Westmoreland Marcellus Citizens’ Group Updates September 5, 2013
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* For articles and updates or to just vent, visit us on facebook;
* To view permanent documents, past updates,
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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 !!
***Endangered
Species Attacked-Sierra Club/National Wildlife Fed. If you want to see your PA legislature trying
to take away the authority of the PA Fish and Boat Commission and PA Game
Commission to protect wildlife, wild trout streams, and endangered species,
check out this video. Do you suppose the
coal, oil and gas companies had any hand in this?
Start
viewing the video at 2:35 where the Exec. Dir. of the PFBC defends the defense
of wild trout and endangered species.
Ed Perry
National Wildlife Federation
Climate Change Campaign
Phone - 814-880-9593
paglobalwarmingoutreach@gmail.com
To Take Action on Endangered Species (Sierra Club)
Just
when you thought the special interests couldn't find another way to eliminate
environmental protection in Pennsylvania, "there they go again......"
This time they are going after the protectors of Pennsylvania's threatened and
endangered species, such as the osprey, the great egret, the bog turtle and the
banded sunfish.
The mining, gas drilling, and timber
industries want to undermine the independence of the PA Fish and Boat
Commission and the PA Game Commission to administer Pennsylvania's endangered
species laws.
House
Bill 1576 would send the Commissions' endangered species lists to the
Independent Regulatory Review Commission -- an agency dominated by the
legislature -- for additional scrutiny.
These
changes proposed in the bill blunt the effect of the Commissions' list of
threatened and endangered species of fish and wildlife, allowing more mining,
drilling and clear-cutting in Pennsylvania's lands. The Commissions would have
to go through a very cumbersome regulatory review process. To make matters even
worse, under the current versions of the bills the agencies would only be allowed
to protect fish and wildlife already listed by the federal government.
At the same time, permit applications for
mining, oil and gas drilling, and timbering would be approved, without any
on-the-ground check for their impacts on the PA endangered species.
This week, Sierra Club's
Conservation Chair Tom Au testified before a Joint House Committees hearing
urging opposition to HB 1576. He pointed out that the agencies' scientists are
better judges of the threats to wildlife and aquatic life. He explained that
the agencies make decisions proposals for protecting rare, threatened, or
endangered species in an open, transparent manner. The agencies publish the
scientific data collected, have it reviewed by other scientists, publish
proposed lists and protection plans, accept public comment, and hold public
hearings. It is hard to find fault with this deliberative process.
TELL
YOUR REPRESENTATIVE TO OPPOSE HB 1576.
Don't let the mining,
drilling and timber industries drive our precious wildlife, fish and plants
into extinction in Pennsylvania!
Thanks, Jeff Schmidt,
Director, Sierra Club Pennsylvania
Chapter
***Stop NPR from Accepting Natural Gas Industry $
(From Move on)
Petition Background
NPR receives underwriting funds from the
American Natural Gas Alliance (ANGA). In
exchange, NPR airs misleading ads promoting further development of natural gas,
which must now be mined by the environmentally damaging extreme extraction
process, “fracking”. This path would
commit the US to decades more of increasing dependence on fossil fuels. NPR refuses to disclose its policy on how
it selects sponsors from which to accept funding. (For a detailed account
of my two-year unsuccessful attempt to get through NPR’s corporate wall of
secrecy surrounding its underwriting practices go to http://wp.me/pJm45-33d.)
NPR (National Public Radio) should stop accepting funds and
airing underwriting announcements from the American Natural Gas Alliance
(ANGA). NPR must be transparent and accountable with its sponsorship practices.
Calendar of Events
***WMCG Steering Committee Meeting Tuesday,
Sept 10. All are invited. 7:30 and Mike and Cindy’s, Greensburg. Email
jan for directions.
***Volunteers Needed
Mother Earth Fair Sept 20-22 Seven Springs
Volunteer!! Mother
Earth Fair
Mountain Watershed Assoc, CoalField Justice, and FracTracker
have a table at the Mother Earth News Fair. Westmoreland Marcellus can also
participate.
We need volunteers to
hand out our literature- I think many
of you would also enjoy the fair.
Cindy,
Mike, Jack, Marian, and I have distributed literature after the Greensburg
concerts and Harriet took some literature to the Northmoreland Labor Fair. This is a good way to inform the public, but
we do need help.
So, if you can volunteer, please email me. jan
Event details:
Mother Earth News Fair
Dates: Sept. 20-22, 2013
Time: All day
Location: Seven Springs, PA
***Allegheny County Parks-Speak Out
“A coalition
of groups is standing firm against any fracking process taking place
on/in/under our county’s land. We, the
people of Allegheny County, are the owners of this park land. We, the people of Allegheny County, pay 80%
of the parks’ operating costs. We, the
people of Allegheny County, have the right to determine what happens at our
parks.
Please
plan to attend one of Allegheny County Council’s upcoming meetings and register
to speak, so that you can add your voice to the discussion.
Meetings
are held on Tuesdays and begin at 5 p.m.
Upcoming
meetings:
Sept.
10 and Sept. 24
Meetings
are held at:
County
Courthouse, 4th Floor - Gold Room
436
Grant Street
Pittsburgh,
PA 15219
**enter
thru courtyard entrance, on Forbes between Grant & Ross St.
REGISTER TO SPEAK
*You must register no later than 24 hours prior to the
meeting.
*Register online:
http://www.county.allegheny.pa.us/council/meetings/index.aspx
Ideas for writing up your statement:
http://www.marcellusprotest.org/comments_20Aug2013
***Great
Ohio River Relay (multi-day) September
14, NOON
(Pittsburgh’s North Shore): sponsored by the Wheeling Water Warriors. Activists
will carry a baton the length of
the Ohio River (Pittsburgh to Cairo,
IL), walking, running, and bicycling, to bring awareness to defending our
water.
We are fighting GreenHunterWater’s
proposed fracking wastewater treatment plant in our residential community, 1.2
miles upriver from the main water intake for Ohio County. We also oppose any
plans to barge fracking wastewater on our River!
We will walk, run, bike, boat, and
even rollerblade our baton the entire 981 miles of our Ohio River to bring
awareness to the whole country about what fracking is doing to our communities
and our water!
ENDING SOMETIME TBA in early October
in Cairo, IL
JOIN US !!!
www.facebook.com/WheelingWaterWarriors
www.facebook.com/events/482808835127323/ www.greatohioriverrelay.com
*** Shale Gas Outrage
(all day). September 25, Philadelphia, PA. The fracking
industry is gathering for their annual conference, and Shale :Gas
Outrage will again bring together thousands of protestors to tell them to Stop
Fracking!
For a full calendar
of area events please see “Marcellus Protest” calendar:
http://marcellusprotest.org/
Frack Links
***Rob Rogers Fracking Cartoon An excerpt:
“The whole idea of
marketing fracking as a “festival” makes me uncomfortable.”
“What’s next the “Carbon monoxide expo” or the
“Mercury-poisoning regatta?”
***Colbert Video -- Range Pays for Silence on Fracking and Health Problems
Colbert’s Satire on Hallowich Case
***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. 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.
***Preview
- Glass Half Empty: An American Water War
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6rVV-umpTlU
***Texan drought
sets residents against fracking - video
Frack News
All articles are excerpted. Please use links to read the full article.
1. Centralized Pit Remains in Mt Pleasant Twp.
The Carter Impoundment is bigger
than a football field and can hold 15 million gallons of water for gas
drilling. Nobody has tapped a Marcellus well in Mt. Pleasant since May 2011,
but the 3-year-old pit and several others remain, having served wells as far as
47 miles away, according to their owner.
Resident
Staub and others call the pit an industrial misfit in a quiet neighborhood and
want it gone.
Susceptible to spills of
chemical-laden water, waste pits can be one of the riskiest parts of the gas
drilling industry. Though they're supposed to be
temporary, that doesn't always mean brief.
“We lost the tranquility of our farm,” said Staub, 49, whose
backyard abuts the Carter property.
For
Range, big pits are a big part of its business. Carter is a special type of pit
— the only one of its kind in Mt. Pleasant — designed so drillers could hold
water in a central place and reuse it.
The pits
are noisy, smelly inconveniences for neighbors, but working without them would
mean more truck shipments, said Range spokesman Matt Pitzarella.
The DEP,
in a regulatory update proposed last
week, moved to block some of the smaller, open-top pits often common at well
sites. Larger pits, such as Carter,
called centralized impoundments, would be OK.
Unlike
smaller pits, in which brine can sit for a long time, centralized impoundments
are designed to be transfer stations. Water comes in and out relatively
quickly, officials said.
Range has eight such pits in Washington
County, more than any driller in Pennsylvania and a third of centralized
impoundments statewide, DEP records show.
Consol
uses the pits for wells within five to seven miles. It connects them by pipes,
generating no truck traffic except when loading or emptying the pits, said
Katharine Fredriksen, who oversees Consol's environmental strategy and
regulatory affairs.
The DEP
has not inspected Consol's centralized pits, according to its online records. Of seven Range impoundments in that
database, all received at least one state environmental violation, most
commonly for improper waste handling. Range passed most inspections at
those sites without violations and hasn't had a violation for improperly
controlling waste since May 2012, the records show.
Staub is among seven families that hired
attorney Dwight D. Ferguson to support Mt. Pleasant's case against Range's
pits. Some of those residents hired another attorney to challenge Range with
claims that benzene and other toxic
chemicals showed up in their blood from inhaling waste pit fumes, Ferguson
said.
Range has tested air and water
near the Mt. Pleasant pits and found them both safe, Pitzarella said.
Range denied similar claims made
by three families in Amwell in a 2012 shale-gas lawsuit. The families claimed
injury from toxic waste in an impoundment that passed 108 state inspections
without a violation since August 2010. The families claim that Range, its
contracted labs and the DEP covered up or ignored complaints and evidence.
The DEP and Range deny that.
Many companies choose to use
large tanks to store wastewater, said David Yoxtheimer, a hydrogeologist at
Penn State University's Marcellus Center for Outreach and Research. Yet tanks
are not a cure-all, Mueller said.
Tanks can leak — an ExxonMobil Corp.
subsidiary agreed in June to pay more than $20 million in improvements and
federal fines for tanks that leaked wastewater in Lycoming County. And tanks can cause air pollution if
they're not sealed, Mueller said.
The Carter Impoundment is an industrial development outside the
industrial part of town. The township tolerated it while Range drilled
there but doesn't believe it makes sense to allow long life for an industrial
site in a residential neighborhood, officials said.
Read
more: http://triblive.com/business/headlines/4595697-74/pits-range-waste#ixzz2de9n3zq4
2. Record-Breaking
Renewable Energy Capacity Pushes Fossil Fuel Plants to Close in Germany
“Germany’s renewable energy
industry has again shown its strength, shattering through another solar power
record, as utility company RWE announces
it will close fossil fuel power plants as they are no longer competitive.
RWE said
3.1 gigawatts (GW) of generating capacity would be taken offline, as it
suspends or shuts down some of its gas and coal-fired power stations. This
represents six percent of RWE’s total capacity.
It said a boom in solar energy meant many of its
power stations were no longer profitable.
RWE’s
statement read:
Due to the continuing boom in solar energy, many power
stations throughout the sector and across Europe are no longer profitable to
operate. During the first half of 2013, the conventional power generation
division’s operating result fell by almost two-thirds.
German
rival E.On has also said it has shut down or left idle 6.5 GW of generating
capacity. And as fossil fuels show signs
of decline in Germany, the country’s record-breaking renewables sector
continues to show its strength.
July saw the country clock 5.1
terawatt hours (TWh) of electricity from solar panel systems, breaking its own
monthly record, according to the latest data from the EEX Transparency
Platform.
This
all-time high for energy generation comes as the country experienced an
especially sunny weather, and saw a continued increase in capacity—although
slower than experienced in previous years.
The 5.1 GW record was 42 percent higher than the same month
in 2012.
This is
an impressive result for a country that gets less than half the sun available
in some of the sunnier parts of the world. The latest record also beats the
five TWh of electricity the country produced from wind turbines this January.
Much of Germany’s massive solar power
capacity comes from roofs of homes and businesses—around 51 percent of the
country’s renewable energy is owned by citizens and this massive uptake of
solar installations in the country has also helped bring down the price of
solar considerably in recent years.”
Visit
EcoWatch’s RENEWABLES pages for more related news on this topic.
http://ecowatch.com/2013/renewables-push-fossil-fuel-plants-to-close/
3. Heinz Endowment--
Caren Glofelty Gone
(This article has been removed from the net, so I typed excerpts
from my copy, August 11, Post Gazette. Jan)
“The Heinz Endowment dismissed
its top environmental officer, Carol Glofelty, who has experience in government
and working with business. Ms Glofelty and her former boss, Mr. Vagt, who spent
10 years in the oil and gas industry before becoming president of Davidson
College, spearheaded the creation of the
Center for Sustainable Shale Development. It was seeded with Heinz money.
All
three of Teresa Heinz’s sons sit on the Endowment’s board of directors. Andre
Heinz, in particular ,shares his mother’s zeal for the environment and in some
ways is more of a hard- line environmentalist.
A report
from the Public Accountability Initiative suggests the Endowment should have
been more forthcoming about the fact the Vagt
is on the board of directors at Kinder Morgan, a natural gas pipeline company
where he was paid $136,016 last year and where he owns $1.2 million in stocks.
Environmentalists
also say the centers’ recommended standards that created new standard for gas
operators, weren’t all that groundbreaking and in some cases less strict that
existing state drilling standards. The
coalition, according to the Public Accountability Initiative, represents a
green-washing campaign controlled by the gas industry and a few philanthropies.
Mr. Seif, former legal chief with EPA , now
an energy expert with Ridge Global, the consulting firm founded by Tom Ridge,
urged the Heinz board and family to “show some more backbone and not be spooked by
a couple of screwballs within the environmental movement.”
Doug Shields
said, “The board members themselves were deeply
conflicted on drilling ….going back to 2011 when the Endowment steered money
away from Fracktracker directed by U.
of Pitt. Center for Healthy Environment and Communities.“
By Bill Toland Post Gazette
4. Battle between
Coal and Gas
“What natural gas gives us is an opportunity
to get better control of our energy future," said Sen. Bob Casey,
D-Pa. “But expansion of natural gas production can't be at the expense of jobs
in coal regions”, he said during a recent interview.
Kathryn
Klaber, CEO of the Marcellus Shale Coalition, said lawmakers don't have to pick
and choose because many who have gas in their districts also have coal. “They
should be for both," said Ms. Klaber
About 42
percent of U.S. electricity is generated by coal, down from 53 percent in 1990,
according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Meanwhile, the share
of U.S. electricity from natural gas increased from 13 percent to 25 percent.
Gas spent $140 million to influence legislation last year, up from $56
million a decade ago.
Even the
most optimistic coal lobbyists predict the new regulations will at least freeze
construction of new coal plants. And already, coal plants in Western
Pennsylvania and elsewhere have begun shutting down, citing their inability to
meet the proposed standards. Others are being converted from coal to natural
gas.
During
the 2012 elections the coal industry poured $13 million to support Republican
candidates and to run commercials accusing Mr. Obama and fellow Democrats of
waging a "war on coal. “The message didn't resonate even in top
coal-producing states, which handed victories to the president and fellow
Democrats.
Reps. Tim Murphy, R-Upper St. Clair, and
Bill Shuster, R-Blair, are among the fiercest defenders of coal. They recently
introduced separate bills to block environmental legislation. The Murphy
plan, which was incorporated into a bill the House passed two weeks ago, would
prevent regulators from considering estimates of environmental risk when
weighing new rules for carbon emissions.
Read
more: http://www.post-gazette.com/stories/local/marcellusshale/battle-between-coal-gas-hot-issue-in-pennsylvania-698915/#ixzz2dyhhxLY9
5. Youngstown Man
Admits Dumping Toxic Fracking Waste Into Mahoning River
An employee of
Hardrock Excavating, that stored, treated and disposed of oil and
gas drilling liquids admitted to dumping tens
of thousands of gallons of fracking waste on at least 24 occasions into a
tributary of the Mahoning River.
Michael
Guesman appeared in U.S. District Court where he pleaded guilty to a charge of
unpermitted discharge of pollutants under the Clean Water Act.
Guesman said
he acted on the orders of his boss at Hardrock Excavating, owner Benedict Lupo,
when he ran a hose from the
20,000-gallon storage tanks to a nearby storm water drain and opened the release
valve. A gusher of waste liquid left over from "fracking" -- poured into the drain, sending saltwater brine and a slurry of toxic
oil-based drilling mud, containing benzene, toluene and other hazardous
pollutants, flowing into the Mahoning, prosecutors said. http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index.ssf/2013/08/youngstown_man_admits_dumping.html
6. Simple
Steps to Protect a Well or Spring from Marcellus Shale Fracking
from Marcellus protest
Dr. Ben Stout,
Professor of Biology, Wheeling Jesuit University, bens@wju.edu
Step 1: Test you water daily
with a conductivity pen.
-Conductivity is a measure of the ability of water to
conduct an electrical current and changes in conductivity reflect changing
water quality conditions. -Check the conductivity of your household water
supply once daily at relatively the same time (i.e. before making your morning
coffee/tea/).
-Record the results in a notebook and watch for dramatic
changes. Small change is expected on a daily and seasonal basis.
Conductivity pens can be used to monitor your well water.
The cost anywhere from $80-150. Here are some links to some vendors of
conductivity pens that we goggled: http://www.fondriest.com/products/extech_ec400.htm
http://www.forestry-suppliers.com/product_pages/View_Catalog_Page.asp?mi=3870
http://www.grainger.com/Grainger/EXTECH-TDSConductivitySalinity-Pen-1ZKY6
Measuring conductivity is the best way to detect spills and
any potential contamination from produced water from the Marcellus Shale
Formation. Typical conductivity recordings in regional streams range from
100-300μS/cm (micro Siemens per centimeter). Your well water should be less
than 500μS/cm. In a Greene County well, freshwater showed conductivity ranging
from 81,000-84,000μS/cm in 3 different samples. Should your well become
contaminated by brine water the change in conductivity should be dramatic.
Step 2:
Establish background water quality conditions of your well water.
-Conductivity measures how much material is dissolved in the
water; however, it does not identify what the ‘material’ specifically is. -To
determine the “material”, you can order kits from an EPA certified lab. Fill
the kit with your well water and send the samples back to the lab. The lab will
send a detailed evaluation of your existing well water conditions.
-Keep your data in a safe place.
You can get water test kits from any water-testing
laboratory. For instance, I typically order kits, fill them up, and send them
back to the National Center for Water Quality Research at Heidelberg
University, http://www.heidelberg.edu/WQL . I recommend an ICP/MS metals scan
($80), nutrients ($20) and VOC’s ($50-60). Do these tests repeatedly, once a
month for 5 or 6 months to establish the background, or pre-drilling conditions
of your well. Also test periodically during the nearby drilling of Marcellus
Shale. Keep these results for your records.
Step 3: Write it down, be
vigilant and create a record for your well.
-Record the characteristics of your water in your
conductivity notebook. Include the color (i.e. clear, milky, brown), taste
(i.e. no taste, bitter, salty), and odor (i.e. no odor, sulfur smell) of your
water. -Some chemicals that are toxic do not have any odor, taste or smell.
There may be a period of time from when your well goes bad to when you notice
any change, and consuming the water during that period could harm your health.
This is why measuring the conductivity daily is important. If you notice a
significant change in the conductivity of your water then stop consuming it
immediately and send a sample to an EPA certified lab as in number 2.
7. Oil and Gas Industry Provides Schools With Lesson Plans
By Anya Litvak / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
“A new energy curriculum is sponsored by the
Pennsylvania Independent Oil and Gas Association(PIOGA) , a trade group
representing the oil and gas industry.
A second curriculum is from Junior Achievement
of Western Pennsylvania's program for eighth-graders in the region. It's funded by donations from companies in the
Marcellus Shale industry and uses their employees as volunteer teachers to
explain common scientific concepts through the lens of oil and gas.
School
districts in Beaver County and the Beaver Valley Intermediate Unit have been
eager to get these programs into classrooms.
The Blackhawk School District was among the first to pilot
Junior Achievement's Careers in Energy Program, and is infusing other oil and
gas references into its classes as well.
For
example, incoming sixth-graders will begin learning about the history of oil
and gas wells in social studies, superintendent Michelle Miller said.
Students at the high school's STEAM -- that's Science,
Technology, Engineering, Arts and Math -- lab will learn geomapping through the
placement of natural gas wells. Others
at the lab might use a computer program to survey a piece of land and determine
where might be a good place to sink a gas well.
In 2011, the Blackhawk school district signed an oil and gas
lease with Oklahoma-based Chesapeake Energy Corp., and while it's unclear when
drilling will start, at some point students may get to see the process first
hand.
After a few pilots, Junior Achievement
officially launched its energy curriculum in the spring. It reached 1,300
students and clocked 100 industry volunteers, some from Range Resources, EQT
Corp., Talisman and Shell, which each contributed $25,000 as sponsors. Chesapeake
Energy, which also provided volunteers, donated $5,000, while FTS
International, a fracking contractor, gave $50,000.”
8. Texas, High Levels of Carbon Disulfide Near Schools
“The
Fort Worth League of Neighborhoods
presented scientific evidence to a group of about 25 parents Thursday that
showed high levels of carbon disulfide found near three FWISD schools.
Carbon
disulfide is a colorless, volatile liquid linked to respiratory,
gastrointestinal and cardiovascular problems. It has not, however, been linked
to cancer.
Testing
found the chemical at gas drilling sites near East Handley Elementary, Dunbar
High School and Burton Hill Elementary.
“It’s
690 feet from my kiddo’s school property. That’s alarming,” said Mary Jane Deben
port, whose two children go to Daggett Montessori in Fort Worth.
What’s more, the scientists found the chemical’s impact went
beyond school boundaries.
“The actual full extent of the plume was in
excess of two miles, so that’s quite extensive,” said Deborah Rogers with
THE Fort Worth League of Neighborhoods.”
http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2011/02/17/harmful-chemical-found-at-drilling-sites-near-3-fwisd-schools/
9. Fracking Linked
to Cancer
“According
to the U.S. Committee on Energy and Commerce, fracking companies used 95
products containing 13 different known and suspected carcinogens between 2005
and 2009 as part of the fracking fluid that is injected in the ground. These
include naphthalene, benzene, and acrylamide. Benzene, which the U.S. EPA has
classified as a Group A, human carcinogen, is released in the fracking process
through air pollution and in the water contaminated by the drilling process.
The Institute of Medicine released a report in December 2011 that links breast
cancer to exposure to benzene.
Up to 37
% of chemicals in fracking fluids have been identified as endocrine-disruptors
-- chemicals that have potential adverse developmental and reproductive
effects. According to the U.S. EPA, exposure to these types of chemicals has
also been implicated in breast cancer.
` Emerging
data points to a problem requiring more study. In the six counties in Texas
which have seen the most concentrated gas drilling, breast cancer rates have risen
significantly, while over the same period the rates for this kind of cancer
have declined elsewhere in the state. Similarly, in western New York, where
traditional gas drilling processes have been used for decades before
hydrofracking came along, has been practiced for nearly two centuries, rural
counties with historically intensive gas industry activity show consistently
higher cancer death rates (PDF) than rural counties without drilling activity.
For women, this includes breast, cervix, colon, endocrine glands, larynx,
ovary, rectal, uterine, and other cancers.
Toxins
linked to Spontaneous Abortion and Birth Defects. Certain compounds, such as
toluene, that are released as gas at the wellhead and also found in water
contaminated by fracking have the potential to harm to pregnant women or women
wishing to become pregnant. According to the U.S. EPA, studies have shown that
toluene can cause an assortment of developmental disorders in children born to
pregnant women that have been exposed to toulene. Pregnant women also carry an
increase risk of spontaneous abortion from exposure to toluene. Wyoming failed
to meet federal standards for air quality due to fumes containing toluene and
benzene in 2009.”
10. PA Gas Production
and Waste Data
(Excerpt)
The Pennsylvania DEP releases unconventional oil and gas
production and waste data twice a year. It is important to note that
both datasets are self-reported from the industry, and there are usually a few
operators who miss the reporting deadline. For that reason, FracTracker
usually waits a week or so to capture the results of the fashionably late.
However, after looking at the data, it is likely that there are still
operators that have not yet reported.
CHART: Unconventional gas production in
Pennsylvania from January to June 2013. All production values are in thousands
of cubic feet (Mcf). Counties with above average production per well are
highlighted in orange.
*Southwestern Energy produced
more than twice as much drill cuttings (128,000 tons) as the next highest operator (Cabot:
50,000 tons)
*Range Resources led the pack
with 172,000 barrels of drilling fluid, with Chevron Appalachia (168,000 barrels) close behind
*PA Gen Energy had the most
flowback fracturing sand reported, with over 8,600 tons, despite having fewer than 100 producing
wells.
*Chevron Appalachia produced the most fracing
fluid waste (934,000 barrels), with Range Resources coming in at number two
(773,000 barrels). This is what
Pennsylvania calls the flowback fluid; this is not the straight chemical additives that used in the hydraulic
fracturing process, but those additives are included in this fluid
*The most produced fluid, or formation brine, came from Range Resources wells (1.6 million barrels), followed
by Chesapeake (1.4 million barrels)
82
percent of the servicing fluid reported was from Cabot (1,741 barrels)
100
percent of the spent lubricant was reported by SWEPI (19 barrels)”
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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