
Videos
***6 Minutes Over
A Fracked Dimock from Bob
Who Would Want to Live Here
Notice how close together these sites are located:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rg72ZvDLqMU
***Infrared of compressor
station in Texas
***Compressor
Station-Liberty Twp, Susquehanna Co. PA
***To sign up for notifications of activity and violations for your
area:
***To view companies with the most violations
***List of the Harmed--There are now
over 1200 names of residents of Pennsylvania who became sick after fracking
began in their area and have placed their name on the list of the harmed. http://pennsylvaniaallianceforcleanwaterandair.wordpress.com/the-list/
***Health Problems Forum-Video
Mac Sawyer, former gas field truck driver, Joe Giovannini mason and resident of
Cannonsburg, Robert McCaslin who
worked as master driller. Larysa Dyrszka, MD, Board certified pediatrician, former director of pediatrics at Holy
Name Hospital in Teaneck, NJ, attendee at the first US Health Impact Assessment
Conference in Washington DC., and affiliate member of Physicians Scientists and
Engineers for Healthy Energy and Lauren
Williams, Esq, PA attorney specializing in environmental and public law who
focuses on land use issues including those that relate to gas drilling. Lauren
William’s discussion of the gag order on doctors is a good explanation of the
problems surrounding the Act 13 order.
You must click on each speaker in turn to hear all the presentations.
Frack
News
1. Beaver Run Reservoir Incident
From Sky Truth Alert
CNX @ Beaver Run78.54
Type Incident- Response to Accident or Event
Violation(s)
ID: 669515 Date: 2013-06-03 Type: Environmental Health & Safety
78.54 - Failure to properly
control or dispose of industrial or residual waste to prevent pollution of the
waters of the Commonwealth.
ID: 669516 Date: 2013-06-03 00:00:00 Type: Administrative
78.56(1) - Pit and tanks not
constructed with sufficient capacity to contain pollutional substances.
What
Kathryn of Mt Watershed was able to find out:
According
to the DEP: Incident was 100 gallons of
flowback water, not believed to have reached waters of the
commonwealth. Apparently the spill took
place on the well pad, but precautionary measures were taken to ensure that
there was no contamination off the pad. The
spill was stopped on the day it occurred.
All impacted areas have been “remediated” and contaminated materials are
currently being stored on site in lined roll off boxes. The DEP office of Waste Management will deal
with where the material is disposed of, and the O&G staff will be notified
of where it was sent after it is disposed of.
2. Driller Wants to Drill Under Murrysville Park
“A privately-owned, small driller
from SW PA, Huntley & Huntley, wants to begin drilling unconventional wells
that target Marcellus Shale. They’ve chosen Westmoreland County, PA as the
place to do it. Huntley & Huntley has
already leased land surrounding the Murrysville Community Park and now wants to
lease the 305-acre park too. They plan to set up drill pads outside of the
park, on adjoining land, and drill under the park.”
http://marcellusdrilling.com/2013/06/conventional-driller-eyes-marcellus-under-murrysville-pa-park/?utm_source=Marcellus+Drilling+News&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2344c06114-MDN_Daily_Alert&utm_term=0_5c988009b6-2344c06114-383588553
3.
Eminent Domain For Pipeline
Note from Paula and Andy:
“Attached is the link to an article
appearing in today's Tribune Review written by Timothy Puko. It discussed the concerns of residents
regarding the proposed Delmont to Houston pipeline.
It is our understanding that this is
propane in a liquid form under very high pressure. If a leak occurs the pressure would drop and
the liquid turns into a gray gas cloud that is heavier than the surrounding
atmosphere. Obviously this poses extreme
danger to anyone living within 20 to 50 miles away from a leak and would
threaten both lives, homes and businesses in the area.”
Article by Tim Puko
“More than a dozen landowners have
contacted state Rep. Ted Harhai, D-Monessen, about stopping Sunoco Logistics
Partners LP from buying rights of way on their land or using eminent domain to
take them, his office manager Mary Jo Smith said.
The residents cite frustration from
other pipeline projects that are still scarring their land, concerns over
private property rights and value, and safety risks.
At stake is part of a $600 million
plan Sunoco Logistics has to ship Marcellus shale propane and ethane to Canada
and Europe. It received support from Gov. Tom Corbett and Sen. Pat Toomey last
fall, then ran into opposition from homeowners along the project's first path
through dense parts of North Huntingdon. Sunoco Logistics responded this year
by pushing the path farther east, along two pipelines that already exist.
Highberger
is upset at Sunoco Logistics for repeatedly telling him and other landowners it
will use eminent domain to take land its owners won't sell. And he's angry,
too, that in the end, the project's goal is to ship fuel abroad. If he can
avoid it, he doesn't plan to sell a right of way, no matter how much the
company's offer is, he said. “
Installing a Pipeline- Photo by Bob Donnan
4.
How Corporations and Law Enforcement Are Spying on Environmentalists by Adam Federman Summer 2013
“ Tom Jiunta and a
small group of residents in northeastern Pennsylvania formed the Gas Drilling
Awareness Coalition (GDAC), an environmental organization opposed to hydraulic
fracturing in the region. The group sought to appeal to the widest possible audience,
and was careful about striking a moderate tone. All members were asked to sign
a code of conduct in which they pledged to carry themselves with
“professionalism, dignity, and kindness” as they worked to protect the
environment and their communities. GDAC’s founders acknowledged that gas
drilling had become a divisive issue misrepresented by individuals on both
sides and agreed to “seek out the truth.”
The
group of about 10 professionals – engineers, nurses, and teachers – began
meeting in the basement of a member’s home. As their numbers grew, they moved
to a local church. In an effort to raise public awareness about the risks of
hydraulic fracturing (or “fracking”) they attended township meetings, zoning
and ordinance hearings, and gas-drilling forums. They invited speakers from
other states affected by gas drilling to talk with Pennsylvania residents. They
held house-party style screenings of documentary films.
Since the group had never engaged in any
kind of illegal activity or particularly radical forms of protest, it came as a
shock when GDAC members learned that their organization had been featured in
intelligence bulletins compiled by a private security firm, The Institute of
Terrorism Research and Response (ITRR). Equally shocking was the revelation
that the Pennsylvania Department of Homeland Security had distributed those
bulletins to local police chiefs, state, federal, and private intelligence
agencies, and the security directors of the natural gas companies, as well as
industry groups and PR firms.
News of the surveillance
broke in September 2010 when the director of the Pennsylvania Department of
Homeland Security, James Powers, mistakenly sent an email to an anti-drilling
activist he believed was sympathetic to the industry, warning her not to post
the bulletins online. The activist was Virginia Cody, a retired Air Force
officer. In his email to Cody, Powers wrote: “We want to continue providing
this support to the Marcellus Shale Formation natural gas stakeholders while
not feeding those groups fomenting dissent against those same companies.”
“While
the above cases involved corporations hiring private security firms to carry
out black-ops against environmental groups, the Pennsylvania scandal may be the first time
that a state agency has contracted with a private security firm to gather
intelligence on lawful groups for the benefit of a specific industry. Although
the ITRR bulletins were produced for the Pennsylvania Department of Homeland
Security, they were shared with PR firms, the major Marcellus Shale companies,
and industry associations.
For
members of GDAC and other anti-drilling organizations, the revelations were
profoundly troubling. Not only were they being lumped together with groups like
Al-Qaeda, but the government agencies tasked with protecting the people of
Pennsylvania were, in their view, essentially working for the gas companies. If
a moderate group like GDAC wasn’t safe from the surveillance-industrial
complex, it seemed nobody was. “These systems and this type of collection is so
rife with inappropriate speculation and error – both intentional and
unintentional – that your good behavior doesn’t protect you,” German says.
In the
wake of the surveillance scandal Pennsylvania Homeland Security Director James
Powers resigned and the state terminated its $103,000 no-bid contract with
ITRR. Then-governor Ed Rendell called the episode “deeply embarrassing” and a
one-day Senate inquiry was held. In testimony before the committee, Virginia
Cody, the retired Air Force officer who had become a critic of gas drilling,
said: “For the first time in my life, I do not feel secure in my home. I worry
that what I say on the phone is being recorded. I wonder if my emails are still
being monitored.”
The
hearing sought to answer questions about how the contract was awarded, why
citizen groups exercising their First Amendment rights were included, and,
crucially, who received the information.
Powers
explained that the information was distributed to various chemical,
agricultural, and transportation companies mentioned in the bulletins. At least
800 individuals were on the distribution list.
In the
case of gas drilling activism he explained, “It [the bulletins] went to the
security directors of the Marcellus Shale companies and DEP .”
…Other activists have described similar cyber
security-related issues. Around the time the ITRR bulletins were made public,
Jiunta told me, members of GDAC experienced persistent problems with their
computers. “Everybody was getting suspicious,” he says. “I had computer issues.
Some are still having issues.”
…John
Trallo, a 61-year-old musician and guitar instructor whose communications were
also featured in the ITRR bulletins, has been an outspoken critic of shale gas
development for several years. In 2007 Chief Oil and Gas offered him a signing
bonus of $1,400 to lease his mineral rights. Trallo, who lives in a modest
two-story home in northeastern Pennsylvania, refused. He’s been fighting the
industry ever since.
“This is something that’s bigger
in my life than I ever wanted it to be,” he says. “Five years ago, when I first
started getting involved in this and I started talking to people, I would say
to myself, ‘these people are a little crazy.’ Five years later I sound like
them.”
Immediately after the
intelligence bulletins were made public Trallo’s computer became nearly
unusable. Documents were corrupted and irretrievable; photos were disappearing
and programs wouldn’t work. A relatively new machine with a high-end operating
system, Trallo had it serviced at a Best Buy in nearby Muncy. He was told by
the Geek Squad at Best Buy that a highly sensitive program that acts like a
Trojan Horse had been installed on his computer. According to Trallo, “They
said that the program monitors every key stroke, every email, everything you do
on the computer.”
For
the rest of the article: http://www.earthisland.org/journal/index.php/eij/article/we_are_being_watched
5.
Water Database Is By Industry and For Industry
A shale-drilling
industry group has created a database of water quality before any drilling
occurs for Pennsylvania's thousands of water wells, but the public does not
have access.
“While
the database is currently being populated, access to the underlying dataset
must remain confidential to protect the identity of the water well owners,”
Forde said. “But that it is our full intention to use this information to
better inform policymakers on the condition of private water wells in the
state.”
DEP has
not yet signed onto the project, he said. DEP officials Wednesday declined to
comment on the issue.
While others agree that pre-drill
testing information is important, they take issue with the secrecy.
“I think having a central
database that is accessible to the public where the results are stored is great
idea,” said Steve Hvozdovich, Marcellus shale coordinator for Clean Water
Action. “That, however is not what the MSC is offering. If they want to keep a
database for their own personal use that is fine but don't tout having a
transparent process that is not open to everyone and requires a confidentiality
agreement from some of those involved.”
But
Hvozdovich does say that pre-drill testing is key.
Conducting pre-drill or baseline testing is an important
issue,” said Hvozdovich. “(But) industry developing a database doesn't real
address the issue. Conducting pre-drill and baseline tests is a critical
process in helping determine if future impacts to a resident’s water supply can
be contributed to natural gas drilling operations. Currently it is within the
industry's best interest to conduct these tests but it is not mandatory nor to
my knowledge are there set parameters to test for.”
Hvozdovich suggests a
different approach, that both DEP and the industry do mandatory pre-drill
testing.
“This
testing should mirror each other in terms of how the sample is taken and what
parameters are tested,” he said. “This way you have samples taken from separate
entities that can be compared for discrepancies. These are also samples that
can be referred to in case contamination issues occur down the line.”
He also said frequency of testing is another issue, and that
multiple samples should be taken to gain a better understanding of what “may or
may not be in someone’s water.”
Adam Kron, lawyer for the Environmental
Integrity Project, put it simply.
“The Marcellus Shale Coalition’s
pre-drill database is everything that’s wrong with the oil and gas industry
right now,” he said. “While the industry has site-specific baseline data that
it easily could release to the public with the flip of a switch, it chooses
instead to hide behind non-disclosure agreements and ‘confidential business
information.’ And then when a landowner or community finds that fracking has
caused groundwater contamination, the industry turns about and claims that the
contamination can’t be proven without pre-drill data.
“If fracking is safe,
then why is the industry so worried about putting all the data on the table?”
http://www.timesonline.com/news/local_news/water-quality-database-created-but-not-available-to-public/article_7aa8fe42-b204-5eff-b09f-ca935869cf52.html
6. Fracking, Corporate Power, Pollution, Got you Stressed—Steinbraber Says DO SOMETHING
from Commencement address by Sandra Steingraber
at SUNY-ESF:
"Here’s the
amazing secret about combining an unflinching willingness to look at the data
with political action: it makes you happy. It gives you purpose. It makes
brave. It makes you a hero. The people who are truly depressed and scared about
our environmental situation are the people who aren’t doing anything about it.
They suffer from what psychologists called well-informed futility system. They
suffer from what I call being a good German in the face of an ecological
holocaust. But that’s a choice. Instead of closing your eyes to hard
environmental truths and pretending everything is fine, you could choose to be
a member of the French resistance. You could choose to be an abolitionist. You
could choose to fight.
And
here’s another secret: taking action makes you a better environmental
scientist. There is a difference between being able to analyze environmental
data objectively, which I believe in, and being neutral about the environmental
crisis, which I don’t believe in. It turns out that it’s nobody’s job to take
the hard truths of environmental data into the political arena and make sure
they inform our laws and policies and our economic structures. We have to do
that work ourselves. And doing it is
what makes science moral."
7. Water Used to Frack Is
Draining Resources, Especially In Western U.S.
Fracking uses so much water that it could
threaten groundwater resources, especially in the Western U.S., two new reports
conclude. The report from the Western
Organization of Resource Councils (WORC), found that fracking removes 7 billion
gallons of water every year in just four states: North Dakota, Wyoming,
Montana and Colorado. The organization blames inadequate federal and
state-level protections for the use and/or contamination of fresh water.
"Fracking's growing demand for water can threaten availability of water
for agriculture and Western rural communities," WORC board member Bob
LeResche said in a prepared release. He also told The Dickinson Press that
"Unless our states take real action soon, we stand to watch our
agricultural economies, and even our human habitation of some places,
disappear. Ninety-nine percent of rural Americans rely on groundwater for their
domestic needs, as do 51 percent of all Americans." WORC is calling on states
to improve the way they monitor and regulate oil and gas drilling, especially
where it affects water — and in many states, water issues are handled by
multiple agencies, none of which take full responsibility for water usage.
Story:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/05/09/fracking-water-use-draining-water_n_3239879.html?utm_hp_ref=green
WORC Report:
8. New Mexico County First
In Nation to Ban Fracking to Safeguard Water
“Acting to protect their water supply, the 5,000 residents of poor,
conservative Mora County make it the first in the U.S. to ban fracking.
Sitting in the tidy living room of the home they built themselves, Sandra and
Roger Alcon inventory what they see as the bounty of their lives: freedom,
family, community, land, animals … and water.
"We've
lived off the land for five generations," said Roger Alcon, 63, looking
out on a northern New Mexico landscape of high mesas, ponderosa pines and black
Angus cattle. "We have what we need. We've been very happy, living in
peace."
Wells
are the Alcons' only source of water. The same is true for everyone else in
Mora County, which is why last month this poor, conservative ranching region of
energy-rich New Mexico became the first county in the nation to pass an
ordinance banning hydraulic fracturing, the controversial oil and gas
extraction technique known as "fracking" that has compromised water
quantity and quality in communities around the country.
"I
don't want to destroy our water," Alcon said. "You can't drink
oil."
In
embracing the ban, landowners turned their back on potentially lucrative
royalty payments from drilling on their property and joined in a groundswell of
civic opposition to fracking that is rolling west from Ohio, New York and
Pennsylvania in the gas-rich Marcellus shale formation.
Pittsburgh
became the first U.S. city to outlaw fracking in November 2010 after it came to
light that an energy company held a lease to drill under a beloved city
cemetery.
Since
then, more than a dozen cities in the East have passed similar ordinances.”
http://articles.latimes.com/2013/may/28/local/la-me-fracking-ban-20130529
9. NATURAL GAS WASTE HAULER
RAIDED
“Federal
and State agents from the IRS, FBI, PA Attorney General’s office and PA DEP
raided Minuteman Environmental Services (MES) May 29.
MES is
located at the Milton Industrial Park in Milton, PA, and has contracts to haul
gas drilling waste. Gov. Tom Corbett visited the Milton facility
on Feb. 8, 2012, calling the Minuteman operation an “American success story.” On Feb. 28, the Central Pennsylvania Chamber of Commerce honored Minuteman with its
“Business of the Year” award.
The
Lewisburg home of Brian Bolus, Minuteman’s CEO, was also raided.
Bolus donated $10,000 to Corbett’s campaign between
2009-2010.
Agents were at the plant for more than 9 hours and seen carrying
out boxes and boxes of presumably files, documents and other records. Reports also stated agents were combing over
every inch of the plant.
Employees
trying to get to work were stopped, frisked and vehicles searched. A few employees inside the facility were
handcuffed with zip ties. They were told
it was for their own protection.
Meanwhile,
outside, workers from the Milton Regional Sewer Authority and agents were seen
opening up and inspecting sewers near the MES facility.
None of the involved agencies would comment
on why they were there and only said they would be there awhile due to an
ongoing investigation. Minuteman
Environmental Services also declined to comment.
In 2011, MES was fined $7,000 by DEP for
dumping and storing waste without DEP approval at sites in Green Township,
Clinton County, and White Deer Township, Union County. DEP stated the facilities held waste from
natural gas drilling sites in the Marcellus Shale.
DEP was
tipped off by a citizen’s complaint in July 2011. MES received a notice from DEP in August 2011 requiring the removal and
proper disposal of the waste. Ten containers of gas-well drill cutting waste
were found at the Green Township site, and 7 at White Deer. Six of the White Deer containers held plastic
lines, and one had liquid from a gas well spill.
A pile of waste on
the ground was also found in White Deer. A follow-up inspection in September
confirmed that MES had complied.
David Spandoni, DEP
Spokesperson, would not comment on whether DEP had the authority to shut
down businesses which have these types of violations. Spandoni did say, “We have no intention of shutting this [MES] business down.”
A call to PEC/Premier for comment was not returned by press
time Monday.
The
general assumption as to why the raid occurred, involves disposal of natural
gas waste as suggested by agents and local workers inspecting sewer drains.
It is curious that if this is all there is to the story, why
are IRS and FBI agents involved? Why
were boxes and boxes of records confiscated, employees frisked, some
handcuffed, vehicles searched and Bolus’s home also raided? Surely, if it was
just dumping, DEP could handle slapping MES on the wrist. If it is just about dumping, perhaps on scale
large enough to attract Federal attention, where’s the EPA? Wouldn’t they have sent an agent or two
along?
What’s the IRS’s part in this if it is just a case of
dumping?”
by Dory Hippauf
10. Gas Is a Bridge Fuel To
Nowhere by David Suzuki
“British
Columbia (B.C.) appears to be pinning its economic hopes on natural gas—much of
it obtained by fracking. While the world should be turning from fossil fuels to
cleaner energy and conservation, we’re poised to dig ourselves deeper into the
climate-altering carbon hole.
Taking a cue from the
liquidation-sale policies of the Alberta and federal governments, B.C.’s
leaders want to get fossil fuels out of the ground, piped to the coast,
liquefied and shipped to Asia—or wherever they can find buyers—as quickly as
possible. It’s a short-sighted plan based on outmoded thinking. In the long
run, it’s not good for the economy or the environment.
Whether
politicians believe fossil fuel supplies are endless or can only see as far as
the next election, they’re selling out our future and leaving a shattered
legacy for our kids and grandkids. To start, natural gas is not the
clean-energy solution it’s touted to be.
According to the Pembina Institute, if only five of the 12 proposed liquefied
natural gas (LNG) terminals were built on the B.C. coast, they could spew 63
million tons of carbon a year into the atmosphere—exceeding the amount now
produced by the Alberta tar sands and equal to all of B.C.’s greenhouse gas
emissions in 2010. Discharged particle matter and volatile organic compounds
would also be significant new sources of pollution.
Liquefying
the gas for export, which requires enormous amounts of energy, isn’t the only
source of greenhouse gases. Leaks–or what the industry refers to as “fugitive
emissions”–during drilling, extraction and transport are also concerns.
Although the B.C. Environment Ministry claims just .3 to .4 percent of gas
escapes into the atmosphere, independent studies say it’s likely many times
that amount.
According to an article in Nature, scientists from the U.S.
National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration and the University of Colorado in Boulder found leaks of
methane—a greenhouse gas 20 times more potent than carbon dioxide—amounted to
between four and nine percent of total production at two gas fields in the U.S.
The industry also relies on taxpayers’
money to subsidize it, through tax and royalty credits, and to provide water,
roads and the massive amounts of energy required to liquefy the gas. And
fugitive emissions from gas operations are exempt from the carbon tax. If we
are really “bridging” to reduce fossil fuels, why are we subsidizing companies
for their carbon costs?
It’s time to invest our money and
human resources in long-term, innovative ideas that will create good, lasting
jobs and ensure that we and our children and grandchildren continue to enjoy
healthy and prosperous lives and that our spectacular “supernatural”
environment is protected. We have abundant renewable resources and
opportunities to conserve energy and lead the way in developing clean energy.
It’s time to move forward.”
For
the rest of the article:
http://ecowatch.com/2013/fracked-gas-bridge-fuel-to-nowhere/
11. Fracking Economics
http://ecowatch.com/2013/fracking-economics-revealed-as-shale-gas-bubble-not-silver-bullet/
“The
reports, Drill Baby Drill by veteran
coal and gas geologist David Hughes, and Shale
and Wall Street by financial analyst Deborah Rogers, assess the economic
sustainability of the oil/ shale gas booms and comprise a thorough and
up-to-date analysis of data on more than 60,000 oil and gas wells and a
comprehensive review of the financial status of the companies involved.
Together, the authors conclude that rather
than offering the nation a century of cheap energy and economic prosperity,
fracking will provide only a decade of gas and oil abundance, at most, and is
creating a fragile new financial bubble that is already starting to deflate.
Additional research conclusions discussed at the briefing included:
1. The shale gas and tight oil booms have been oversold.
According to actual well production data filed in many states, shale gas and
shale oil reserves have been overestimated by operators by as much as 400-500
percent.
2. Wall Street has played a key
behind-the-scenes role in hyping the fracking boom through mergers and
acquisitions and transactional fees, similar to the pattern seen in the housing
boom that led to the financial crisis.
3. High productivity shale plays are not
common. Just five gas plays and two oil plays account for 80 percent of production
of those energy sources, while the most productive areas constitute relatively
small “sweet spots” within those plays.
4. Production rates are already in decline in
many shale plays. The high rates of per-well investment required to
maintain production mean U.S. shale gas production may have already peaked and
maintaining production will require high rates of potentially unsustainable,
high-cost drilling.
“The
fracking debate in New York and nationwide has been consistently framed as a
way to generate economic benefits and job creation, with limited risk of
environmental and public health impacts,” says Deborah Rogers. “But data don’t
lie. In every region where shale gas
development occurs, economic stability has proven elusive—yet environmental
degradation and peripheral costs have proved very real.”
“Based
on our research and what is increasingly evident in gas and oil fields, a new
energy dialogue is clearly needed nationally and in states like New York,” says
David Hughes. “Given the true potential, limitations, and both financial and
environmental costs of the energy panaceas being touted by industry and
government proponents, it will simply not be possible to drill and frack our
way to ‘energy independence.’”
12. One Earth, One Struggle:
The fight for our lives against ‘extreme energy’ technology
By
John Detweiler for Marcellus Protest Newsletter
“The strategy of ‘Divide and Conquer’ is as
old as the origins of the animal kingdom. Members of more vulnerable species know
that sticking together improves their chances of survival. Predators, for their
part, work to isolate and overpower their victims one-by-one.
We are engaged in this timeless
battle again, as our own human family responds to the inhuman threat from extreme
energy technologies: exemplified by hydraulic fracturing of deep shales, but
also encompassing nuclear reactors, mountain-top removal, the quarrying of tar
sands, and deep-water and polar drilling.
The predator’s Divide-and-Conquer
strategy plays out through pitting geographies and economic strata against each
other, and by inciting phoney ‘pick your poison’ debates over which mode of
extreme energy technology is better or worse than another.
A basic ’geographic’ ploy is to
isolate the sub-processes of a single technology, so that its alleged benefits
and its ultimate costs will fall upon different communities. Take fracking, for
example: its fresh water is obtained from one place, its waste water is dumped
in another; its sand is mined in yet another, and its transient workers have
their emotional roots in places far away from those homes, farms and forests
that they’ve been hired to disrupt.
In Pennsylvania, the frackers
tell us that “fracking fluid is just water and sand.” This is meant to sound benign,
and at first it does (ignoring those other deadly additives), until we learn
for ourselves that the “sand” isn’t from the beach: it’s strip-mined in
Wisconsin, with environmental destruction and human health impacts comparable
to the direct effects of fracking in our region.
In isolation, each sub-process is
portrayed as ‘inevitable’, driven by other sub-processes which are too far away
to understand or to influence. Thus, since ‘Fracking is already happening’ in
Pennsylvania, Ohioans are told that it’s hopeless to fight against wastewater
injection in their state — and that ‘jobs’ will be lost if the waste goes
somewhere else. The question, “What does toxic wastewater do to us all?” isn’t
discussed in either state.
Cultural and economic differences
are exploited as well. The promise of blue-collar ‘jobs’ is used to neutralize
the ‘elitist’ warnings of scientists, while industry ‘experts’ are employed to
trivialize the first-hand experiences of farmers and homeowners.
And Americans, made dependent on
our cheap-energy lifestyle through the dismantling of public infrastructure,
are shamed into silence by accusations of ‘denying progress’ to the peoples of
other countries—whose own economies and autonomy are being undermined by the
forces of extreme energy technology.
Finally, we are goaded into
arguments about ‘coal versus gas’ or ‘American gas versus foreign oil’, when it
should be clear that there is no choice to be made. Under our free market
ideology, no mode of capital-intensive extreme energy will surrender its market
to another—each one appeals to its own constituencies (investors, workers,
academics and politicians) for more money, longer hours, more exotic gadgets,
more time, in order to meet the ‘threat’ from all the other modes. Unless we see
them all as one, we will have them all at once: more and more and more.
Lately, Divide-and-Conquer is
undercutting cooperation among environmental activists. Some of us are offered
“a seat at the table” as reward for being “reasonable”; others are marginalized,
to be picked-off in isolation.
The devastation from extreme
energy technology is global and universal. Three times as much carbon-based
fuel is already under development as our global climate can survive, and yet
ever deeper deposits are being targeted, with ever higher costs of extraction.
Anything that we can do, we must do; everything we do matters. We are in this
together, fighting for our lives.”
Photo: Pipeline
Crossing Rt 220 Sonestown, Davidson Twp., from John Trallo
