How Much Proof Is Needed To Show That Fracking Is a Disaster for Air and Water?

The following piece by Paul Galley, President of Hudson Riverkeep,  appeared in the Huffington Post.  under the title “Gas Industry Spin Can’t Cover Up Air, Water Problems Caused by Fracking.”   We’re reprinting it in its entirety because of the magnitude of  the information Mr. Galley has gathered.  How much proof is needed?  Obviously, government officials are turning a blind eye to the obvious.  –Hardly Waite.

It’s like some in the gas industry are living in a different universe from the rest of us, when it comes to the risks from shale gas extraction via fracking. Call it the “Spin Zone.”

At a Wall Street Journal conference last week, Chesapeake Energy CEO Aubrey McClendon told attendees he’s unaware of any problems resulting from thethousands of fracking wells drilled in Fort Worth, Texas in recent years. McClendon peevishly referred to the fracking-related air pollution concerns I raised at the conference as “environmental nonsense.”

Well, read on. Then decide who’s talking “nonsense”:

• In December 2011, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) reported that oil and gas operations in the Dallas-Fort Worth region emit more smog-causing volatile organic compounds (VOCs) than all cars, trucks, buses and other mobile sources in the area combined. This wasn’t true before the fracking boom: TCEQ’s data shows that VOCs from oil and gas production have increased 60 percent since 2006.
• Ozone, a corrosive gas that can exacerbate asthma and other respiratory diseases, is created when VOCs from petroleum operations mix with heat and sunlight. In 2011, Dallas-Fort Worth violated federal ozone standards on more days than anywhere else in Texas. Dallas-Fort Worth is a “particularly extreme” example of higher air pollution in Texas, according to David Allen, a chemical engineering professor and state air-quality program director.
• In 2010, TCEQ found elevated levels of benzene around 21 gas fields out of the 94 it tested in the Barnett Shale. According to TCEQ toxicologist Shannon Ethridge, their monitors in the Barnett Shale pulled up “some of the highest benzene concentrations we have monitored in the state.”
• In Texas, which had about 93,000 natural-gas wells in 2011, up from around 58,000 a dozen years ago, a hospital system in six counties with some of the heaviest drilling, including the Barnett Shale region, found that “children in the community ages 6-9 are three times more likely to have asthma than the average for that age group in the State of Texas.” According to Baylor University, in 2009, childhood asthma rates in the Tarrant County area of the Barnett were more than double the national average, prompting a new study to evaluate asthma and pollution sources.

Up north in the Mountain States, the problem is just as serious:

• According to a 2012 study from the Colorado School of Public Health, cancer risks were 66 percent higher for residents living less than half a mile from oil and gas wells than for those living farther away, with benzene being the major contributor to the increased risk. This same study reminds us that chronic exposure to ozone, prevalent at gas production sites, can lead to asthma and pulmonary diseases, particularly in children and the aged.
• A recent study by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) found elevated levels of methane coming from well sites in Northeastern Colorado. NOAA scientists say initial results from another study show high concentrations of butane, ethane and propane in Erie, east of Boulder, where hundreds of natural-gas wells are operating.” “We are finding a huge amount of methane and other chemicals coming out of the natural-gas fields,” said Russell Schnell, a NOAA scientist in Boulder. NOAA estimates that gas producers in this area are losing about 4 percent of gas to the atmosphere — not including losses in the pipeline and distribution system.
• Levels of ozone in Wyoming’s fracking country are higher than in Los Angeles (Wyoming levels have been as high as 124 parts per billion, two-thirds higher than the federal EPA’s maximum healthy limit). In 2009, Wyoming’s environmental agency concluded “that elevated ozone at the Boulder [Wyoming] monitor is primarily due to local emissions from oil and gas (O&G) development activities: drilling, production, storage, transport, and treating.”

Finally, let’s not forget the 2011 Duke University study proving that drinking water wells near fracking sites have 17 times more methane than wells not located near fracking, and that this extra methane has a chemical fingerprint which shows it’s coming from deep drilling. Fracking operations have generated billions of gallons of radiation-laced toxic wastewater that weren’t managed properly and fracking has forced families to abandon their homes after they were poisoned by dangerous levels of arsenic, benzene and toluene.

Most drillers remain in deep denial, routinely choosing to circle the wagons rather than acknowledge environmental and public health problems. As oneWall Street Journal conference blogger pointedly observed, after I suggested that the gas companies deny problems and demonize critics, McClendon’s next move was, well, to deny and demonize. To be fair, other pro-fracking conference panelists like former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell were somewhat more critical of the industry, arguing that the gas companies must accept blame for rushing fracking and relying on “cowboy” drillers.

In the end, conference attendees weren’t buying the drillers’ “don’t worry, just keep buying more of our gas” message. After my and McClendon’s mini-debate, an astonishing 49 percent of this business-friendly audience said that we need federal regulation of the gas industry. Only 7 percent thought the answer to our problems lies with self-regulation by the frackers.

Fracking and its impact on public health, in particular our children’s health, is a serious issue that calls for swift action — action that the gas industry repeatedly tries to block. In New York, for example, the industry recently helped kill alegislative proposal for a public health impact assessment which hundreds of medical professionals had joined community activists and environmentalists in supporting.

Let the gas companies continue to deny fracking’s proven link to air and water pollution. The public isn’t buying their spin. They know where the “nonsense” is coming from.

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Water As A Weapon

by Hardly Waite

The article we’ve excerpted below provides a good example of the use of water as a weapon of torture and destruction.  Ironically, the use of such techniques as intentional flooding,  promotion of bacterial water contamination, and , as in the case cited below, blockage of natural drainage to promote disease and property destruction, seem to slip by unnoticed by the mainstream media.  If a bomb kills five people on a bus, the world rightly decries the act of terrorism; but if a powerful nation bombs a water treatment plant, then imposes economic sanctions that prohibit the sale of chlorine and repair parts needed to repair the plant, purposefully causing  the deaths of thousands upon thousands of peaceful civilians,  it is not viewed as terrorism but diplomacy.

Walls and winter rains afflict Palestinian towns

— Heavy winter downpours have turned some Palestinian lands in the occupied West Bank into a morass of filth and flooding as an Israeli barrier blocks the waters from draining away.

In Qalqilya, a town of 42,000 in the northern West Bank almost completely surrounded by the concrete wall, Khaled Kandeel and his family huddled by an open fire in a shed as trash-laden water swelled through his pear orchard.

“Before the wall, the water used to drain fine, and flowed down to the sea easily. They could just flip a switch and end our suffering, but they don’t,” Kandeel said, his breath steamy from the winter cold.

Israel started building the barrier, a mix of metal fencing, barbed wire and concrete walls, in 2002 in response to a wave of Palestinian suicide bombings.

Drainage channels run under the imposing ramparts but their automated metal gates are mostly closed and now clogged with refuse and stones that block the outflow of storm water.

The Israeli military, citing security reasons, generally bars locals from clearing the obstructions or digging their own channels close to the barrier.

Built mostly within occupied land and not on the “Green Line” which was Israel’s de facto border before the 1967 Middle East War, the barrier inside the West Bank is deemed illegal by the U.N.’s International Court of Justice.

It directly impacts the farming,  grazing and environment of about 170 communities, the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) says.

Hemmed-in residents of northern towns in the West Bank have been deprived of large swathes of rural land, forcing poorly-regulated waste dumping closer to farms and homes.

Driving rain could not mask the stench of raw sewage being unloaded from a tanker on a village road outside Qalqilya on Tuesday, its putrid contents mixing with the brown torrent pouring past olive trees clustered on the hills.

“Raw sewage is disposed near, or on, agricultural land resulting in the contamination of soil and groundwater,” UNRWA said in a report.

Reuters Report.

Why Is the FDA in Such a Hurry to Approve the Sale and Consumption of Frankenfish?

The following statement from the Cornucopia Institute questions the wisdom of the FDA’s rush to allow genetically engineer salmon to be raised and sold in the US.

Despite overwhelming opposition from citizens and public interest groups to genetically engineered (GE) food, including 400,000 public comments opposing GE salmon, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced December 26, 2012 that it is prepared to give transgenic salmon its final stamp of approval.

The FDA failed to address serious concerns about the safety of consuming salmon that has been genetically engineered to produce growth hormones at all times, allowing it to grow faster and bigger than natural salmon. The FDA has not conducted any safety testing, and merely assumes that the genetically engineered salmon is safe to eat.

The FDA has also not considered the potential ecological and economic impacts of approving genetically engineered salmon. Salmon is an integral part of the ecosystem, and the accidental escape of genetically engineered salmon could devastate populations of native salmon, as well as the fish and marine mammals that depend on salmon for their food. Scientists have predicted that escaped GE salmon would likely wipe out wild salmon populations, which will destroy the livelihood of coastal communities that depend on fishing.

Despite the fact that the vast majority of Americans do not want to eat genetically modified organisms, this salmon will not be labeled as such. Yet the Obama administration is willing to gamble with our health for the financial benefit of one biotechnology company.

Which of these fish has had its DNA genetically altered? If you guessed the smaller one, you’re wrong. The DNA of the top fish has been genetically engineered to produce growth hormones all the time for its entire life. People who eat this fish will be eating this DNA, along with the growth hormones.

For instructions on how to comment to the FDA, visit the Cornucopia Institute’s website.

Water Is Not the Benign Substance We Have Been Led to Believe

Furthermore, almost all alcohol abusers started on water and  most flooding is directly caused by water.  The list of the dangers of water could go on forever.   However, on a serious note  . . .

Dangers of Metal Water Bottles

There are many indirect dangers from drinking water as well.  A water bottle accident that is rare but terrifying involves drinking water from popular  metal water bottles.   This month it was revealed that metal water bottles pose a serious threat to users, not because they emit toxic substances into the water but because the drinker’s tongue can be trapped by the narrow neck of the bottle.

NBC’s Rossen Reports revealed that popular metal bottles can grab the drinker’s tongue,  which swells rapidly in the neck of the bottle making it impossible to extract the tongue from the bottle.  This is especially dangerous for children, and several children whose tongues have been trapped by water bottles have had to undergo dangerous and painful surgical removal.  Seeing the NBC video will make your realize that poking your tongue into a metal water bottle may be as dangerous as licking a pump handle in sub-freezing weather.

Above: Mary Kate Person got her tongue trapped inside a metal water bottle  Extracting her tongue required traumatic  surgery and several days in the hospital.

See video.

 Families Who Lost Wells Will Probably Be Connected to the Village of Jackson Municipal Water System

Last July, a major rupture of a pipeline owned by West Shore Pipe Line Co. of Illinois ruined the wells of several families in the Jackson, Wisconsin area.

West Shore owns a 650-mile fuel distribution system within Illinois, Wisconsin and Indiana. Pipelines extend from East Chicago, Ind., around Chicago to Milwaukee and Green Bay. A separate line runs from the Chicago area to Janesville and Madison.

A section of 10-inch pipe in the company’s Milwaukee to Green Bay line ruptured along a welded seam July 17 in the 1800 block of Western Ave. in the town. The pipeline was built in 1961.

An estimated 54,600 gallons of gasoline spilled within a few minutes in a farm pasture.

Tests have detected gasoline contaminants in a total of 27 residential drinking water wells and two nonresidential wells since the spill.

Contaminant levels fluctuate in the wells. As of Jan. 2, West Shore reported recent tests detected benzene in 13 of the 29 wells.

Plans for compensation include drilling a new town well for the residents and providing a water treatment facility, but the leading plan is to connect the owners of ruined wells to the Village of Jackson municipal water system.

More Information

Ruptured Main Spilled 14 Million Gallons of Water into Downtown Streets

Many large buildings in downtown Minneapolis were without water for several days, and traffic had to be rerouted around certain parts of the city,  because of a ruptured water main that dumped 14,000,000 gallons of water into the area.

Although repairs are now complete,  testing will be required before the area’s water is deemed safe to drink.

Winter Flood in Minneapolis. A backup service using temporary lines provided water for six buildings. The break occurred at a construction site.

Article Source.

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University of Vermont Is Expected to Ban Single Drink Water Bottles

A new ban on the sales of single-serving plastic water bottles has taken effect in Concord.

An empty water bottle sculpture in Burlington VT. The University of Vermont is preparing to ban bottled water sales, as has the town of Concord.

The ban began Tuesday, Jan. 1,  and follows an April vote by Town Meeting, which made historic Concord one of the first communities in the nation to make the bottles illegal. …

The new law was adopted after a three-year campaign by local activists. They pushed a return to tap water, saying banning the bottles will cut down on plastic waste and reduce the use of the fossil fuels used to make the bottles.

Lake Michigan and Lake Huron Reach Record Low Levels

According to a TV station in Traverse City, Michigan, the Great Lakes have had lower water levels this past year, but now they have reached an all-time, record low.

The Federal Government says preliminary numbers show both Lake Michigan and Lake Huron reached record low water levels, in December.

The credit is given to the low level, to light snowfall last Winter, and light rainfall in the Spring.

The previous all-time low level was set in 1964, at 576.2 feet.

The preliminary mark for December 2012, is 576.15 feet.

Water Conservation Ideas Offered for Texas Legislature

by Kate Galbraith

Reprinted from Texas Tribune, January 3, 2013

Editor’s Note:  This excellent piece on the management of Texas’ water dilemma reveals  the difficulties faced in Texas and across the nation by lawmakers.  Water policy, though of supreme public importance, does not fall outside the realm of politics.  As the article shows, no matter how sane the plan or how necessary, it usually bumps against someone’s vested interest in keeping things the way they are.  Placing restrictions on the massive watering of golf courses makes perfect sense, unless you own a golf course, or a business that is helped by a nearby golf course, or you sell sporting goods or irrigation equipment or turf, or if you play golf.  — Hardly Waite. 

Using less water is the cheapest way to meet Texas’ long-term water needs. The state water plan envisions nearly a quarter of Texas’ future water supplies coming from conservation. So what could and should Texas lawmakers do to promote the idea of saving water?

This is a tricky question, because conservation is generally the domain of local authorities. The nature of water supplies varies tremendously from place to place. Some towns may have fairly stable reservoirs, while others draw from diminishing aquifers. So local groups maintain day-to-day management of their water supplies, including ordering restrictions at times of drought (as many Texas cities have).

But environmentalists and some lawmakers say the state has a key role to play in promoting conservation. Blanket statewide watering restrictions seem politically infeasible, given the unpopularity of mandates. But other options abound. State Rep. Lyle Larson, R-San Antonio, has filed a bill to create a sales-tax exemption for water-saving appliances sold over Memorial Day weekend, and environmentalists’ other ideas (not yet in bills) include requiring farmers to put meters on their water wells and preventing homeowners’ associations from barring drought-resistant landscaping. Improving how Texas measures water use and water savings is also high on the agenda of the Water Conservation Advisory Council, a group that brings together representatives of numerous state agencies.

Texas has passed water-conservation bills in the past. In fact, Texas and California rank first among all states in water efficiency, according to a September report from the Alliance for Water Efficiency. Texas accumulated points for laws such as requiring water utilities to audit their water losses and limiting the amount of water that toilets and urinals can use. (A 2009 measure by state Rep. Allan Ritter, R-Nederland, tightened the limits, some of which take effect in 2014.) The Legislature created the Water Conservation Advisory Council in 2007; last month it produced a report filled with recommendations for the Legislature.

But Texas, with its fast-growing population, needs to do more, water experts say. “Even though we’re requiring [utilities to have water conservation plans and] we’re requiring reports on implementation, at the end of the day there is just not enforcement of any of those things,” said Carole Baker, executive director of the nonprofit Texas Water Foundation. Requiring more consistent implementation of water conservation plans is one area where the Legislature could act, she said.

Texas has worked on standardizing its water information. Senate Bill 181, passed in 2011, requires the state to develop a consistent method for tallying water use and conservation, for example by breaking data into categories like residential single-family use, multifamily residential use and agriculture. Senate Bill 660, also passed in 2011, clarified requirements for reporting on water conservation.

Larson has also filed a bill for the upcoming session requiring utilities to better project future water shortages by assessing how long their current supplies can last.

The nonprofit Environment Texas offers a range of conservation-related proposals for the next session. Among them: ensuring that homeowners’ associations allow drought-resistant landscaping; prodding cities to adopt plans to limit per-capita water usage; and requiring farmers to put meters on their wells.

The metering proposal would not go down well with farmers. “My members will oppose being required to put meters on the wells,” said Billy Howe, the state legislative director for the Texas Farm Bureau. His group would support state funding to help farmers switch to less water-intensive technologies, through research or other means.

Proposals by Environment Texas to limit the use of fresh water for hydraulic fracturing during droughts and require new power plants to study less water-intensive cooling technologies, would probably meet industry resistance as well.

Water conservation is also likely to enter the broad debate over funding for water projects during the session. Lawmakers are discussing whether to allocate $1 billion or more from the state’s Rainy Day Fund to create a revolving fund for water infrastructure projects, such as building desalination plants or pipelines. Environmentalists want conservation projects to be prioritized when the funds are doled out.

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Class Action Lawsuit Targets “Floc” Treatment Used in Coal Mines and Water Treatment Plants

In the settlement of a West Virginia class action suit, many coal treatment plants and water treatment plants in the state were required to pay $6.6 million to provide free medical examinations for workers in the plants.

The suit centered on the use of use of a certain type of water treatment chemical called polyacrylamide (often called “flocculent” or “floc”).  Many coal preparation plants in West Virginia and Pennsylvania, and water treatment plants in West Virginia, used the chemical to separate solids from liquids.

The lawsuit claims that the chemical is toxic and that workers at these plants who were exposed to the chemical have a higher risk of getting serious diseases.  The Defendants, manufacturers and distributors of polyacrylamide, deny those claims and that they did anything wrong.  Both sides have agreed to settle the case to avoid the cost and burdens associated with ongoing litigation.

One of the largest uses for polyacrylamide is to flocculate  solids in a liquid. This process applies to is used in water treatment and in processes like paper making.

Full details.