* For articles and updates or to just vent, visit us on facebook;
https://www.facebook.com/groups/MarcellusWestmorelandCountyPA/
* To view past updates, reports, general
information, permanent documents, and meeting
information http://westmorelandmarcellus.blogspot.com/
* Email address: westmcg@gmail.com
* To contact your state
legislator:
For the email address, click on the envelope
under the photo
* For information on PA state gas legislation
and local control: http://pajustpowers.org/aboutthebills.html-
Contributors To Our Updates
Thank you to contributors to our Updates:
Debbie Borowiec, Lou Pochet, Ron Gulla, the Pollocks, Marian Szmyd, Bob Donnan,
April Jackman, Kacey Comini, Elizabeth Donahue, and Bob Schmetzer.
Get Involved ---
Contact People for Local Groups:
Ligonier
Township –Jan Milburn
janjackmil@gmail.com
Penn
Trafford- protectpenntwp@gmail.com
Murrysville- Alyson Sharp alysonsharp@yahoo.com
Hempfield
Twp. - Stephanie at Mt Watershed
stephanie@mtwatershed.com
Calendar
***Grassroots Summit-Mt. Watershed June 12-14
This
year’s 2nd annual Grassroots Summit will be held June 12-14th, 2015 at the
Laurelville Mennonite Church Center in Mount Pleasant for grassroots
organizations and individuals advocating for change on shale gas issues.
The theme of this year’s summit is “Embrace diversity,
discover commonality, achieve solidarity.”
Frack News
Due to the activity in Ligonier Township, I am getting the
Updates sent out less frequently. They are therefore longer- but with many
townships working on the same issues, I want to share the information so we all
have access to what each of us are doing. Jan
***South
Fayette Working on Revisions to Drilling Ordinance
April 24 “Revisions
to the current South Fayette oil and gas well ordinance are underway.
Solicitor
Jon Kamin cited a Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruling as the reason for the
updates.
“The state Supreme Court stated
that drilling is an industrial use. We agree with that characterization,” Mr.
Kamin said. “In terms of classifying the use, drilling should only be permitted
in industrial areas.”
If the revised ordinance is
accepted, it means drilling development, compressor stations and processing
plants would be permitted in only industrial areas. Currently, the ordinance permits drilling development on land zoned
commercial, business, industrial or planned economic development.
Mr.
Kamin distributed the revised ordinance draft April 15 to commissioners. The
board voted 4-1 to forward it to the planning commission.
Commissioner
Jessica Cardillo-Wagenhoffer was opposed. She defended landowners, calling the
proposed changes unfair.
“This
is taking away the rights of property owners to explore the minerals they own
because of how they are zoned,” she said.
Commissioner
Raymond Pitetti wants to find balance between the rights of property owners and
the health and safety of residents.
“I have yet to find a credible long-term
study that clearly proves there are no long-term negative health impacts,” said
Commissioner Lisa Malosh. She said the current ordinance was adopted prior
to any Act 13 legislation and wants to bring it into compliance.
Commissioner
Joseph Horowitz shared a similar sentiment. “It is our duty to bring it into
compliance with the state Supreme Court’s ruling,” he said.
Commissioner
Deron Gabriel
wants to restrict drilling to industrial areas.
“The [Supreme Court] case holds that
industrial activity is not to occur in residential areas, as that would be
incompatible with our requirement to protect the health, safety and welfare of
our residents,” he said.
Every
commissioner made similar statements about protecting the well-being of
residents.
Although
not required to do so, the planners will have a public hearing, Mr. Kamin said.
Another hearing will take place at a commissioners’ meeting before they vote on
the ordinance, he said, adding that he anticipates there will be changes as
part of the process.
“I
am looking forward to hearing the public comments,” said Mr. Horowitz, who
favors drilling in nonresidential locations.
http://www.post-gazette.com/powersource/policy-powersource/2015/04/24/South-Fayette-working-on-revisions-to-drilling-ordinance.html
.
***Middlesex
Case Challenges Zoning That Favors Gas Development
May 18, 2015 |
“Local
rights to zone for oil and gas development in Pennsylvania are being tested by
a Butler County case in which plaintiffs claim a township has acted unconstitutionally by failing to protect residents
from the effects of a sharp increase in industrial activity.
Middlesex
Township, about 35 miles north of Pittsburgh, approved an ordinance in August
last year that allows industrial
development on about 90 percent of its land area, up from about 30 percent
before the ordinance was passed.
The measure has been challenged
by two environmental groups, Clean Air Council and Delaware Riverkeeper
Network, and four township residents, partly on grounds that it violates
citizens’ rights to health and safety under Article 1 of the Pennsylvania
Constitution.
The
plaintiffs also argue that Ordinance 127
violates the state Constitution’s Environmental Rights Amendment, under
which government has a responsibility to maintain environmental quality for its
citizens.
The
challenge, which will be reviewed at the township’s Zoning Hearing Board on
Wednesday, May 27, attempts to build on the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s
landmark Robinson Township ruling in December 2013 that, among other things,
established local responsibility to zone in a way that protects the health and
safety of local residents.
`In
the Robinson ruling, the court ruled as unconstitutional three parts of Act 13,
Pennsylvania’s wide-ranging 2012 gas law, which pre-empted municipalities’
ability to set their own zoning for oil & gas development; required local
ordinances to allow for “reasonable” oil and gas development, and gave gas
companies the right to obtain waivers of state rules designed to keep wells and
rigs a certain distance from natural water sources.
Now,
the Middlesex plaintiffs hope to establish the principle that municipalities
must take residents’ health and safety into account when making industrial
zoning decisions.
“We see it as a logical outgrowth of the
Robinson Township decision, providing opportunities to further develop the Environmental
Rights Amendment jurisprudence and establish that municipalities have a
responsibility to zone for unconventional natural gas development in a manner
that is protective of the health and safety of local residents,” said Aaron
Jacobs-Smith, Philadelphia-based Managing Attorney for the Clean Air Council.
If, as expected, the local zoning
board rejects the plaintiffs’ arguments at its upcoming meeting, Jacobs-Smith
said he expects the case to be appealed to the Butler County Court of Common
Pleas, and then to the Commonwealth Court.
Township
manager Eric Kaunert declined to comment, and referred an inquiry to the
township’s attorney, Mike Hnath, who did not return two phone calls seeking
comment.
Crystal Yost, a township
resident, said she supports the lawsuit because the new zoning allows a
compressor station to be built on a site about 1,000 feet from her home. Yost
said she was unaware of any plan for such a plant but fears she and her three
children could be exposed to noise and pollution if it is built.
She
also fears that a nearby compressor station would erode the value of her
property.
“If
I do find out they are going to put one in, I don’t want to live here,” she
said. “So will I be able to sell my house then? Will someone want to buy my
house?”
Plaintiff
David Denk, who lives with his wife and two daughters less than a mile from a
potential well pad, said that in considering the effects of gas-well
development near his home, he is most concerned with the possibility of air pollution and explosions.
“I
understand that the risk is relatively low, but when it comes to the safety of
my kids I don’t see why any risk is acceptable,” he said. “I live just over
1,000 feet downwind of a proposed well pad and my kids attend the Mars Area School District which is
approximately half a mile from the well pad. This means that my kids will be exposed to
these hazards 24/7, which is not acceptable to me.”
If the courts uphold the township’s zoning
change, Denk said he and his wife will consider moving away from the township
where they had expected to live permanently.
“I
still can’t understand why township officials, or anyone for that matter, would
think that allowing dangerous industrial activity immediately adjacent to
schools and heavily populated housing communities is considered responsible
zoning,” he said. “It’s not.”
The plaintiffs note that all
three township supervisors and all four members of the Zoning Hearing Board
have leases with gas companies, and stand to gain financially from the zoning
change.
“If
the ordinance takes effect, those leased lands stand to benefit,” Jacobs-Smith
said.
Butler County documents show that three zoning board members signed leases
with R.E. Gas Development, the parent of Rex Energy, between 2010 and 2012, and
that one signed with Huntley & Huntley Energy Exploration in 2013. The
three township supervisors signed leases between 2008 and 2014.
None of the supervisors returned a phone call
to the township seeking comment.
In their 64-page complaint, presented to the
Zoning Hearing Board last October, the plaintiffs argue that the ordinance allows gas development in
areas previously zoned for residential, agricultural, and commercial uses.
“The
ordinance injects industrial uses into non-industrial zones…upending
established expectations, conflicting with the very purposes of the
non-industrial districts, and making the districts themselves irrational,” the
complaint says.
It cites five zones where oil and gas
development was previously banned but where it may now take place.
In
three of the areas, zoned for residential and/or agricultural use, the
township’s board of supervisors made no provision for public hearings from any
residents who might object to the changes, the case says.
It claims the township has
created a “false equivalency” between oil and gas development and
non-industrial land use. “In sum, the township has premised the changes to its zoning on the
unexamined and erroneous assumption that industrial shale-gas development is as
innocuous as a single-family home,” the document says.
The
threat to the local environment is illustrated by development of a well pad on
a previously residential/agricultural parcel in the town of Mars where Rex
Energy has obtained state and local permits to drill and operate six wells, the
complaint said.
The company did not return a phone call
seeking comment.
Elsewhere
in western Pennsylvania, challenges to zoning ordinances have been brought
against Pulaski Township in Beaver County; Allegheny Township in Westmoreland
County, and against Robinson Township,
which recently elected a board of supervisors who are more friendly to the gas
industry than their predecessors who successfully challenged Act 13,
Jacobs-Smith said.
He argued that the
Middlesex challenge is further advanced than the others and so is being watched
as an indicator of whether zoning ordinances will be able to control oil and
gas development statewide.
In a reply brief to
Rex Energy and the township on May 8 this year, the plaintiffs argue that the
township has a legal duty to protect residents’ “health, safety, morals and
general welfare,” which they say would be endangered by more oil and gas
development.
People
living near unconventional natural gas development are at increased risk of
health problems ranging from birth defects to cancer, the plaintiffs argue, and townships have a
responsibility to protect their residents from those effects. Supervisors may
not violate residents’ constitutional right to health and safety any more than
they may violate their right to bear arms, the plaintiffs say.
They accuse
supervisors of ignoring the health concerns of its citizens in the zoning
decision.
The township’s proposed findings barely mention health and in fact ask
the board to believe that public health is not even “relevant to the issues
pending before the ZHB,” the document says.
http://stateimpact.npr.org/pennsylvania/2015/05/18/case-challenges-townships-right-to-change-zoning-in-favor-of-gas-development/
***MarkWest
Grants Cecil 30-day Extension
Judge
Anne Covey writes that the compressor is unlikely to trigger air related health
problems
“Christopher L. Rimkus,
managing counsel for MarkWest, who proposed the construction of a natural gas
compressor station in the township in November 2010, let the zoning hearing
board off the hook by granting them a 30-day extension to grant a special
exception.
After
the state Supreme Court’s refusal to hear an appeal in April, the zoning board
was prepared to grant the exception.
“Be advised, we do have a court order saying
we must grant this,” said chairman George Augustine
at the onset of the meeting. “It’s over.”
After almost
five years of lawsuits and court hearings, it did appear to be over for those
who vehemently oppose the construction of the facility. The extension by
MarkWest likely will not prevent the compressor station from being built, but
will give the board more time to compile a list of terms and conditions.
The board denied MarkWest’s request in
March 2011, saying it was not in the same character as other permitted uses in
Cecil’s light industrial district.
MarkWest
filed an appeal in April 2011. Washington County Court affirmed the zoning
hearing board’s decision in January 2013.
MarkWest
and Range Resources, acting as property owner or tenant, again appealed, which
led to the September 2014 Commonwealth Court decision that stated the board
erred in its denial.
The board wrote the facility
would cause carcinogenic materials and other hazards to be expelled into the
air, “creating a greater hazard than the emissions from the manufacturing uses
permitted by right in the I-1 District.”
In
the Commonwealth Court decision, Judge Anne E. Covey wrote MarkWest provided documentation indicating
the DEP found the facility was “unlikely to trigger air-related health issues.”
Many of the approximately 100
residents in attendance Monday were skeptical the plant would not give off
harmful emissions. Other concerns included proximity to Cecil Intermediate
School, noise, truck traffic and decreased property values.
Jonathan
Kamin, an attorney representing about six Cecil residents, outlined 25
conditions he and his clients believe should be placed on the facility, including electric engines, air and water
studies and a noise limit.
“This
is your one chance to get it right,” he said to the board.
Board
attorney Jeffrey D. Ries stressed to residents the board can only impose
conditions that are compliant with the township’s unified development ordinance
and that were originally discussed during the three public hearings held in
2011.
The site of the proposed
facility, which would include up to eight engines and sound structures, piping,
dehydration facilities, tanks and a vapor recovery unit, is located about a
half-mile north of the intersection of Route 980 and Route 50.
“Hopefully,
MarkWest will do the right thing to minimize their impact,” said Kamin after
the extension was granted.
A
zoning hearing board meeting is scheduled for 7 p.m. June 15.
http://www.observer-reporter.com/article/20150518/NEWS01/150519446
***Anne
Covey Who Ruled In Favor Of Act 13 Makes Republican
Ticket
Anne Covey is now a Republican nominee
on November's election for PA Supreme Court, even though in 2013 as a
commonwealth court judge she ruled in favor of Act 13 (a decision overturned by
the PA Supreme Court in 2013). Here's how she's recently been diminishing local control via zoning and
the consequences Cecil now has to deal with:
In Sep 2014, she overturned Cecil
Twp commissioners' denial of a permit for a proposed compressor station and now
Cecil has no choice but to ask for some conditions and allow the compressor
station:
"The
board denied MarkWest’s request in March 2011, saying it was not in the same
character as other permitted uses in Cecil’s light industrial district.
MarkWest filed an appeal in April 2011.
Washington County Court affirmed the zoning hearing board’s decision in January
2013.
MarkWest
and Range Resources, acting as property owner or tenant, again appealed, which
led to the September 2014 Commonwealth Court decision that stated the board
erred in its denial.
The
board wrote the facility would cause carcinogenic materials and other hazards
to be expelled into the air, 'creating a greater hazard than the emissions from
the manufacturing uses permitted by right in the I-1 District.'
In
the Commonwealth Court decision, Judge Anne E. Covey wrote MarkWest provided
documentation indicating the DEP found the facility was 'unlikely to trigger
air-related health issues.'"
www.observer-reporter.com/article/20150518/NEWS01/150519446
MarkWest grants Cecil 30-day extension
***Penn Twp
Baseline Testing
Baseline testing (pre-drilling)
of the levels of methane at 5 sites will be done as part of a PixController/CSE
partnership. This technology also allows for constant air monitoring of
methane.
***Penn
Twp-Apex Site
From Alyson Holt
“IMPORTANT
update on Quest from the front page of Penn-Franklin which reports that Penn Township will only allow drilling on
the Apex site to proceed when the current legal appeal is resolved. Very
good and reasonable step by their commissioners.
The
approval came with conditions. "Perhaps the most important is the one that
stipulates they must show evidence of
compliance with the township's zoning code before they can proceed. This
includes the expiration of any and all appeal periods related to the zoning
hearing board decision handed down April 14.
In
other words, the appeal currently in court must first be resolved."
"In addressing the issue prior to the
vote, Leslie Mlakar, township solicitor,
said issuance of a permit is not considered compliance as long as it is under
appeal. 'The commissioners can set reasonable requirements and this is a
reasonable requirement,' Mlakar stated."
"If you allow them (Apex) to
proceed and the appeal is pending, they could have a well drilled and producing
before the appeal is decided," said Mlakar.”
***Penn
Twp. Adds Conditions to 2 Proposed Gas Well Sites
“Apex
Energy has spent the last several months pursuing gas well sites in Penn
Township, and after Monday's township commissioners meeting, the company will
have to wait a little longer.
Commissioners unanimously
approved a resolution that requires Apex to meet additional conditions before
the company can begin drilling within the township. This reverses an April 9
decision by the township zoning board, which had given Apex the go-ahead to
begin construction on two unconventional gas wells near the William Penn
nursing home and senior residence off Walton Road.
Residents group Project PT filed
an appeal on April 27 in Common Pleas Court requesting that the zoning board's
decision be vacated and requiring Apex to submit a site-specific emergency
response plan, air-quality modeling and hydrogeological studies before
beginning construction.
On
Monday, Dan Begg spoke at the meeting to speak on behalf of Project PT. Begg
urged commissioners to pass the resolution.
He
was followed by two Apex attorneys, Robert Wratcher and Jeff Wilhelm. Both
asked the commissioners to reject the resolution, stating that Apex already had
fulfilled the zoning hearing board's requirements.
“The
courts have the ability to stop us if they want to,” Wratcher said. “The only
body that should be able to stop us at this point is the court, not the
township.”
Wilhelm,
a land-use litigator at Reed Smith, echoed Wratcher's comments. He said the
township was violating the planning code and could be deemed liable for any
delays to the project.
“If
you impose a stay, you may be damaging a client,” Wilhelm said. “I would point
out that there may be damages to a client, and so in addition to the fact that
it might be an illegal condition, it may be opening up this township for
liability.”
When
it came time for the commissioners to make a decision, township solicitor Les
Mlakar advised the board to approve the resolution. Mlaker argued that the
township was within its rights to establish additional regulations and that
Apex had the obligation to fulfill these new requirements. Mlakar noted that
the conditions received approval from the zoning board's solicitor.
“The threat of a damage action by
the township should be ignored,” Mlakar said. “I don't believe that because
somebody threatens you with a lawsuit that you should cower and not follow the
dictates of our ordinance.”
Mlakar said
that if the commissioners allowed Apex to proceed, there would be a chance that
the wells would be drilled and producing before the court decides on Project
PT's appeal, which could leave Penn Township with illegal gas wells.
He
also went on to say that if the commissioners tabled the issue, the 90 days
since the application was filed would expire, and Apex would be given approval
without the conditions.”
http://triblive.com/neighborhoods/yourpenntrafford/yourpenntraffordmore/8399347-74/township-apex-commissioners#ixzz3apcC2LBE
***Texas
Bans Fracking Bans
“The
Texas state legislature voted to ban fracking bans. Ever since the people of
Denton, Texas voted to ban fracking last November, state lawmakers in cahoots
with the oil and gas industry and the American Legislative Exchange Council, or
ALEC, have attempted to strip
municipalities like Denton of home rule authority to override the city’s ban.
Approved
by the Texas House and Senate, the bill banning fracking bans is expected to be
signed by Governor Greg Abbott.
In
response, citizens banded together to form Frack Free Denton to fight for home
rule. The group has put together a powerful film,, documenting their fight to
ban fracking within city limits in the heart of oil and gas country. The vote
comes despite recent findings by a team of researchers from Southern Methodist
University that linked the earthquakes in one area of Texas, which did not have
earthquakes prior to the fracking boom..
…..“The bill would provide what’s called state
preemption and that is state law here would trump anything that local
jurisdictions, cities and towns pass,” says Trang.
A
similar bill, in Oklahoma, passed one chamber. “The sponsor of that bill said
he wants to ‘get ahead of what we’re seeing in other states,'” reports Trang.
Ryssdal asks if there is a group
connecting all these state lawmakers. Trang’s response? You guessed it: ALEC.”
***Wake
Up & Smell The Coffee
Bob
Donnan
“Simple
Formula:
More wells =
More compressor stations = More air pollution
We now realize those early
Marcellus Shale compressor stations in Washington County, which averaged 6,000
to 7,000 compression horsepower, were the smaller compact size, even though
some of them grew in size from two to five compressors. Here is a look at the
Fulton Compressor Station near Hickory:
Three of the latest compressor stations
built by Colorado-based Markwest in our county are the new JUMBO models! Enter the new shale age of 18,000 to 19,000
compression horsepower models, 3-times the size of their predecessors!!!”
***Denmark
Suspends Fracking Over Unauthorized Chemical
Defoamer
“Denmark
has suspended the first exploratory drilling for shale gas which lasted only
one day after it discovered that French gas-giant Total, in charge of the
project, had used “unauthorized” chemicals.
"They used a product that was not part of
those authorized" for the procedure, Ture Falbe-Hansen, a Danish
Energy Agency spokesman told AFP.
The type of
defoamer known as Null Foam is used in fracking to extract shale gas and is
considered hazardous to the environment, according to Danish public broadcaster
DR.
Environmental
committee chairman of Frederikshavn Council Anders Brandt Sørensen said Total’s
use of the non-approved product “makes [him] very mad”.
“We will simply not accept this kind of
violation of our EIA [environmental impact assessment],” he told broadcaster
DR.
http://rt.com/news/256229-denmark-fracking-chemicals-total/
***Gas
Industry’s Campaign Donations Rose 47% in 2013- 2014
"The biggest spender on lobbying was Range
Resources Appalachia, which spent some $3.8 million between 2011
and 2014. Range, which has the largest number of active wells on the top-20
list, was the fourth-largest donor of campaign gifts, with a total of $242,985
during the period, the report said."
Pennsylvania’s natural gas
industry donated 47% more to state political campaigns in 2013-14 than it did
two years earlier in an effort to weaken regulations and minimize taxation,
according to a new report from Common Cause Pennsylvania.
The
advocacy organization issued an updated report on , showing that the industry spent $2.8 million on political
campaigns in the latest period, and
increased its lobbying expenditure by $2.1 million to $17.9 million.
Of the lobbying total, $12.9
million was paid by the 20 companies with the largest number of environmental
violations between 2011 and 2014. Those companies also spent $2.1 million on campaign
gifts, the report said, citing data for that part of the report from the
nonprofit Environment America Research & Policy Center.
Cabot Oil & Gas, the dominant operator
in Susquehanna County, topped the list with 265 violations over the period,
spending $575,913 on lobbying and $58,614 in campaign contributions,
according to the Common Cause report, titled Marcellus Money.
Neither Cabot, nor Range, responded to
requests for comment.
Former Republican Governor Tom Corbett
attracted almost $795,000 in campaign contributions from the gas industry in
2013-14, the report said. It accused Corbett of giving away the state’s natural
resources by signing the wide-ranging Act 13 which allowed energy companies to
continue to operate without a severance tax on gas production, which is levied
by all other gas-producing states.
By successfully lobbying for an
impact fee rather than a severance tax, the industry has paid between $200
million and $300 million a year based on its gas production, or less than half
of the $600 million to $800 million that would have been raised by a 5%
severance tax,
the report said, citing research by the Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center.
“The
consistently high levels of gas industry investment in political contributions
and lobbying should worry all Pennsylvanians,” said Barry Kauffman, executive
director of Common Cause PA. “These political investments were made for a
purpose – to ensure the industry could hold sway over public policies and
government officials.”
The
report, which was based on data from the Pennsylvania Department of State, also
published details on the amounts donated to state lawmakers. They include State
Rep. Brian Ellis, a Republican sponsor of Act 13, who received $62,650 from the
industry between 2007 and 2014, and Rep. Jeff Pyle, also Republican, who was
paid $97,868 over the period.
In
2013-2014, the industry donated some
$2.2 million to 197 Republican candidates and PACs compared with about $520,000
to 127 Democratic candidates and PACs, the report said.
Current
Governor Tom Wolf, a Democrat, received $59,500 in campaign contributions from
the gas industry in 2013-14, while his chief of staff, Katie McGinty, received
$72,500, the report said. “
***Fracking Chemicals Detected in Pennsylvania Drinking Water
“An analysis of drinking
water sampled from three homes in Bradford County, Pa., revealed traces of a
compound commonly found in Marcellus Shale drilling fluids. The paper, was published
in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Dr. Brantley said her team believed that the well contaminants came from either a documented surface tank
leak in 2009 or, more likely, as a result of poor drilling well integrity.
The nearby gas wells, which were established in 2009,
were constructed with a protective intermediate casing of steel and cement from
the surface down to almost 1,000 feet.
But the wells below that depth lacked the protective casing, and were
potentially at greater risk of leaking their contents into the surrounding rock
layers, according to Dr. Brantley.
In April 2011 the three homeowners in Bradford County
sued the drilling company, Chesapeake Energy Corporation, over reports of
finding natural gas and sediment in their drinking well water. In May of that
year, the Pennsylvania DEP cited the oil
and gas company for violating the Pennsylvania Oil and Gas Act and Clean
Streams Law by letting natural gas enter the drinking wells, though the company
admitted no fault. In 2012, the homeowners settled the lawsuit and the
company bought the three households.
As a result of that suit, the DEP recommended that the
drilling company require that their wells extend what are known as intermediate
casings beyond 1,000 feet.
Dr. Brantley described the geology in northern
Pennsylvania as being similar to a layer cake with numerous layers that extend
down thousands of feet to the Marcellus Shale. The vertical fractures are like knife cuts through the layers. They can
extend deep underground, and can act like superhighways for escaped gas and
liquids from drill wells to travel along, for distances greater than a mile
away, she said.
Garth
T. Llewellyn, a hydrogeologist with Appalachia Hydrogeologic and Environmental
Consulting and the lead author of the report, said that when his team sampled
water wells that were farther away from the drilling sites, they did not find
any of the compounds found in the three households. “When you include all of
the lines of evidence, it concludes that that’s the most probable source,” he
said.
Victor
Heilweil, a hydrogeologist from the University of Utah who was not involved
with the study but reviewed its details, said it was noteworthy for showing “the detailed
geologic fabric explaining how these contaminants can move relatively long
distances from the depth to the drinking well.”
An
environmental scientist from Stanford University, Rob Jackson, who also
reviewed the paper, said it “clearly shows an impact of oil and gas drilling on
water quality.” But he emphasized that this instance was an exception.
Study Links Foam In Water Wells to Shale Well Sites
“White foam in northeastern Pennsylvania water wells likely
was caused by Marcellus gas well sites that have already been blamed for
causing natural gas to infiltrate residential water supplies, a paper published
by the journal Proceedings of the
National Academy of Sciences reported .
Environmental consultant Garth Llewellyn and researchers
with Penn State University used a novel method to identify low levels of
organic compounds that they said likely explain foaming from three water wells
in Bradford County between 2010 and 2012. Test
results from commercial laboratories during investigations at the sites had not
picked up on what was causing the foaming — they reported no unsafe levels of
compounds other than natural gas in the water, while other compounds, like
glycols and surfactants, had appeared inconsistently or at barely detectable
levels.
The same or similar organic compounds that the
researchers traced in the water,
including 2-n-Butoxyethanol, or 2-BE, are known to be used in drilling and
hydraulic fracturing additives or to appear in waste fluids from oil and gas
operations.
The researchers said it is impossible to “prove
unambiguously” that the contaminants in the water came from shale gas-related
activities because they were unable to secure samples of fluids that were used
at or near the well site. But they said that multiple strands of evidence,
including timing, well construction problems and the presence of matching
compounds in both shale fluids and the water wells, make shale activity “the
most probable source.”
The researchers do not suspect that fracking chemicals
traveled upwards from the Marcellus Shale. Rather they said the most likely explanation is that the compounds were
driven about 1 to 3 kilometers along natural underground fractures to the
aquifer. The trigger might have been
drilling, fracking or the leaking pit, the researchers said, but a
particular point of weakness identified was an uncased section of the well deeper than 300 meters underground that
intersected with an existing fault.
Pennsylvania regulators have since strengthened drilling
rules to require additional strings of cemented steel casing in shale gas well
bores to keep gas and fluids from escaping.
Mr. Llewellyn, the
paper’s lead author, and his firm Appalachia Hydrogeologic and
Environmental Consulting, provided litigation support and environmental
consulting services to the impacted households, the paper disclosed.
Mr. Llewellyn said that the state’s investigation and the
private case focused on natural gas contamination, but he remained puzzled by
the foam, which he likened to dishwashing suds.
Penn State researchers
used a tool called 2D gas chromatography coupled to time-of-flight mass spectrometry,
which allowed them to identify classes of contaminants, like hydrocarbons,
without pinpointing individual chemicals one by one.
The researchers said their results raise questions about the sufficiency
of conventional analytical techniques to explain water impacts in some cases.
Normally, very low
detections of compounds could be dismissed, but the persistent foam indicated
something was wrong, Penn State geosciences professor Susan Brantley said.
The study is not the only
time shale gas activity has been implicated in causing thick suds in drinking
water or groundwater in the state.
Last May, the DEP found 2-BE and other chemicals in a Susquehanna County water well after a
resident complained of rank, foamy water. DEP said the chemicals were consistent with the surfactant Air Foam that was
used to drill a natural gas well 1,500 feet away.”
In 2011, DEP fined Pennsylvania General Energy Co.
$28,960 for discharging Airfoam HD from a Marcellus Shale well bore to a spring
and into Pine Creek in Lycoming County.
***PAH Pollution from Frack Operations
Environmental Science & Technology's-Kim Anderson
“People living or
working near active natural gas wells may be exposed to certain pollutants at
higher levels than the EPA considers safe for lifetime exposure, according
to scientists from Oregon State University and the University of Cincinnati.
The researchers found that hydraulic fracturing emits pollutants known as PAHs (polycyclic
aromatic hydrocarbons), including some that are linked with increased risk of
cancer and respiratory ailments. The rural area Carroll Ohio has more than one active well site per square mile.
"Air pollution from fracking operations may pose an
under-recognized health hazard to people living near them," said the
study's coauthor Kim Anderson, an environmental chemist with OSU's College of
Agricultural Sciences.
The study, appears in the journal Environmental Science & Technology. Haynes got in touch with Anderson and Kincl, and
together they designed the study to include citizen participation. They placed air samplers on the properties
of 23 volunteers living or working at sites ranging from right next to a gas
well to a little more than three miles away.
The samplers picked up high levels of PAHs across the
study area. Levels were highest closest
to the wells and decreased by about 30 percent with distance.
Even the lowest levels
-- detected on sites more than a mile away from a well -- were higher than
previous researchers had found in downtown Chicago and near a Belgian oil
refinery. They were about 10 times higher than in a rural Michigan area with no
natural gas wells.
By looking at the ratios of individual PAHs detected by
the samplers, Anderson and her team were able to discern whether they came
directly from Earth -- a "petrogenic" source -- or from
"pyrogenic" sources like the burning of fossil fuels. The proportion
of petrogenic PAHs in the mix was highest nearer the wells and decreased with
distance.
The team also accounted for the influences of wood smoke
and vehicle exhaust, common sources of airborne pyrogenic PAHs. Wood smoke was
consistent across the sampling area, supporting the conclusion that the gas
wells were contributing to the higher PAH levels.
The researchers then used a standard calculation to
determine the additional cancer risk posed by airborne contaminants over a
range of scenarios. For the worst-case scenario (exposure 24 hours a day over
25 years), they found that a person anywhere in the study area would be exposed
at a risk level exceeding the threshold of what the EPA deems acceptable.
The highest-risk areas were
those nearest the wells, Anderson said. Areas more than a mile away posed about
30 percent less risk.
Anderson cautioned that these numbers are worst-case
estimates and can't predict the risk to any particular individual. "Actual
risk would depend heavily on exposure time, exposure frequency and proximity to
a natural gas well," she said.
"We made these calculations to put our findings in
context with other, similar risk assessments and to compare the levels we found
with the EPA's acceptable risk level."
The study has other caveats, Anderson said, the main one
being the small number of non-random samples used. In addition, findings aren't
necessarily applicable to other gas-producing areas, because PAH emissions are influenced by extraction
techniques and by underlying geology.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150513093611.htm
***DEP
Must Enact Strong Standards To Regulate Methane
Letter to the Editor
April 29, 2015
I
was not surprised to learn that emissions from Pennsylvania’s under-regulated
gas industry are on the rise (“Pennsylvania DEP Says Emissions Increased From
Expanding Natural Gas Industry,” April 20). For years drillers have been coming
to Pennsylvania in droves to take advantage of our state’s rich shale play
knowing that rules requiring operators to manage their air pollution are few
and far between.
It’s no surprise that the American Lung
Association repeatedly ranks Pennsylvania’s drilling counties among the lowest
in the state in terms of air quality.
But
I was puzzled by the assertion that methane pollution is decreasing as a result
of “strong state-based regulations,” according to the Marcellus Shale Coalition
president. There are no rules in
Pennsylvania that directly target methane pollution, yet the PG quotes a
pro-gas lobbyist as saying they are delivering “meaningful environmental
results.”
The fact is the only entity
keeping an eye on methane pollution is the EPA, not our DEP and certainly not
the drillers themselves. In fact in areas where EPA does not require emission
reductions, methane pollution actually increased.
We can’t trust drillers to
voluntarily take control of the methane pollution; we need DEP to enact strong
methane standards to cut harmful air pollution from the oil and gas industry.
JENNY LISAK
Punxsutawney, Pa.
***Health,
Safety, Trust-
Letter
To Editor
May 4, 2015 12:00 AM
http://www.post-gazette.com/opinion/letters/2015/05/04/Health-safety-trust/stories/201505040037
Recently,
as a parent and advocate for my children and children across Pennsylvania, I
spoke at a public hearing to report on mounting peer-reviewed research pertaining
to unconventional gas drilling (“Members Representing Public Interest to Remain
on Pennsylvania Oil and Gas Board,” April 23).
Because research concludes
harmful health effects and safety impacts are within a two-mile radius of
drilling sites, scientific-based regulations are imperative. All stages of drilling
operations, which are not confined to industrial areas, emit toxic air
pollutants that impact community health. Furthermore, incidents and accidents
related to drilling continue to require up to a two-mile evacuation zone.
Although
new regulations are proposed, and now include schools, they are unfortunately
inadequate and have no scientific basis.
Alarmingly absent from proposed
regulations is methane. This potent greenhouse gas permeates from thousands of existing well
sites, the continued development and the sprawling pervasive infrastructure.
Immediate regulations are essential for the
commonwealth.
Scientific
and comprehensive drilling regulations are fundamental. Protection for our children
and a safe and healthy environment are paramount. The proposed revisions to the
state’s oil and gas regulations under Pennsylvania Code Chapter 78 are a
positive beginning, but Pennsylvania leaders must do more to protect our health
and safety. Utilize the research and data to make sound scientific-based
regulations and heed the warnings of those most affected to restore community
trust. Our leaders may be able to live with compromise, but future generations
cannot.
AMY NASSIF
Mars Parent Group
***Marcellus Waste Radioactivity In Water Leaching From Landfills-WVA
From 2014
CHARLESTON, W.Va. - Tests
show that wastewater from gas field landfills contains radioactivity. That is raising concerns about the disposal of
Marcellus Shale drill cuttings.
Bill Hughes, chair, Wetzel County Solid Waste Authority,
said tests on water leaching from the
Meadowfill landfill near Bridgeport show widely varying levels of
radioactivity, sometimes spiking to 40
times the clean drinking water standard. The radioactivity occurs naturally
in the drill cuttings and brine that comes from Marcellus gas wells, he said,
so it is in the waste dumped in Meadowfill and other landfills.
"We are
putting radioactive waste in a bunch of landfills in large quantities, and we
don't yet know the long-term danger of doing this," Hughes said.
Water leaching from Meadowfill averaged 250 picocuries
per liter last year. The clean drinking water standard is 50, Hughes explained,
adding that at times Meadowfill spiked as high as 2,000 picocuries or dropped
below 40. Wetzel - the other landfill taking large amounts of the waste - also
showed radioactivity.
The drinking water
standards are probably too tight to use on fluids leaching from a landfill, he
said, but the solid waste authority is defaulting to the tougher standard,
simply because the county is not set up to deal with radioactive waste in
municipal garbage dumps.
According to the West Virginia Department of
Environmental Protection, landfills are a safe and appropriate place to put the
drill cuttings.
Hughes said the entire
process shows that the state is playing catch-up to a big, rapidly moving
industry.
"We haven't
normally been putting radioactive material in a municipal waste landfill. We're
not set up to process, handle, test, dispose. We don't know what we're
doing," Hughes warned.
Concerns about radioactive drill cuttings have prompted
state lawmakers to increase monitoring - See more at:
http://www.publicnewsservice.org/2014-04-21/environment/marcellus-waste-radioactivity-in-water-leaching-from-landfills/a38864-1#sthash.Ejg7gNqD.dpuf
***DEP Wants 'Significant' Sunoco Fine For Drilling Mud Spills
“The DEP is negotiating a
"significant" fine with Sunoco Pipeline for thousands of gallons of
drilling clay that a subcontractor spilled into several western Pennsylvania
creeks.
Poister says DEP officials are seeking the
fine for erosion problems, and alleged failure to control the bentonite mud
spills on a 53-mile natural gas pipeline that crosses Washington and
Westmoreland counties.
About 5,300 gallons of the nontoxic mud
leaked into Little Mingo Creek in Union Township, Washington County, on Sept.
18. It can kill fish if enough of it enters a waterway.
The
fines also pertain to five other inadvertent mud spills that Poister calls
"obvious clean stream violations."
http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20150421_ap_59761b99b9b944f79f8e954a16f3ef27.html#LvlXc4JZivOeKtb0.99
***Toxic Vapors Kill Oil Gas Workers
(You can hear Mac Sawyer- truck driver- talk about health
problems and the frack industry https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSvMhmF4Myw)
“……But his March 2014 death soon became part of a mysterious puzzle that the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention is piecing together along with eight other oil field deaths over the past five years.
All of the fatalities occurred at crude oil production tanks, and all the
victims were either working alone or weren't being observed by anyone. Most of
the death certificates listed natural causes or heart failure as the cause.
By late
April, federal health officials had enough evidence to sound a national alarm
over a dangerous trend in America's oil fields. The men died after inhaling toxic amounts of hydrocarbon chemicals
after either tank gauging — measuring the level of oil or other byproducts in
tanks coming out of wells — or from taking samples of oil for more testing.
The exposure
happens when hatches on production tanks are opened manually and a plume of
hydrocarbon gases and vapors are released under high pressure. The gases and
vapors can include benzene, a carcinogen, as well as hydrocarbons like ethane,
propane and butane.
Besides explosions and
asphyxiation, high concentrations of hydrocarbons can cause disorientation and,
in some cases, sudden death.
"Just breathing in
these chemicals at the right amount can kill," said Robert Harrison, an
occupational medicine physician at the University of California, San Francisco.
Harrison said medical
examiners can sometimes miss signs of toxic inhalation during a routine
autopsy, which is why some of the victims were thought to have died from
natural causes.
"It's important that
coroners run the right toxicology tests for those chemicals emitted from the
tanks," said Harrison.
According to the CDC,
inhalation victims can suffer cardiac arrhythmia — or irregular heartbeat — and
have problems in getting enough oxygen. Exposure can also cause inadequate
ventilation of the lungs.
The CDC and the National
Institute for Occupational Safety and Health signaled the hazards of tank
gauging this spring. They, along with the oil and gas industry, recently issued
recommendations to companies to limit exposure to hydrocarbons.
The recommendations include
providing training of the proper use of respiratory protection and implementing
engineering controls, including remote gauging and venting.
"We will do everything we can to get this
information out as quickly as possible," said Kenny Jordan, executive
director of the Association of Energy Service Companies.
The sudden hike in tank gauging deaths could be linked to
the explosive growth of the oil and gas industry in the United States, which
brought in younger, inexperienced workers, Jordan said.”
http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_28136543/colorado-oil-and-gas-workers-fell-victim-little
***Pipeline Critics Warn of Health Problems-Chronic Leaks
NY
“Three years ago, federal regulators declared that a $43
million natural-gas compressor station proposed for Minisink wouldn't have a
significant impact on humans.
The compressor station was built a year
and a half ago. Now Pramilla Malick, a weekend resident of Minisink and one of
hundreds who opposed the plan, says their fears are being realized. In March
2012, a 78-page report prepared by the staff of the Federal Energy Regulatory
Commission (FERC) found the project "with appropriate mitigation, would
not constitute a major federal action significantly affecting the quality of
the human environment."
Malick, who at the time
called FERC's assessment "completely inadequate," says her
experiences since have reinforced that judgment.
Malick’s house is three-eighths of a mile from the Minisink compressor built by
Millennium Pipeline. She planned to have an organic garden, but she says she
only visits Minisink occasionally now because of maladies that afflict her and
her family there since the compressor began operation.
Malick
says she has asthma attacks, and her adolescent daughter gets gushing
nosebleeds. She says she and her daughter only have symptoms in Minisink, not
where they live in Manhattan.
She says the same symptoms simultaneously began troubling some of her neighbors,
along with rashes, neurological, and gastrointestinal problems.
Malick said several families have left;
and others are now trying to sell their houses.
“We hoped to make compressor dangers
known and jar some action, but they’re fed up and want to leave,” Malick said.
“I’m getting close. If the CPV power plant is built in Wawayanda, there’s no way
I’ll stay.”
Malick and members of the activist group
Protect Orange County are trying to
organize opposition to the 640-megawatt Competitive Power Ventures gas power
plant planned for Wawayanda. While the $900 million project has support
from town and county officials, CPV has yet to attain a power purchase
agreement from the New York Power Authority.
In a presentation she gave before about
100 people at the Slate Hill Senior Center recently, Malick said power plants such as the one CPV plans
to build have created public health problems elsewhere. The plant would include a gas compressor and produce the same emissions
as Minisink’s compressor, but many times more, according to environmental
scientist Wilma Subra, who consulted with Malick’s group.
“What worries me is not the nosebleeds,
but rather the long-term implications and the cause,” Malick said.
Pipeline foes rally in Albany
With energy companies seeking to move
gas from a hydrofracking boom in Pennsylvania to the Northeast for sale and
potential export, opponents of the
expanding network of natural gas pipelines went to Albany on April 27 to warn
that chronic pollution leaks from the pipes would threaten public health.
Malick was a member of that contingent.
Opponents
from 21 counties urged the state to delay air pollution permit approvals for
hundreds of miles of new high-pressure pipes until after conducting a
comprehensive health study of potential risks to people who would live near the
projects.
"The most urgent problem in New York
right now is the expansion of pipelines bringing Pennsylvania natural gas
across New York to New England," said David Carpenter, director of the
Institute for Health and the Environment at the University at Albany
Pipelines require high-powered compressor
stations every 30 to 50 miles to keep gas flowing. Carpenter said studies in
other states have shown compressor stations leak dangerous gases, like
formaldehyde, a known human carcinogen, at higher rates than gas fracking
wells.
Unsafe
emissions can occur up to a mile or more from the stations or other parts of
pipeline infrastructure such as metering and regulating stations, Carpenter
said. Such pipeline components also leak
methane, which can convert to formaldehyde when exposed to sunlight, he
added.
Studies in other states are suggesting that people near pipelines
suffer more health problems. Some pipeline neighbors experience symptoms
like sudden nosebleeds, because breathing in formaldehyde is like
"pickling your nose," Carpenter said.
Currently, air pollution emissions from
natural gas pipelines are reported by energy companies, which project emissions
based on formulas, but do not conduct
continuous emissions testing.
Carpenter and pipeline opponents urged
the state to begin a health study of people who live near current pipelines,
and to gather air quality samples from areas where new pipelines are proposed,
so that if projects are completed potential changes in air quality could be
calculated.
"'We can't breathe, and our lives
matter,” Malick said at the press conference. “We should not be turning large
portions of our state into sacrifice zones."
http://www.recordonline.com/article/20150508/NEWS/150509512/-1/RSS777
***Why NY Banned Fracking? The Official Report Is Now Public
May 15 2015
“The massive study
finds that health, safety and environmental uncertainties regarding fracking's
dangers have 'grown worse over time.'
New York issued its long-awaited environmental assessment
of fracking detailing a wide range of health and climate concerns that
underpinned Governor Andrew Cuomo's decision last December to impose a
statewide ban on the practice.
High-volume hydraulic fracturing "raises new,
significant, adverse impacts not studied" in the state's last major
analysis of oil and gas development in 1992, the 2,000-page report concludes.
The negative effects that fracking could bring to the state include:
— Air impacts that could
affect respiratory health due to increased levels of particulate matter, diesel
exhaust or volatile organic chemicals.
— Climate change impacts
due to methane and other volatile organic chemical released into the
atmosphere.
— Drinking water impacts
from underground migration of methane and/or fracturing fluid chemicals
associated with faulty well construction or seismic activity.
— Surface spills
potentially resulting in soil, groundwater and surface water contamination.
— Surface water
contamination resulting from inadequate wastewater treatment.
— Earthquakes and creation
of fissures induced during the hydraulic fracturing stage.
— Community impacts such as
increased vehicle traffic, road damage, noise, odor complaints, and increased
local demand for housing and medical care.
Issued by the
Department of Environmental Conservation, the "Final Supplemental Generic
Environmental Impact Statement" took more than six years to produce, as
public comments on drafts and the burgeoning literature on the various effects
of fracking led to repeated revisions of the study.
The assessment
notes that considerable uncertainty over the adverse environmental and public
health consequences of fracking has "grown worse over time."
Industry, for
example, has long asserted that fracking fluid has never migrated to or tainted
underground drinking water, but documented cases have revealed drinking water
contamination from fracking. A study
this month in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences found the presence
of chemicals used in fracking fluids in the drinking water of three
Pennsylvania households. State regulators also detected methane in the
families' water. Similarly, leakage rates into the atmosphere of methane, a
powerful greenhouse gas that could wipe out the climate benefit of natural gas,
remain unclear as major studies only now get underway.
In
New York, the resistance to fracking grew as residents saw the effects of the
gas boom across the border in Pennsylvania. New York localities, such as the village of Dryden, created fracking
bans that withstood court challenges adding momentum to activist efforts for a
statewide prohibition.
New York is the
first state with substantial natural gas reserves to ban fracking. Others, such
as North Carolina, placed moratoria on the practice that they eventually
lifted. Some, such as Vermont, have bans in place that are mostly symbolic as
they have minimal oil and gas reserves.
Using industry
projections, the report estimated that New York could have received more than
1,600 applications a year on average from drillers to use fracking to develop
gas reserves in the Marcellus and Utica shale formations. That rate of activity
could have extended over a 30-year period, the report said.
Within ten days of
the report's publication, by May 23, the state's Environmental Conservation
Commissioner must issue the final decision on the fracking ban, according to
New York regulations. The ban is not permanent, however, and could be reversed
by a future administration.”
http://insideclimatenews.org/news/15052015/why-did-ny-ban-fracking-official-report-now-public?utm_source=Inside+Climate+News&utm_campaign=70767f3fa3-Weekly_Newsletter_5_175_15_2015&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_29c928ffb5-70767f3fa3-327748361
***Truck Driver Sues Range Resources Over Injuries
“A West Virginia truck driver is suing Range Resources
over claims that company employees ordered him to keep working in wet clothes
for hours after he was splashed with flowback water at a Buffalo Township well site.
Russell Evans of Triadelphia claimed he suffered chemical burns, blisters and
rashes from the alleged incident May 21, 2013, at which time he was working
for Equipment Transport LLC.
Evans was transporting
“reused” water a distance of about five miles to a well site in Buffalo
Township, he backed his truck up to a “sloppy pond” used to store reused frack
water and noticed that water was leaking from the back hatch of his tanker
truck.
He claimed he was doused with water when he attempted to
stop the leak and was told by a Range
employee the water would not harm him. He claimed he was ordered to stay on
site until he was cleared to leave, which was about two hours later.
Range employees roped off and swept the area where the
spill occurred and made no attempt to examine Evans or arrange for him to take
a “chemical bath,” he alleged. He claimed an employee told him to “wash the
water off at a nearby McDonald’s.”
“Due to the fact that Mr. Evans was told the reused water
was harmless, he remained in his wet clothes for several hours….. the complaint
alleged. “In total, Mr. Evans remained in these clothes for over four hours.”
Evans said he went to MedExpress when he developed a rash and blisters and claimed that
physicians told him he could not be treated
without knowledge of the chemicals he may have been exposed to. The complaint
alleges Range “kept the chemical makeup of the fracking fluid a secret.”
He claimed he also
was refused medical care at an emergency room in Wheeling a week after the
alleged incident because of his inability to name the constituents of the
water. In addition to skin ailments, he claimed he suffered nausea, shortness
of breath, indigestion, vertigo and headaches, as well as potentially permanent
skin discoloration and permanent sensitivity to sunlight.
Range spokesman Matt Pitzarella said the company is still
reviewing the complaint. He said the components of all industry materials,
including reuse water, are disclosed by law.”
http://www.observer-reporter.com/article/20150508/NEWS01/150509493
***Act
13 Issues Still To Be Decided
April 14, 2015
| Catalyst, Pennsylvania Chamber of Business and Industry Magazine
Matthew H.
Haverstick and Andrew K. Garden
“This year, the Pennsylvania Supreme
Court is expected to revisit Act 13 of 2012. In so doing, it will
decide: 1. Whether the Public
Utility Commission will keep its authority, established in Act 13, to police
distribution of the “impact fee” paid by oil and gas producers; 2. Whether the DEP will continue to be able to
inform local communities when oil and gas operations threaten the safety of a
public water supply; 3. Whether
Act 13 allows private corporations to take private property for private
use; 4. Whether Act 13
prohibits doctors and other healthcare professionals from disclosing trade
secrets they receive from oil and gas operators about the chemicals the
companies use in their extraction technology; and 5. Whether the Court should revisit its 2013
interpretation of the Environmental Rights Amendment to the Pennsylvania
Constitution.
The
plaintiffs in Robinson Township originally claimed that various provisions of Act 13 were unconstitutional.
In an earlier appeal to the Supreme Court, three of the plaintiffs’ challenges
met with success: First, the plaintiffs objected to Act 13’s
new statewide ban on local zoning
ordinances regulating “where” oil and gas exploration could take place.
Second, the plaintiffs went after Act 13’s requirement
that the DEP grant so-called “setback waivers” upon request of a company prospecting
for oil and gas. (A “setback” is the minimum permitted distance between an
extraction site and a residential property.) Third, the plaintiffs objected to
the fact that Act 13 did not permit a
local government to appeal the DEP's decision to grant a well permit. Three
of the four Justices in the 2013 Supreme Court majority cast their votes to
invalidate these features of Act 13 based on a 1960s environmental rights
amendment to the Pennsylvania constitution (the amendment is also known as
“Section 27”.) However, this rationale did not command a majority of the
Court. And although a new Justice (Correale F. Stevens) was a member by the
time the case was decided, he did not vote on the outcome.
This year, Act 13 returns to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court for a second time.
Below, we identify some of the issues that the Court is being asked to resolve.
Several of these issues should be of interest to the business community.
For example, one issue the Court is
being asked to decide concerns the
Public Utility Commission’s ability to police distribution of the so-called
“impact fee” imposed on the oil and gas industry by Act 13. The impact fee
is distributed to local governments in areas where oil and gas exploration
takes place. Act 13 allows the Commission to withhold the impact fee from local
governments not in compliance with various parts of Act 13 and other laws (for
example, the Municipalities Planning Code, which sets a baseline for how local
governments pass zoning ordinances). The
problem is that some sections of Act 13 that local governments are required to
comply with in order to receive the impact fee have been invalidated. The
Court must decide whether the Commission’s ability to enforce the remaining
provisions can stand. The Commonwealth Court decided that it could not. The
Commission questions whether anyone can now enforce the standards local
communities are required to meet in order to be entitled to receive the impact
fee.
Another
challenged section of Act 13 requires the DEP to inform local communities
when oil and gas operations threaten the safety of a public water supply.
The plaintiffs say that it is unconstitutional to not also require the DEP to
make notifications about threats to private water supplies. This presents what
is often called an “equal protection” challenge. Essentially, the plaintiffs
claim that the government does not have a reason for treating two situations,
which they see as similar, differently. The Commonwealth Court disagreed and
decided that this provision of Act 13 was acceptable.
Also being challenged is Act 13’s
provision that allows certain entities to exercise eminent domain (that is, to
take private property—usually land—from private owners.) The plaintiffs
believe that the section in question actually allows private corporations to
take private property for private use. They argue that this is unconstitutional
because the Pennsylvania and United States constitutions only permit the taking
of private property for public use. Again, the Commonwealth Court was
unconvinced by this argument.
Next, the Supreme Court will also be asked to pass on a section of Act 13
that prohibits doctors and other healthcare professionals from disclosing trade
secrets they receive from oil and gas operators about the chemicals the
companies use in their extraction technology. The plaintiffs contend that this prohibition jeopardizes
public health and prevents doctors from treating patients effectively. In
essence, they argue that doctors will be unable to consult with their colleagues
as professional standards require. The Commonwealth Court also disagreed
with this contention.
Finally, the Supreme Court will be
asked to revisit its 2013 interpretation of Section 27. As summarized above,
three members of the Supreme Court previously set out an expansive description
of the purpose and function of Section 27. Now, the Public Utility Commission
will ask the Supreme Court to revisit this plurality assessment and return to
the traditional understanding of Section 27, which generally said that it was
up to the General Assembly - and not local governments or the courts - to
balance environmental protection and economic development.
http://www.conradobrien.com/news/issues-at-stake-in-act-13-litigation-impact-the-commonwealths-business-community
***$50,000 Means No legal Responsibility for Gas Industry
“It didn't take long for the residents of Finleyville who
lived near the fracking operations to complain – about the noise and air
quality, and what they regarded as threats to their health and quality of life.
Initially, EQT, one of the largest producers of natural gas in Pennsylvania,
tried to allay concerns with promises of noise studies and offers of vouchers
so residents could stay in hotels to avoid the noise and fumes.
But then, in what experts say was a rare tactic, the company got more aggressive: it offered all of the
households along Cardox Road $50,000 in cash if they would
agree to release the company from any legal liability, for current operations
as well as those to be carried out in the future. It covered potential health
problems and property damage, and gave the company blanket protection from any
kind of claim over noise, dust, light, smoke, odors, fumes, soot, air pollution or
vibrations.
The agreement also
defined the company's operations as not only including drilling activity but
the construction of pipelines, power lines, roads, tanks, ponds, pits,
compressor stations, houses and buildings.
"The release is so incredibly broad and such a
laundry list," said Doug Clark, a gas lease attorney in Pennsylvania who
mainly represents landowners. "You're releasing for everything including
activity that hasn't even occurred yet. It's crazy."
***Letter to Editor
Frackers talk a good game in TV ads, but let's look at reality
As
I listen to and watch the advertisements on the radio and television promoting
the shale gas industry, I wonder why we can’t have an honest conversation about
fracking. The spokesperson in the advertisement invariably tells us how they
have looked into this activity and found it to be “safe.” The spokesperson goes
on to say that fracking has been done for more than 60 years.
The real fact is that slick water
fracking, which is what is being done in Pennsylvania, has only been done since
2004. And, as for “safe,” there have been hundreds of documented spills,
accidents and fines levied by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental
Protection. Lawsuits are now increasingly common — against the drillers,
against local officials who have refused to protect their residents and even
against leaseholders who have leased their land and jeopardized their
neighbors’ health, safety and property values.
The advertising spokesperson
mentions none of this, but instead talks about energy independence for the USA,
saying that wells will produce gas for 50 to 100 years. Actual data now shows
that most wells produce for only three to five years!
How
will this affect our future property tax base, since land that has been fracked
is now unsuitable for any other activity? If more drill pads, compressor
stations and processing facilities are built, how will they impact the
livability of our region, especially the water and air quality?
Pennsylvania, unlike California,
is blessed with plenty of water. But what happens if much of it becomes
contaminated by the radioactive wastewater which is brought back to the surface
after a well is fracked?
I can only conclude that the
individuals in the fracking “infomercials” have not truly educated themselves
on the facts about fracking. They are most likely paid actors, leaseholders or
others who stand to profit from this industry.
BARBARA
SIMS
Exporthttp://www.post-gazette.com/opinion/letters/2015/04/28/Frackers-talk-a-good-game-in-TV-ads-but-let-s-look-at-reality/stories/201504280084
***EPA Finds Plants
That Flaring Emits 4 Times More Pollution
Gas Flares Are Probably Worse
April
27, 2015 12:00 AM
A new EPA formula for calculating
the amount of pollutants released by flares at refineries and chemical plants
nationwide shows that those emissions are four times higher than previously
thought.
The EPA said last week that the court-ordered update of a
decades-old method used by the government and individual industrial facilities
to calculate pollution releases will provide more accurate estimates of carbon
monoxide, nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds released by the
flaring or burning of waste gases at those facilities.
The change was triggered by a
2013 lawsuit against the EPA by Environmental Integrity Project, a Washington,
D.C., environmental enforcement advocacy organization.
The EPA said the new formula does
not apply to, and should not be used by, the expanding oil and gas development
sector, a grouping that encompasses thousands of wells and compressor
stations that occasionally flare gases, or gas processing facilities that
regularly flare. An
example of the latter is an ethane “cracker” that Shell Chemical Appalachia, a
division of Royal Dutch Shell, is considering building along the Ohio River in
Monaca, Beaver County.
The Environmental Integrity
Project said it was disappointed by the exclusion of the oil and gas sector and
is considering further legal action.
Calculations based on the new
formula, according to Environment Integrity Project, indicate that an estimated
500 flares at approximately 100
refineries nationwide could be releasing up to 52,800 tons of volatile organic compounds
annually instead of the 13,200 tons estimated by the EPA under the old formula.
It also means that the public health toll from smog producing VOCs, which can
cause respiratory problems and include carcinogens, is likely more than $120
million a year instead of the $30 million estimated under the old formula.
“The VOC air pollution plume from flares is four times
larger than we thought, and that’s too big to ignore. It multiplies their
contribution to health problems,” said Eric Schaeffer, executive director of the
Environmental Integrity Project.
Mr.
Schaeffer, a former head of the EPA’s enforcement division, said the new
emissions estimates likely will mean that more refineries and chemical plants
will be required to obtain air pollution control permits and limit emissions. He also said oil
and gas facility flares could emit even more pollutants because of combustion
inconsistencies.
“If the pollution
released by petrochemical plants is four times higher, the flaring pollution
from oil and gas operations is not going to be lower,” he said. “They’re going
to be higher because they don’t get a clean burn.”
The EPA declined to say when it
would establish a new emissions factor for the oil and gas industry. Bob
Schell, who heads the EPA group that developed the refinery flare emissions
factor based on field tests in Texas and Arkansas, said he is not aware of any
oil and gas facility test data under consideration by the EPA.
According to the DEP, there are
182 industrial facilities in Pennsylvania classified as either chemical plants
or refineries, and 68 industrial flares. Some of those facilities operate
multiple flares.
According to the EPA, its emissions factors are used by industrial
facilities to estimate and report their emissions, but facilities can also use
actual emissions stack testing to report their emissions. The EPA, in turn,
uses those industry emissions reports to calculate local, regional and national
emission inventories that identify and quantify individual pollution sources
and establish emissions control targets.
Emissions from flaring can contain carbon particles, also known as
soot, unburned hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, sometimes sulfur
dioxide and volatile organic compounds. How much of those pollutants are emitted
depends on the degree of combustion efficiency. Properly operated flares
achieve at least 98 percent combustion efficiency, but Mr. Schaeffer said
petrochemical facility flares have an average combustion efficiency of 92
percent.
http://www.post-gazette.com/news/environment/2015/04/27/Flares-emit-more-pollutants-than-previously-thought-EPA-updates-find/stories/201504220097?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=most-viewed-business&utm_campaign=Headlines-Newsletter
***Vera
Scroggins Required to Stay 100 Feet From Cabot
“We need a map. We need to know where I can and cannot go,” Vera said.
“Can I stop here, or can I not stop here? Is it OK to be here if I go to a
business or if I go to a home? I have had to ask and check out every person I
go to: ‘are you leased to Cabot’?
Vera
Scroggins, a retired nurse’s aide living in the sacrifice zone of Susquehanna
County, Pennsylvania. She wanted nothing more than to enjoy her
home, her garden and her grandchildren.
Then the natural gas industry came to her peaceful community.
What Vera saw made her put down her gardening tools and
pick up a video camera. That action has the frackers shaking in their boots.
Armed with a video camera, Vera began documenting the
natural gas industry activities in northeast Pennsylvania. Her
short YouTube videos show what the industry doesn’t want you to see. She had
led visitors, government officials, and journalists on tours of the gas fields,
to rigs and well pads, pipelines, compressor stations, and roads damaged by the
heavy volume of truck traffic necessary to build and support the wells. She
introduces the visitors to those affected by fracking, to the people of
northeast Pennsylvania who have seen their air and water polluted, their health
impacted.
The big fracker in Susquehanna County is Cabot Oil &
Gas.
https://frackorporation.wordpress.com/2015/05/05/vera-the-woman-frackers-fear/
Frack Links
***New Frack
Infrastructure Map—
The Clean Air Council’s new
gas infrastructure map will make it easy to
see compressor stations, dehydration stations, gas processing plants, natural
gas liquid pumping stations, power plants, and pipelines in the state, You
can also report pollution issues from nearby facilities directly to regulatory
agencies—including the DEP and the U.S. Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease
Registry. The map is now available
online at: http://tinyurl.com/gasmapPA
Sincerely, Joseph Otis Minott, Director Photo by Bob Donnan
***Fracking 101-
Sierra Club 2 minute video
Great
info to share
https://www.facebook.com/SierraClub/videos/vb.6204742571/10152579612822572/?type=2&theater
***Chuck Hunnel of Isaac Walton League Testifies on Radiation in
Green County Creeks
***South Fayette- Last ten minutes of meeting
where revisions to O and G discussed
https://youtu.be/Ol76iuKadns
***Essential
Pittsburgh-Rising Radon in Pittsburgh Air and Illah Nourbakhsh on Testing
Indoor Air-- 90.5
*** Mac Sawyer, frack truck driver, talks about health problems and the frack industry
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSvMhmF4Myw)
***Dramatic Photos of Gas Explosions – https://www.popularresistance.org/colorado-fracking-wastewater-injection-site-up-in-flames/
***Middlesex-Jordan Yeager’s Closing Argument
**Video- What you
breathe from gas operations-excellent 5 minutes
**
Power point CHEJ Health Impacts of Fracking
***Video: Middlesex Zoning Case-Geyer Well Near Schools
“The
video is about 3 minutes long. Parents in Butler approach supervisors when
fracking threatens the health and safety of their rural community. The proposed Geyer Well Pad is 1/2 mile from the Mars
District schools and even closer to homes in a nearby sub-division.
A
few excerpts:
Jordan Yeager for Delaware Riverkeepers-
“Townships cannot put the interest of one set of property owners above the
community as a whole”
Tom
Daniels-U of Penn Land Use Expert – The ordinance
allows heavy industrial use in agricultural areas permits haphazard oil and gas
development which is contrary to protection of public health safety welfare.
Acoustic
Expert Kayna Bowen states that Rex acoustic
assessment is incorrect.
***How Much Land Does Fracking Encompass?
This
article includes several good visuals.
***Fracking's Wide Health Impact: From the
Ozone to Ground Water and All Those
Living in Between, a Science Update
Speaker presentation slides:
***Gas Density -Google Earth
Dr. Ingraffea of Cornell has
pointed out that the industry can only be profitable if they achieve density.
That’s why leased regions are honeycombed with hundreds or thousands of wells.
This video presents photo shots
of Texas, Arkansas- You only need to watch the first few minutes then jump to
other sections of the video to get the gist. But everyone should watch at least
part of this.
***Link to
Shalefield Stories-Personal stories of those affected by
fracking http://www.friendsoftheharmed.com/
***To sign up for Skytruth notifications of activity and violations for
your area:
*** List of the Harmed--There are now over 1400
residents of Pennsylvania who have placed their names on the list of the harmed
when they became sick after fracking began in their area. http://pennsylvaniaallianceforcleanwaterandair.wordpress.com/the-list/
Westmoreland Marcellus Citizens’ Group—Mission Statement
WMCG is a project
of the Thomas Merton Society
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 and Thomas Merton Liason-Lou Pochet
Secretary-Ron Nordstrom
Facebook Coordinator-Elizabeth Nordstrom
Blogsite –April Jackman
Science Advisor-Dr. Cynthia Walter
To receive our
news updates, please email jan at westmcg@gmail.com
To remove your
name from our list please put “remove name from list’ in the subject line
Donations
We are very appreciative of donations, both
large and small, to our group.
With
your help, we have handed out thousands of flyers on the health and
environmental effects of fracking, sponsored numerous public meetings, and
provided information to citizens and officials countywide. If you would like to
support our efforts:
Checks to our group should be
made out to the Thomas Merton
Center/Westmoreland Marcellus Citizens’ Group. And in the Reminder line please
write- Westmoreland Marcellus Citizens’ Group. The reason for this is that
we are one project of 12 at Thomas Merton. You can send your check to:
Westmoreland Marcellus Citizens’ Group, PO Box 1040, Latrobe, PA, 15650.
Or
you can give the check or cash to Lou Pochet or Jan Milburn.
