Westmoreland Marcellus Citizens’ Group Updates August 15, 2013
* 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/
*
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* 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-
TAKE ACTION!!
***Ask
Pres. Obama to Resume Fracking Studies
From Food and Water Watch
“Last
week, there was breaking news from EPA whistle-blowers that in 2012 the EPA abandoned an investigation of
fracking-related water contamination in Dimock, Pennsylvania after an EPA staff
member raised the flag that it was likely caused by fracking¹.
There's
an unfortunate trend here, because they've also abandoned their
fracking-related water contamination investigations in Pavillion, Wyoming² and
Weatherford, Texas³. This is
unbelievable, and totally unacceptable.
Will
you join me today in calling on President Obama and his new EPA administrator
Gina McCarthy to immediately reopen these investigations and deliver safe
drinking water to the residents of these communities while the investigations
commence?
Thanks
for taking action,
Sarah Alexander, Deputy Organizing Director, Food & Water Watch”
***WMCG Steering Committee Meeting- 7:30 Monday,
August 19. Meetings are
usually held in Greensburg . All are welcome to attend. Email Jan for
directions.
***Allegheny County--The Fight for County Parks (From Marcellus
Protest-please share widely)
“Allegheny County
government is seriously considering fracking in our parks.
Boyce
Park
Deer
Lakes Park
Harrison
Hills Park
Hartwood
Acres Park
North
Park
Round
Hill Park
Settlers
Cabin Park
South
Park
White
Oak Park
We're
planning to get up & get in the way - NO Fracking at our County Parks!
Sign up to SPEAK against fracking our parks at the
upcoming County Council meeting. Each speaker will have up to 3 minutes to
speak. Let them know why YOU think our parks shouldn't be fracked.
Your request to speak MUST be in no later 24 hours BEFORE
the Aug. 20 meeting. Sign up online, do
it TODAY: Online: http://www.county.allegheny.pa.us/council/meetings/recomm.asp
Meeting date:
Tuesday, August 20 at 5 p.m.
Location: County Courthouse 436 Grant Street, 4th Floor -
Gold Room, Pittsburgh
Phone: 412-350-6495”
Find your council district
& member:
http://www.county.allegheny.pa.us/council/dist.aspx
For a full calendar
of area events please see “Marcellus Protest” calendar:
Frack Links
***To sign up for notifications
of activity and violations for your area:
***List of the Harmed--There are now
over 1300 residents of Pennsylvania who placed their names on the list of the
harmed because they became sick after fracking began in their area . http://pennsylvaniaallianceforcleanwaterandair.wordpress.com/the-list/
***Problems with
Gas?—Report It-from Clean Air Council
Clean
Air Council is announcing a new auto-alert system for notifying relevant
agencies about odors, noises or visible emissions that residents suspect are
coming from natural gas operations in their community.
Just
fill out the questions below and our system will automatically generate and
send your complaint to the appropriate agencies.
Agencies that will receive your e-mail: the Pennsylvania
Department of Environmental Protection (Regional Office of sender and
Harrisburg Office), the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Agency for
Toxic Substances and Disease Registry.
Take Action Here
If you witness the release of potentially hazardous
material into the environment, please also use the National Response Center's
online form below:
Thanks for your
help.
Sincerely, , Matt Walker, Community Outreach Director, Clean
Air Council
***Dr. Brasch
Hosts Fracking Program-- Dr. Walter Brasch, author of the critically
acclaimed book, Fracking Pennsylvania,
is hosting a weekly half-hour radio show about fracking. "The Frack Report" airs 7:30 p.m.,
Mondays (beginning July 29) and is re-run 7:30 a.m., Wednesdays, on WFTE-FM
(90.3 in Mt. Cobb and 105.7 in Scranton.) The show will be also be live
streamed at www.wfte.org and also available a day after the Monday night
broadcast on the station's website. Brasch's first guest is Karen Feridun,
founder of Berks Gas Truth. He will be interviewing activists, persons affected
by fracking, scientists, and politicians. Each show will also feature news
about fracking and the anti-fracking movement.
Brasch is a multi-award-winning four-decade
journalist and social activist, a former newspaper reporter and editor,
multimedia production writer-producer. Among his most recent awards are those
from the Pennsylvania Associated Press Broadcasters Association, Pennsylvania
Press Club, National Federation of Press Women, National Society of Newspaper
Columnists, and Society of Professional Journalists. He is professor emeritus
from the Pa. State System of Higher Education. He is also the author of 17
books, most fusing history with contemporary social issues.
FRACK NEWS
1. Frack Fluid Spills at Beaver Run Reservoir in June
(Where
are the voices of our county commissioners about toxic waste being spilled next
to the drinking water of 150,000 people? Jan)
“The PA DEP has cited
Consol Energy's CNX Gas after a spill of fracturing fluid at Beaver Run
Reservoir in June.
Officials at the Municipal Authority of
Westmoreland County said no contamination occurred from the June 1 incident at the Kuhn 3D pad in
Bell Township.
According
to a statement on the authority website, CNX was “fracturing” a well when a
leak occurred at a plumbing union. While workers were repairing the leak, at least 100 gallons of processed fracking
water flowed into the soil.
The
reservoir is the source of drinking water for 150,000 people, including those
in Murrysville, Export and Delmont.
Soil
in the affected area was excavated, and chloride levels in the soil and water
were tested. Fracking resumed on June 3, Consol Energy spokeswoman Lynn Seay
said, and tests showed that all the problems were remedied by June 4.
DEP cited CNX for failure to properly
control or dispose of industrial or residual waste to prevent pollution of the
waters of the Commonwealth; stream discharge of IW, including drill
cuttings, oil, brine and/or silt; and pit and tanks not constructed with
sufficient capacity to contain pollutional substances. DEP has not determined a fine or penalty
for CNX. The company has set in place additional controls at the site since
the incident, Seay said.
That
wasn't the only incident at the reservoir that month. On June 13, a containment dike
around the Mamont 1 drilling pad overflowed muddy water down a hill towards the
reservoir. The dike, which is designed to hold rainwater and release it
slowly in the environment, was repaired the same day. DEP is not citing the
driller for the incident.
The
incidents have Murrysville Councilman Dave Perry scratching his head.
“The two incidents are relatively minor, but
CNX needs to re-evaluate their spill-control policy,” said Perry, an
environmental geologist. “Sure, there was no impact, but two uncontrolled
releases in two weeks indicates that their spill-control procedures are
inadequate.”
Last
July, CNX was cited after liquid cement leaked into a creek that empties into
the reservoir at the Kuhns 3B well pad. That was the first violation incurred
by the company at the reservoir. Drilling has taken place at the reservoir
since 2010.
Consol
Energy has 36 horizontal Marcellus wells located on five pads and five
vertically drilling wells on one pad at Beaver Run Reservoir, Seay said. The
company plans to drill on another pad in 2014.”
Excerpt: Daveen Rae Kurutz is a staff writer for Trib
Total Media. She can be reached at 412-856-7400, ext. 8627, or
dkurutz@tribweb.com.
Read more:
http://triblive.com/neighborhoods/yourmurrysville/yourmurrysvillemore/4442612-74/reservoir-cnx-cited#ixzz2bu8zD0AE
2.
Obama Administration Censors Truth About Dimock
by DeSmog Blog by Steve Horn
“DeSmogBlog
has obtained a copy of an Obama Administrations EPA fracking groundwater
contamination PowerPoint presentation describing a then-forthcoming study's
findings in Dimock, Pennsylvania.
The PowerPoint presentation
reveals a clear link between "fracking" for gas in Dimock and groundwater contamination,
but was censored by the Obama Administration. Instead, the
EPA issued an official desk statement in July 2012 - in the thick of election
year - saying the water in Dimock was safe for consumption.
Titled
"Isotech-Stable Isotype Analysis:
Determining the Origin of Methane and Its Effects on the Aquifer," the
PowerPoint presentation concludes that in Cabot Oil and Gas' Dimock Gesford 2
well, "Drilling creates pathways, either temporary or permanent, that allows gas
to migrate to the shallow aquifer near [the] surface...In
some cases, these gases disrupt groundwater quality."
Other
charts depict Cabot's Gesford 3 and 9
wells as doing much of the same, allowing methane to migrate up to
aquifers to unprecedented levels - not coincidentally - coinciding with the
wells being fracked. The PowerPoint's conclusions are damning.
"Methane
is released during the drilling and perhaps during the fracking process and
other gas well work," the presentation states. "Methane is at
significantly higher concentrations in the aquifers after gas drilling and
perhaps as a result of fracking and other gas well work...Methane and other
gases released during drilling (including air from the drilling) apparently
cause significant damage to the water quality."
Despite
the findings, the official EPA desk statement concluded any groundwater
contamination in Dimock was "naturally occurring."
"EPA
found hazardous substances, specifically arsenic, barium or manganese, all of
which are also naturally occurring substances, in well water at five homes at
levels that could present a health concern," read the EPA desk statement.
"EPA has provided the residents with all of their sampling results and has
no further plans to conduct additional drinking water sampling in Dimock."
Two
EPA whistleblowers recently approached the American Tradition Institute and
revealed politics were at-play in the decision to censor the EPA's actual
findings in Dimock. At the heart of the cover-up was former EPA head Lisa
Jackson.
EnergyWire's
Mike Soraghan explained the studies were dropped - according to one of the
unidentified whistleblowers close to the field team in Dimock - "out of
fear the inquiries would hurt President Obama's re-election chances."
Though the two EPA career employees' initial
findings pointed to water contamination in Dimock - as seen in the PowerPoint
presentation - their superiors told them to stop the investigation, in turn
motivating them to blow the whistle.
One of the whistleblowers said he came forward due to
witnessing "patently unethical and possibility illegal acts conducted by
EPA management."
"I have for over a year now worked within the
system to try and make right the injustice and apparent unethical acts I
witnessed. I have not been alone in this effort," the unnamed
whistleblower told Soraghan. "I took an oath when I became a federal
employee that I assume very solemnly."
At the center of the management team overseeing the
false desk statement: former EPA head Lisa Jackson, who now works as
Apple's top environmental advisor. Jackson was recently replaced by
just-confirmed EPA head Gina McCarthy.
This was revealed by the other whistleblower, who as
part of the regular duties of his job, was a member of the
"HQ-Dimock" email listserv. On that list, Jackson went by the
pseudonym "Richard Windsor" as a way to shield her real name from
potential Freedom of Information Act requests.
"Many members of the email group...were lawyers
and members of Lisa Jackson's inner political circle," explained Soraghan.
Key Freedom of
Information Act Filed
American Tradition Institute has filed two FOIA's
in response to the whistleblowers coming forward.
"One FOIA request seeks certain e-mails, text
messages, or instant messages of three specified EPA field staff which are to,
from or make reference to the White House or EPA HQ,"explained ATI.
"The second FOIA request focuses on emails sent as part of the ‘HQ-Dimock’
discussion group. Both requests cover the seven-month period from December 1,
2011 through June 30, 2012."
Natural Resources Defense Council - which has also
been critical of the EPA on this issue - is suspicious of ATI's motives in this
case.
ATI is more well-known for denying climate change's
existence and "ClimateGate" in particular. Yet, when push comes to
shove, NRDC's Kate Sinding approves of ATI's FOIA filing and looks forward to
what it discovers.
"It appears to be an attempt to bully EPA out of
these cases," Sinding told EnergyWire. "If their request results in
getting more information about the decision-making, that's good information for
everyone. But I question their motivation."
The real question at the heart of the matter: What
were the EPA's motives for doing an about-face on a key multi-year tax-payer
subsidized study?
"It is unconscionable that, in the name of
political expediency, the Obama Administration suppressed key information that
would have connected the dots between fracking and water contamination,"
Wenonah Hauter, Executive Director of Food and Water Watch told DeSmogBlog.
"Gina McCarthy must put the health and safety of Americans first and
prevent the agency from succumbing to political pressure."
` Scott Ely - a former Cabot
employee and Dimock resident who has three small children and whose water was
contaminated by Cabot - expressed similar despair over EPA abandoning ship in
this high-profile study.
"When
does anybody just stand by the truth? Why is it that we have a bunch of people
in Washington, DC who are trying to manipulate the truth of what's happening to
people in Dimock because of the industry?," Ely asked rhetorically.
Ely says he keeps an open line of communications
with EPA employees, who regularly check in and caution him not to use his
water. The employees remain unidentified for fear of retribution by EPA
upper-level management.
"We thought EPA was going to come in and be our
savior. And what'd they do? They said the truth can't be known: hide it, drop
it, forget about it."
© 2013 DeSmog Blog
3. PA Shale Drillers Face New Rules on Air Pollution
By Don Hopey /
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
“Shale gas drillers
in Pennsylvania are facing new rules
that will, for the first time, limit noxious emissions, including nitrogen
oxides, volatile organic compounds and hazardous air pollutants.
The new state rules
will take effect immediately. According to the rules, shale gas drillers will
be required to either get an air quality plan approved by the state DEP before
drilling a well, or implement practices and emission controls more stringent
than federal requirements that took effect in April 2012.
The new rules end the 1996 blanket exemption granted unconventional
shale gas wells from pollution control requirements.
Chris Abruzzo,
acting DEP secretary, said Thursday that the new emission rules build on
"existing federal requirements by continuing to set the high, but fair,
bar we have come to expect."
The rules require well operators to do leak
detection and make timely repairs for the entire well pad and facility,
including condensate tanks containing so-called "wet gases" such as
ethane, propane, and butane. Emissions of nitrogen oxides must be reduced to less
than 100 pounds per hour, half a ton per day and 6.6 tons per year. Federal
rules do not limit those emissions.
According
to Kevin Sunday, DEP spokesman, the
state's rules will also require that all
flaring done for emissions control on gas storage tanks be enclosed.
According to the
DEP, enclosing flares reduces emissions of volatile organic compounds and
hazardous gases by up to 99.9 percent.
Patrick Creighton, a
spokesman for the Marcellus Shale Coalition, said the new rules will result in
improved air quality in the state.
"Operators
can either meet the tougher than federal conditions or go through the state
plan approval process, which can take a long time," Mr. Creighton said.
"Operators may be incentivized to meet the tougher standards."
According to Clean
Air Council attorney David Presley, the council also commented on the proposed
rules but hasn't had a chance to review the final language.
"If the wells are no longer
exempt from getting a plan approval, that's something we asked for," Mr.
Presley said.”
Don Hopey: dhopey@post-gazette.com or
412-263-1983.
4. Researcher Brian Fontenot Interviewed
Pro Publica
“High levels of arsenic and other metals found in groundwater study
What did you find?
We found that there were actually
quite a few examples of elevated constituents, such as heavy metals, the main
players being arsenic, selenium and strontium. And we found each of those
metals at levels that are above EPA’s maximum contaminate limit for drinking
water.
These heavy metals do naturally occur in
the groundwater in this region. But we have a historical dataset that points to
the fact that the levels we found are sort of unusual and not natural. These
really high levels differ from what the groundwater used to be like before
fracking came in. And when you look at the location of the natural gas
wells, you find that any time you have water wells that exceed the maximum
contaminate limit for any of these heavy metals, they are within about three
kilometers of a natural gas well. Once you get a private water well that’s
not very close to a natural gas well, all of these heavy metals come down. But
just because you’re close to a natural gas well does not mean you’re guaranteed
to have elevated contaminate levels. We had quite a few samples that were very
close to natural gas wells that had no problems with their water at all.
We also found a few samples that had measureable levels of methanol and ethanol,
and these are two substances that don’t naturally occur in groundwater.
They can actually be created by bacterial interactions
underwater, but whenever
methanol or ethanol occurs in the environment, they’re very fleeting and
transient. So for us to be able to actually randomly take a grab sample and
detect detectable methanol and ethanol — that implies that there may be a
continuous source of this.
You found levels of arsenic in areas with fracking that
were almost 18 times higher than in areas without fracking or in the historical
data. What would happen to someone who drank that water?
Arsenic is a
pretty well-known poison. If you experience a lot of long-term exposure to
arsenic, you get a lot of different risks, like skin damage, problems with the
circulatory system or even an increased risk of cancer. The levels that we
found would not be a lethal dose, but they’re certainly levels that you would
not want to be exposed to for any extended period of time.
What about the other stuff you found?
The heavy metals are a little bit
different because they are known to be included in some fracking recipes. But
they’re also naturally occurring compounds. We think the problem is that
they’re becoming concentrated at levels that aren’t normal as a result of some
aspect of natural gas extraction.
It’s not necessarily that we’re
saying fracking fluid getting out. We don’t have any evidence of that. But
there are many other steps involved, from drilling the hole to getting the
water back out. A lot of these can actually cause different scenarios whereby
the naturally occurring heavy metals will become concentrated in ways they
normally wouldn’t. For example, if you have a private water well that’s not
kept up well, you’ll have a scale of rust on the inside. And if someone were to
do a lot of drilling nearby, you may find some pressure waves or vibrations
that would cause those rust particles to flake out into the water. Arsenic is
bound up inside that rust, and that can actually mobilize arsenic that would
never be in the water otherwise.
Methanol and ethanol are
substances that should not be very easy to find in the groundwater naturally.
We definitely know that those are on the list of things that are known to be in
hydraulic fracturing fluid. But we were unable to actually sample any hydraulic
fracturing fluid, so we can’t make any claims that we have evidence fluids got
into the water.
Do
you think fracking is responsible for what you found?
Well, I can’t
say we have a smoking gun. We don’t want the public to take away from this that
we have pegged fracking as the cause of these issues. But we have shown that
these issues do occur in close relation, geographically, to natural gas
extraction. And we have this historical database from pretty much the same
exact areas that we sampled that never had these issues until the onset of all
the fracking. We have about 16,000 active wells here in the Barnett Shale, and
that’s all popped up in about the last decade, so it’s been a pretty dramatic
increase.
We noticed that when you’re
closer to a well, you’re more likely to have a problem, and that today’s
samples have problems, while yesterday’s samples before the fracking showed up
did not. So we think that the strongest argument we can say is that this needs
more research.”
5. Victory in Fracking Wastewater Fight in PA
Thank You Clean Water Action and Earthjustice!
"If not for the effort of Clean Water Action and Earthjustice, a wastewater
treatment plant in southwestern Pennsylvania might have spent each day of the
past three years dumping up to 500,000 gallons of untreated natural gas
drilling wastewater into the Monongahela River. Instead, the
plant has not discharged a drop of waste into the river—a drinking water source
for 350,000 people. And under a new permit issued by the Pennsylvania DEP, the plant will not be allowed to
discharge anything, unless it proves it can comply with the law and treat all
of the contaminants in fracking wastewater.
The DEP had initially tried to fast-track
the planned wastewater plant in Masontown, PA, quietly allowing Shallenberger
Construction Inc. to dump inadequately treated fracking wastewater directly
into the Monongahela River until the company built all of the necessary
treatment facilities at the plant.
“When fracking began in western
Pennsylvania, the gas industry treated our rivers
as a convenient place to dispose of their waste,” stated Myron
Arnowitt, PA state director for Clean Water Action. “We knew we had to act and
we are glad to see that this agreement upholds the protection for our drinking
water that every Pennsylvanian expects and deserves.” In 2008, pollution levels spiked so high in a 70-mile stretch of the
Monongahela River that the entire city of Pittsburgh was urged to drink bottled
water. The DEP acknowledged that the problem was due in large part to untreated fracking wastewater
being discharged from sewage treatment plants. The Shallenberger plant would
have added to that contamination."
August
7
6. Wastewater
in Warren PA
By Sharon Kelly, DE Smog Blog, July 18
“A Pennsylvania industrial wastewater treatment
plant has been illegally accepting oil and gas wastewater and polluting the
Allegheny River with radioactive waste and other pollutants, according Clean
Water Action, which announced today that it is suing the plant.
“Waste
Treatment Corporation has been illegally discharging oil and gas wastewater
since at least 2003, and continues to discharge such wastewater without
authorization under the Clean Water Act and the Clean Streams Law,” the notice
of intent to sue delivered by Clean Water Action reads.
Many pollutants associated with oil and gas
drilling—including chlorides, bromides, strontium and magnesium—were discovered
immediately downstream of the plant’s discharge pipe in Warren, PA, state
regulators discovered in January. Upstream of the plant, those same
contaminants were found at levels one percent or less than those downstream, or
were not present at all.
State
officials also discovered that the sediments immediately downstream from the
plant were tainted with high levels of radium-226, radium-228 and uranium.
Those particular radioactive elements are known to be found at especially high
levels in wastewater from Marcellus shale gas drilling and fracking, and state
regulators have warned that the radioactive materials would tend to accumulate
in river sediment downstream from plants accepting Marcellus waste.
“To
us, that says that they are discharging Marcellus Shale wastewater, although no
one admits to sending it to them,” said Myron Arnowitt, Pennsylvania state
director for Clean Water Action.
The
amount of radioactivity found in the Allegheny riverbed is striking. Sediments
just downstream of the Waste Treatment Corporation’s discharge pipe contained
over 50 picocuries per gram (pCi/g) of radium-226, state records show. To put
that number in rough context, the levels found in the Allegheny are 10 times
those that the EPA requires the surface soil at cleaned-up uranium mining sites
to achieve.”
DeSmogBlog http://www.desmogblog.com/2013/07/17/another-pennsylvania-wastewater-treatment-plant-accused-illegally-disposing-fracking-radioactive-waste
7. Research: Higher Leakage Rate of Methane from Fracking
“A new study of the air above a natural gas field
in Utah suggests that far more methane gas may be escaping into the atmosphere
from drilling operations than previously estimated. The study, to be published
in the journal Geophysical Research
Letters, is the first to use an
aircraft to directly sample the air downwind of natural gas and oil wells in
order to calculate emissions of methane and contributors to smog. Most other
studies to date have relied on various estimating techniques to determine
methane emissions associated with natural gas drilling.
The new
study sheds insight on a critical question — just how much methane gas, which
in the short-term is a far more powerful global warming agent than carbon
dioxide (CO2) — is escaping from drilling, processing, shipping, and burning
natural gas in the U.S.? The EPA estimates that, nationally, the “methane
leakage” rate is about 1.5 percent, but other recent studies have suggested
that is a lowball estimate.
This new
study, while limited in scope to one natural gas field on one particular day in
2012, also argues for a higher estimate
of methane leakage, on the order of between 6.2 and 11.7 percent.
Malcolm
Sweeney, a coauthor of the study and a scientist with the Cooperative Institute
for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) at the University of Colorado
Boulder, told Climate Central that he was surprised by the “huge amount” of
methane emissions the study found. “We’re estimating that 9 percent of that is
just leaking right out, never getting to the end of the pipeline . . . to the
actual user point,” he said. http://www.climatecentral.org/news/methane-leaking-in-utah-suggests-higher-national-rate-16316
8. Hallowichs Required to Sign Off on Health Problems
By Don Hopey / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, August 12
“The
previously confidential agreement to settle a Washington County family's claims
that its health and property value were damaged by nearby shale gas development
contains lifetime bans on what they can
say and do, and also places restrictions on where they may live.
The
2-year-old settlement agreement, restored to the public court record Monday
morning when it was filed with the Washington County prothonotary, prohibits
the Hallowich family from living within 2 miles of any existing Marcellus Shale
facility owned by Range Resources, MarkWest Energy and Williams Gas/Laurel
Mountain Midstream, or within 1,000 feet of any existing natural gas lease
involving the companies.
The 17-page
settlement agreement also includes the Hallowiches' previously reported payoff
of $750,000, and notes they will continue to receive oil and gas royalties
under the terms of a lease agreement entered into by the previous owners of
their farm.
It prohibits
them from objecting to any drilling under any new property or residence they
may own, and details the lifetime nondisclosure and nondisparagement clauses
preventing them from speaking publicly about the settlement or protesting or
challenging any gas development activity or lease by the operators. The
operators also agreed not to disclose the terms of the settlement nor to
disparage the Hallowiches.
Before
signing the agreement in August 2011, Stephanie Hallowich and her husband,
Chris, had been vocal critics of the shale gas development that surrounded
their 10-acre farm in Mount Pleasant, Washington County.
The
settlement agreement states the companies denied their shale gas development
activities caused any health problems, and Matt Pitzarella, a Range spokesman,
has repeated that position in recent weeks when the Hallowich case has been in
the news.
"We are pleased that the public now
has access to this information, which clearly demonstrates that there [are]
absolutely no health, environmental or safety impacts from gas
development," Mr. Pitzarella said in an emailed statement.
The settlement included an admission by the
family that it suffered no environmental, health or safety impact from drilling
adjacent to their property. The Hallowiches' attorney, Peter Villari, said the
companies insisted that such a provision be included in the settlement.
The settlement
document, though relied on by
Washington County Judge Paul Pozonsky to approve of and seal the settlement
Aug. 23, 2011, was missing from the case file delivered to the prothonotary's
office that day. Its absence from the
court records was discovered when Debbie O'Dell-Seneca, Washington County Court
of Common Pleas president judge, acting on a request by the Pittsburgh
Post-Gazette and the Washington Observer-Reporter, ordered the case file
unsealed in March 2013.
Reporters from the Post-Gazette were excluded from the
settlement hearing, and when the court released a hearing transcript two weeks
ago at the Post-Gazette's request, it contained a statement by Range's attorney
that the agreement's gag order applied to the Hallowiches and their children,
then ages 7 and 10.
After the release of the transcript, Mr. Pitzarella
said Range never intended for the gag order to apply to the children, but the
other companies have not issued similar denials. Kathy K. Condo, an attorney
representing MarkWest, declined to comment, and Erin McDowell, Mark West's
attorney, did not respond to a request for comment.”
9. A
Texan Tragedy: Plenty Of Oil, No water
“Fracking
boom sucks away precious water from beneath the ground, leaving cattle dead,
farms bone-dry and people thirsty.
Beverly McGuire saw the warning
signs before the town well went dry: sand in the toilet bowl, the sputter of
air in the tap, a pump working overtime to no effect. But it still did not
prepare her for the night last month when she turned on the tap and discovered
the tiny town where she had made her home for 35 years was out of water. "The day that we ran out of water
I turned on my faucet and nothing was there and at that moment I knew the whole
of Barnhart was down the tubes," she said, blinking back tears. "I
went: 'dear God help us. That was the first thought that came to mind."
Across the south-west, residents
of small communities like Barnhart are confronting the reality that something
as basic as running water, as unthinking as turning on a tap, can no longer be
taken for granted. Three years of drought, decades of overuse and now the oil industry's outsize demands on water for fracking are running down reservoirs and underground aquifers. And climate change is making things
worse. In Texas alone, about 30 communities could run out of water by the end of the
year, according to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. Nearly 15 million people are living
under some form of water rationing, barred from freely sprinkling their lawns
or refilling their swimming pools. In Barnhart's case, the well appears to have
run dry because the water was being extracted for shale gas fracking."
10. Sen. Bob Casey Wants Federal Money for Frack Associated Jobs
“Alberts’ Spray
Solutions uses heavy-duty polymer sprays to construct containment pens that
prevent spills from contaminating the soil at drilling sites. In just three
years, the subsidiary has grown to account for 20 percent of the parent
company's gross annual sales, according to company president Edward Alberts.
The expansion has caught the attention of U.S. Sen. Bob Casey,
D-Pa., who kicked off a statewide economic development tour Monday by visiting
the Alberts Company headquarters just outside Williamsport.
In front of
the Spray Solutions’ warehouse, Casey held a press conference to unveil a bill
that aims to pump federal job-training
dollars into Pennsylvania's gas industry.
Casey, a member of
the Senate Finance Committee and Joint Economic Committee, touted his Marcellus
Shale bill as a chance to help Pennsylvania thrive economically, and also
support the nation in its push to become less dependent on foreign oil.
Meanwhile,
controversy continues to brew over fracking, the drilling process using
pressurized fluids to bring natural gas to the surface. Opponents argue
fracking may cause irreparable harm to the environment, and accuse regulators
of overlooking negative consequences in favor of immediate economic boons.
Critics worry the gas industry is bound for a boom-and-bust cycle that won't
benefit communities like Williamsport in the long term.”
11. Labor Law Violations By Gas
Industry
“Mr.
Bean, an
attorney with Steptoe & Johnson PLLC, is
getting more and more calls these days, as the Labor Department's Marcellus
Shale Initiative enters its second year.
The
agency began targeting oil and gas firms because the industry has shown a
pattern of labor law violations, according to John DuMont, district director
for the department's Pittsburgh office.
The firms tend to improperly label their workers as independent contractors,
which allows the companies to avoid paying overtime. They also pay employees a
day rate without calculating how many hours are worked in a week and without
keeping proper records. So far, the largest judgment from the initiative
was issued against Groundwater and Environmental Services Inc., a New
Jersey-based company, for violations found in an audit of its Cranberry and
Fairmont, W.Va., offices.
The
Labor Department audit concluded the environmental firm improperly classified
69 workers, who collected water samples from Marcellus Shale well sites, as
professionals exempt from the Fair Labor Standards Act, even though they
required no advanced knowledge to perform their jobs. The
exemption from minimum wage and overtime pay applies "bona fide
executive, administrative, professional and outside sales positions, as well as
certain computer employees," who are typically paid on a salary basis, the
department said.
If you're in the shale
gas industry, especially in Pennsylvania and West Virginia, then the U.S.
Department of Labor has you under a microscope right now," Mr. Bean said.
The odds of getting audited are high, he warned, and for those audited,
"it's almost always bad news.” By that he means that most audits uncover
violations, which isn't surprising, given how specific some employment laws are
and the oil and gas industry's higher-than-typical rate of violating those
laws.”
12. Butler Wastewater Plant
“RES
Water-Butler, a Penn Township-based wastewater processor, has broken ground to
build a treatment plant for the shale gas industry.
The
$2.5 million facility is expected to open by Nov. 1, according to company
president Andy Kicinski. It will accept
drilling fluid, flow-back frack water and produced water from shale wells,
and treat it to a point where it can be reused in future drilling.
The
new facility will be in Penn Township, Butler County, and will be able to
process 10,000 to 15,000 gallons of wastewater daily. XTO Energy, a division of
Exxon Mobil, is the anchor client, but it will be open to other operators as
well. It is the same model as another
facility in New Stanton operated by Reserved Environmental Services of
O'Hara, which has some of the same owners and the same management team as RES
Water.
"We're
going to be cookie-cuttering these things across the western part of
Pennsylvania," Mr. Kicinski said.
In
fact, as the Butler plant is going up, another in Lycoming County is already
permitted and scheduled to be built by 2015. Another plan to add hydraulic
fracturing water processing capabilities to an existing treatment plant in
Wheeling, W.Va., is under consideration, according to Nick Haden, vice
president of government affairs and marketing for Reserved Environmental
Services.
Mr.
Kicinski said he's considered getting a
discharge permit, which would require the facility to separate the salts in the
wastewater stream, but at the moment it doesn't make sense because there's no
market for those salts.”
Read more:
http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/business/news/reserved-environmental-services-second-wastewater-plant-set-to-launch-in-penn-township-698019/#ixzz2blqPk6NL
13. Dimock Area Residents Want Water Investigation Reopened
“Residents
and activists personally harmed by the hazards of fracking gathered at the EPA
Region 3 office in Philadelphia, calling for the reopening of the investigation
into drinking water contamination in Dimock, PA.
A recent
report in the Los Angeles Times revealed that EPA officials in Washington chose
to close an investigation of Dimock drinking water despite evidence gathered
from agency investigators based in Philadelphia that found “significant damage
to the water quality,” from poisonous contamination likely caused by fracking.
The EPA PowerPoint
Presentation was released last Monday on DeSmog blog by investigative
journalist Steve Horn. Evidence of drinking water contamination due to fracking
was similarly ignored by the EPA in Pavillion, WY, and Weatherford, TX. The resident-activists
conducted a press conference on their way down to EPA headquarters in
Washington, DC, where they will deliver about 50,000 petitions to new EPA
Administrator Gina McCarthy calling on her to reopen investigations in Dimock,
PA, as well as Pavillion, WY, and Weatherford, TX. They are also calling on EPA
to provide safe drinking water to residents while these investigations
recommence.
“For years now, I have had to live with toxic,
poisoned fracked water in my home,” said Ray Kemble, a former gas industry
employee turned whistleblower and an affected Dimock area resident. “When EPA
finally stepped in and tested my water, I thought ‘Thank God. Someone is
finally here to help us.’ But then it became apparent to those of us on the
ground that they were playing politics. EPA officials literally told us
officially that our water was safe to drink but then told us off-the-record not
to drink it. Now the truth is out and we want justice.”
“The purpose of the EPA is to protect all
Americans from the types of health and safety hazards fracking so obviously
caused in Dimock and elsewhere,” said Sam Bernhardt, statewide organizer with
Food & Water Watch, the organization that led the petition collection
effort.
“It’s time for Gina McCarthy and
the EPA to do its job and stand up for public health, not continue wilting
under pressure from the oil and gas industry to simply maintain the dangerous
status quo.”
http://ecowatch.com/2013/dimock-residents-demand-epa-reopen-fracking-water-study/
Food & Water Watch
14. ALEC Slush Fund Benefits Gas/Oil Industry
Now there are new charges by two government
watchdog groups that ALEC, the corporate-funded American Legislative Exchange
Council, is running a secretive multimillion-dollar slush fund that finances
lavish trips for state legislators and has misled the IRS about the fund's
activity.
Most of the money in
the scholarship fund comes from the telecom, pharmaceutical, and the oil and
gas industry giants. And so it really is
quite a scam, in my opinion. What you have here is influence peddling. I actually describe it as sort of
institutionalized corruption. And what it means is that corporations are
basically paying the lawmakers' travel, their airfare, their hotel, for the
conference where these legislators meet to actually vote behind closed doors
with these same lobbyists, many of the same lobbyists, on model legislation on
bills to change our rights. And the corporations get a tax write-off for what
is basically lobbying, and ALEC gets to wash this money for them, to wash it,
basically, through their accounts. And the public is left in the dark. They
have no idea that this corporation that wants to change the law in your state
just paid for an all-expense paid trip for a legislator, not just to go on a
trip, but to actually schmooze and booze and wine and dine, be wined and dined
by these same corporations, all off the books, basically, in most states.”
Read: http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=10539
Westmoreland Marcellus Citizen’s Group—Mission Statement
To raise the public’s general awareness and
understanding of the impacts of Marcellus drilling on the natural environment,
health, and long-term economies of local communities.
Officers:
President-Jan Milburn
Treasurer-Wanda Guthrie
Secretary-Ron Nordstrom
Facebook Coordinator-Elizabeth Nordstrom
Blogsite –April Jackman
Science Subcommittee-Dr. Cynthia Walter
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