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Lisa Jackson

The Facts Behind EPA’s Dimock Two Step
Set aside all the stage props, backdrops and inflatable scenery deployed as part of the continuing saga known as Dimock, and you’re left with a pretty basic question – albeit one to which very few outside media have gone out of their way to find a legitimate, science-based answer. Quite simply: Is the water up there safe?

In Dec., EPA says water’s safe; in Jan, with no new data, it says it’s not – EID lays out what’s known and what’s not

Set aside all the stage props, backdrops and inflatable scenery deployed as part of the continuing saga known as Dimock, and you’re left with a pretty basic question – albeit one to which very few outside media have gone out of their way to find a legitimate, science-based answer. Quite simply: Is the water up there safe?

On Dec. 2, 2011, EPA declared that it was, sending an email to several Dimock residents indicating that the data it had reviewed from state-certified laboratories and the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) “does not indicate that the well water presents an immediate health threat.” On Jan. 19, despite having no new data, EPA reversed its position, sending a letter to the agency’s hazardous site cleanup division demanding “immediate action” to protect public health and safety.

Predictably, those opposed to the development of affordable, clean-burning natural gas were quick to applaud the news — with ProPublica even declaring in a 38-point headline that EPA’s change of heart constituted “evidence of fracking contamination,” even though EPA never actually said that (and couldn’t have, since it gathered no data) and state experts consistently having shown it to be false. So once again, amidst all the pomp, circumstance and fanfare, we’re left with a couple questions: For starters, what do the data actually indicate is in the water? And second: Is there actually any evidence suggesting that any of it got there as a result of natural gas development?

In an effort to answer the first question, EPA released a series of memos and letters last week – the list is available here — laying out in specific terms what was found in wells tested by DEP on and near Carter Rd. But sift through the dozen or so documents posted on the website, and eventually you stumble across two memos of significantly greater value than the rest. The first is a memo written by technician Donna Ioven to Richard Fetzer, EPA’s “on-scene coordinator” in Dimock. The second is a 10-page letter from Mr. Fetzer to his bosses at EPA.

As you can see by clicking here, the Ioven memo is short, sweet and to the point: not even two pages in length, and almost all of it focused on identifying which specific components were found in which specific residential water wells. Of the eight wells for which DEP collected data, Ms. Ioven writes that four of them contained compounds of potential concern: Resident 4 had high levels of sodium and manganese; same for Resident 6; Resident 7 had manganese; and Resident 8, arsenic. These were the four households selected by EPA for water deliveries.

The Ioven memo is supposed to serve as the factual, technical basis for Mr. Fetzer’s letter to EPA’s Dennis Carney – capturing and reporting what is known and what isn’t, and passing that information up the food-chain for further consideration. But here’s the problem: Fetzer’s letter doesn’t look anything like Ioven’s memo. The latter, as mentioned, is a simple recitation of facts and figures. The former, unfortunately, reads more like a brief filed by a plaintiff’s attorney – attempting to defend EPA’s decision to intervene by going out of its way to link each of the components found in wells to drilling activity (and on several occasions, looking quite silly doing it).

Take, for instance, Mr. Fetzer’s explanation for how arsenic may have found its way into one private well: suggesting in his letter it could have gotten there from “the use and effects of drilling fluids.” But spend about 10 seconds researching the issue online, and you find that arsenic isn’t even used as a component of drilling and/or completing a well. So where did it come from? According to the U.S Geological Survey (4:00 of this video): “Overwhelmingly, the evidence that we have suggests that the arsenic we see in groundwater originates from natural sources.” Unfortunately, this overwhelming evidence appears to be news to Mr. Fetzer.

The Fetzer letter also makes sure to mention that “glycols” were found in one well, once again attempting to blame that on “drilling fluids.”

Glycols are a major ingredient of antifreeze, and much like other industrial processes, are sometimes used in very small percentages in an oil and gas context to prevent scale build-up in the pipe. Thing is, Cabot has already confirmed that it didn’t use any glycols when it drilled and completed its wells in the area more than two years ago. And actually, the one well in which glycols were detected came in at such low levels that EPA didn’t include that household among the four it chose to receive water deliveries. As reported by the Philadelphia Inquirer: “Tests also found glycol, which is used in antifreeze, at safe levels, and 2-methoxyethanol, a solvent, which does not have an established toxicity level. Those houses are not receiving shipments of water.”

So, after all that, apparently what we have is an issue with sodium and manganese. According to Mr. Fetzer, manganese is “known to be a constituent of some specialized drilling fluids.” Which fluids are those? And did Cabot actually use any of them in Dimock? Fetzer doesn’t say, probably because Fetzer doesn’t know. So we posed the question to the operator itself; the answer we got back was a resounding “no.” But, as we were reminded, neither sodium or manganese is considered a health hazard by EPA. In fact, EPA doesn’t even have what’s called a “maximum contaminant level” (or MCL) for either of those two. According to one federal report:

High levels of … manganese do not pose any known adverse health risks. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has not set maximum contaminant levels (MCL) for … manganese in the National Primary Drinking Water Regulations. Secondary maximum contaminant levels (SMCL) recommended in the National Secondary Drinking Water Regulations are set for esthetic reasons and are not enforceable by EPA.”

So there you have it. Boil it all down, condense it, strain it, and reduce it to its irreducible parts, and what you’re left with is a decision by EPA to spend hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars supplying water to people who don’t need it — a decision made less than two months after the agency deemed the water to be safe, using the same exact data that it cited last week in arguing the opposite. Of the four households set to receive water, three of them have elevated levels of two things that EPA itself doesn’t consider hazardous to health. And the fourth? According to federal scientists, that well has something in it of which “overwhelming evidence” indicates a natural origin. Not drilling a well.

But you know what really gets our goat? According to an updated study released by the Center for Rural Pennsylvania last year, more than 40 percent of private water wells tested in the state don’t meet basic health and safety standards for drinking water – for reasons that have nothing to do with oil or natural gas. Considering that more than three million folks across the state rely on wells for their water, that means more than one million Pennsylvanians could be drinking water today that’s unsafe.

All of which begs the question: If this thing weren’t about politics, why isn’t EPA supplying clean water to any of them?

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The Griswolds Go to Pittsburgh

Sprawling piece on natural gas development in SWPA lands in NYT Sunday Mag; EID sorts through the data that NYT’s Griswold leaves behind

If it’s true that the definition of a good compromise is one in which both sides leave unhappy, it might seem that the 5,700-word piece on Marcellus development in Washington Co., Pa. filed this past weekend in the Sunday magazine of The New York Times comes close to being one heck of a deal.

Writing about the piece on the environmental website Grist – no friend to shale – Sarah Laskow concludes that “anyone who already understands the issue should probably skip it, to avoid getting ticked off.” For what it’s worth, we happen to agree — albeit for different reasons.

On the positive side of the ledger, NYT contributor Eliza Griswold includes about a half-dozen stories from real folks in the Amwell Twp. community whose lives have been made materially better owing to the local development of enormous reserves of clean-burning natural gas from shale. Folks who now can keep their farms, send their kids to college, maybe even retire somewhere someday. Folks who care deeply about the quality and nature of their local environment, and who, despite the hype, have seen no evidence heretofore that Marcellus activity is deleterious to it.

Those are the parts that Grist doesn’t like, preferring instead the ones in which Griswold attempts to paint a picture of natural gas development as scourge to air, water, and land; hoof, hound and equine. But a closer look at the air and water testing data compiled by state regulators and third-party technicians – every bit of it publicly available; very little of it mentioned in this piece — reveals a reality in tiny Amwell Twp. very much at odds with the narrative put forth by the Times.

Below, we take a closer look at some of the claims made in the piece, and see how they stack-up when juxtaposed with the science.

Wrong on the basics

NYT: “’Fracking,’ as it is known, is a process of natural-gas drilling that involves pumping vast quantities of water, sand and chemicals thousands of feet into the earth to crack the deep shale deposits and free bubbles of gas from the ancient, porous rock.”

NYT: “This summer, Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York moved to lift the state’s yearlong moratorium on fracking against vocal opposition from environmentalists and many local residents. Following a series of hearings this month, New York will decide whether to allow fracking early next year.”

Wrong on Amwell Township

NYT: “Beth Voyles, 54, a horse trainer and dog breeder … signed the lease with Haney in 2008. She told Haney that her 11 /2-year-old boxer, Cummins, had just died. Voyles thought that he was poisoned. She saw the dog drinking repeatedly from a puddle of road runoff, and she thought that the water the gas company used to wet down the roads probably had antifreeze in it.”

NYT: “Voyles … called the Department of Environmental Protection to register yet another complaint about the stench. The D.E.P. sent out a water specialist, John Carson. … Voyles claims that Carson refused to take her complaint.”

NYT: “In Amwell Township, your opinion of fracking tends to correspond with how much money you’re making and with how close you live to the gas wells, chemical ponds, pipelines and compressor stations springing up in the area.”

Wrong on disclosure

NYT: “Popular concerns about natural-gas drilling have centered on what chemicals companies are putting into the earth, not least because this list is a proprietary secret.”

NYT: “In 2005, Vice President Dick Cheney spearheaded an amendment to the energy bill, which critics call the Halliburton Loophole. This legislation exempts hydraulic fracturing from the Safe Drinking Water Act and protects companies like Halliburton, of which Cheney was once the C.E.O., from disclosing what chemicals are going into the ground.”

Wrong on the numbers

NYT: “There are more than 4,000 Marcellus wells in Pennsylvania, with projections ranging from 2,500 new wells a year to a total of more than 100,000 over the next few decades.”

NYT: “According to a recent study by Pennsylvania State University, the industry has created 23,000 jobs, including employment for roustabouts, construction workers, helicopter pilots, sign makers, Laundromat workers, electricians, caterers, chambermaids, office workers, water haulers and land surveyors.”

NYT: “Currently, companies operating in Pennsylvania pay no tax to extract gas.”

NYT: “Banks have expressed reluctance to back home mortgages within up to three miles of a well. Whole towns could become brown fields, and home values would drop precipitously.”

Wrong on water management

NYT: “Disposing of the chemical water has meant trucking it to another state or paying local treatment facilities to process it. The facilities, which are not equipped to remove salts, have often sent the frack water back into local rivers.”

NYT: “Thanks to the money [Ray] received from allowing Range Resources to drill, build a compressor station and dig a chemical pond on his land, he has been able to reroof two barns, buy a new hay baler and construct an addition to his house for his 94-year-old mother.”

Wrong on “The Mon”

NYT: “In 2008 … [f]or several months, the Monongahela River, which provides most people in the Pittsburgh area with drinking water, no longer met state and federal standards. Following a request from the State of Pennsylvania, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers found it would require five times the amount of water in their reservoirs to dilute the river. It took five months to clean it up.”


New Study Underscores Enormous Potential Economic Benefits From NY’s Marcellus Shale

Earlier this week, New York’s state House doubled down on its bad bet of a year ago and sought to extend by another year the state’s moratorium on the use of fracturing technology — at least the kind requiring enough water to access the Marcellus. Such a proposal seeks to only further put out of reach the potentially widespread economic benefits – tens of thousands of jobs, millions in revenue – associated with shale gas production for New York State.

A recent New York Post editorial captures the contours of this debate:

“The longer fracking is verboten in New York, the longer the upstate region loses out on a promising economic boost. Indeed, new drilling operations alone could create thousands of jobs for the economically ailing area.”

Further, and perhaps even more clearly, these facts and economic potentials are echoed in a Manhattan Institute report issued this week. The report analyzed the economic and environmental impacts of shale gas development in New York State as based upon Pennsylvania’s Marcellus activity. The study indicated that a moratorium on drilling provides little environmental benefit while imposing large scale economic cost.

Data was generated on a per-well basis to create an “economic-environmental benefit-cost ratio for a typical Marcellus shale gas well.” The study further notes the importance of understanding the downstream positive externalities of natural gas potentials as an alternative to coal and oil energy generation.

Here are several key findings:

The authors also determine that “Clearly, the economic benefits of shale gas drilling far outweigh the environmental costs.” And it’s true, hydraulic fracturing has never impacted groundwater. And despite claims, EPA administrator Lisa Jackson – our nation’s top environmental watchdog – told Congress this recently when asked about fracturing:

“I’m not aware of any proven case where the fracking process itself has affected water.”

Misunderstanding and misrepresentation of the science and facts surrounding shale gas production has diluted the potential of hydraulic fracturing for New York’s energy and economic future. And New Yorkers need only to look Pennsylvania and West Virginia, where natural gas development is being done in an environmentally responsible way.

Yesterday, under the headline “Gas drilling makes millionaires in Marshall County”, West Virginia Public Broadcasting notes the positive economic benefit drilling has brought into the homes of its residents, as well as its small businesses and community:

Some residents in Marshall County are becoming rich off Marcellus shale drilling. The gas drilling boom is creating an economic upswing throughout the community. Despite the recession, Marshall County is doing better than most counties in the state. It is now the #2 coal producing county in West Virginia. It’s also become a big draw for gas companies looking to tap the natural gas in Marcellus Shale deep underground.

Marshall County Commissioner Donald Mason said this means big money for some residents. “We have seen several people in our county become instant millionaires with the signing of the leases and some of them are already producing. There are rumors that some people are getting as much as $60,000 a month from their gas wells,” Mason said.

And the money from those lease checks is trickling into the community.

Back at Auto Choice in Moundsville, John Hunnel said he’s seen the Northern Panhandle area suffer from a loss in manufacturing jobs like glass and steel over the years. He said the Marcellus shale drilling activity has him feeling pretty optimistic about the future. “Anytime you have different jobs coming in to the area it does help. It brings other businesses along with it which is good, but I think this whole area is going to change dramatically within the next probably 5 to 10 years for sure,” said Hunnel.

Modern shale gas development is a labor-intensive task, for sure, requiring continual man power and thereby generating continued and much-needed employment opportunities. According the Pennsylvania Department of Labor & Industry, there are 141,000 Marcellus related jobs in the Commonwealth, with an average Marcellus wage of $69,996.

New York’s ongoing de facto moratorium – as well as the one passed by the General Assembly – will only continue to stifle the desperately needed economic potential of shale gas production for the state. The economic benefits are too great to be ignored.

As the Manhattan Institute study lays out, “Our analysis of Marcellus development in Pennsylvania suggests that environmentally safe development is possible in New York. Our study finds the net economic and environmental benefits from shale gas development to be considerable, suggesting that the current moratorium is far costlier than its proponents, or even its opponents, realize.”


Those in Glass Houses Shouldn’t Throw Stones: Pa. Paper Lodges Baseless Claims About Hydraulic Fracturing

Perhaps you caught the editorial in today’s Doylestown (Pa.) Intelligencer under the headline “Cawley vs. DEP: Two stories about natural gas fracking.” True to form, EID is eager to separate the facts from fiction regarding the claims made about hydraulic fracturing in this editorial.

But first, by way of background, here’s what the paper’s hard news section reported on Sunday under the headline “Cawley: No evidence of pollution from fracking”:

Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. Jim Cawley on Friday said that there was no documented evidence of water being affected by the fracking process used in the mining of Marcellus shale natural gas.

Now back to today’s editorial, which plays fast-and-loose with the facts. This from the piece:

Lt. Gov. Jim Cawley may want to check his facts a little more closely the next time he talks about the natural gas mining technique known as fracking.

The former Bucks County commissioner and now chairman of the Governor’s Marcellus Shale Advisory Commission last week told members of the county Transportation Management Association that there “has never been a documented case of water being affected by fracking for Marcellus Shale.”

Cawley’s deputy chief of staff maintained what his boss said was accurate, and that the process of fracking is not in itself risky.

With all due respect, a statement like that is akin to saying coal mining is not in itself risky. Or drilling for oil is not in itself risky. Or a nuclear power plant is not in itself risky.

But as they say, facts are awfully stubborn things. So, with all due respect to the paper’s editorial board members and editors, here are the facts:


U.S EPA: Not aware of any proven case where HF has affected drinking water

Earlier today, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson testified before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform at a hearing on gas prices and the “Pain At The Pump.” So why are we posting about this on EID? Great question. At the hearing, a Congressman posed the following question to the Administrator: “Is there any evidence that hydraulic fracturing however can affect aquifers and water supplies?” Click on the following video link for the Administrator’s response, which may (or may not) surprise you.

While we often disagree with Mrs. Jackson on a number of issues, today she deserves a hat tip for setting the record straight when it comes to the history and deployment of hydraulic fracturing technology.


Energy in Depth Issue Alert: Rep. Hinchey, EPA Administrator Jackson, HF, SDWA

On Tuesday, May 19, the office of U.S. Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-N.Y.) issued a press release subsequent to a hearing of the House Interior Appropriations Subcommittee suggesting the congressman had gotten EPA administrator Lisa Jackson to “acknowledge” the need for her agency “to reexamine the Bush administration’s misguided views on the risks associated with hydraulic fracturing.”

Context

In 2005, Congress passed (with the vote of then-Sen. Barack Obama) the Energy Policy Act, a key provision of which sought to clarify Congress’s historical intent on whether the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) of 1974 was ever designed to regulate hydraulic fracturing.

The answer was no, and in this case, history proved an effective guide: When SDWA was passed in 1974, hydraulic fracturing had already been in use for 25 years. Hydraulic fracturing was never considered for inclusion under SDWA jurisdiction at the time. The Act was amended in 1986, and then again in 1996. At no point in the process was the concept of SDWA regulation over fracturing ever considered a necessity – or even a possibility.

Subtext

Hydraulic fracturing is a commonly used, and increasingly critical, technology for finding and developing oil and gas resources trapped below rock that would otherwise be too deep, too hard and too expensive to access. The technique has been deployed more than a million times over the past 60 years, delivering to the American people more than 600 trillion cubic feet of American natural gas and seven billions barrels of American oil.

In 2008, a report issued by professors from Pennsylvania and New York suggested that the Marcellus Shale formation, a unit of sedimentary rock spread across much of the Appalachian Basin, could contain 516 trillion cubic feet of natural gas – enough to heat more than 60 million homes for 160 years. Without hydraulic fracturing, these resources cannot be feasibly or economically produced.

Politics

Those who oppose the responsible development of American energy have seized on hydraulic fracturing as a means of blocking reasonable access to, and production of, domestic energy resources. The centerpiece of their campaign appears to be focused on blaming hydraulic fracturing for everything from exploding houses in Ohio, to flammable water in Colorado, to hard water deposits in New York (each of these accusations, and others, are debunked here).

Despite these claims, hydraulic fracturing continues to be aggressively regulated by the states, and has compiled an unparalleled record of safety over the 60 years since its first commercial use.

Economic Impacts

More recently, legislation co-sponsored by Rep. Hinchey has sought to destroy this existing state-federal regulatory partnership in favor of an EPA-only approach. Were this and other restrictive regulatory measures to come to pass, a recent analysis showed it could result in the forced closure of more than half of America’s oil wells, a third of its gas wells, cost the federal government $4 billion in lost revenue, slash American oil production by 183,000 barrels per day, and natural gas by 245 billion cubic feet per year.

EPA on Record

In 1995, then-EPA administrator Carol Browner (currently the president’s energy and environment czar) wrote that that her agency saw “no evidence” that hydraulic fracturing “has resulted in any contamination or endangerment of underground sources of drinking water (USDW).”

“Moreover,” she added, “given the horizontal and vertical distance between the drinking water well and the closest gas production wells, the possibility of contamination or endangerment of USDWs in the area is extremely remote.”

In 2004, EPA issued a landmark report examining the question of safety as it relates to hydraulic fracturing, finding “the injection of hydraulic fracturing fluids” poses “minimal threat to USDWs.” In arriving at that conclusion, EPA stated it had “reviewed more than 200 peer-reviewed publications, other research, and public comments.”

States on Record

Recognizing that hydraulic fracturing is both a safe technology and a key driver of local economic development, states such as Alabama, Louisiana, North Dakota, Utah, Wyoming, Oklahoma and Texas have recently taken up or passed resolutions informing Congress and EPA that the current regulatory relationship is working well, and that efforts to disrupt it could produce serious and long-term consequences.

In New Mexico, former U.S. Energy Secretary and current Governor Bill Richardson introduced a plan in February aimed at easing unnecessary compliance burdens, recognizing that thousands of jobs and millions in potential revenue were tied to safe, responsible, state-regulated natural gas and oil production.

Statement from Lee Fuller, policy director for Energy In Depth

“Those familiar with the history surrounding the passage and amendment of the Safe Drinking Water Act understand what this measure was intended to do, and what it clearly was not. Unfortunately, instead of taking on the issue of responsible energy development candidly and on its merits, opponents of natural resource development have decided to target the essential tools needed to safely and efficiently bring this energy to market.”


Posts Tagged ‘Lisa Jackson’

The Facts Behind EPA’s Dimock Two Step

Monday, January 23rd, 2012

In Dec., EPA says water’s safe; in Jan, with no new data, it says it’s not – EID lays out what’s known and what’s not

Set aside all the stage props, backdrops and inflatable scenery deployed as part of the continuing saga known as Dimock, and you’re left with a pretty basic question – albeit one to which very few outside media have gone out of their way to find a legitimate, science-based answer. Quite simply: Is the water up there safe?

On Dec. 2, 2011, EPA declared that it was, sending an email to several Dimock residents indicating that the data it had reviewed from state-certified laboratories and the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection (DEP) “does not indicate that the well water presents an immediate health threat.” On Jan. 19, despite having no new data, EPA reversed its position, sending a letter to the agency’s hazardous site cleanup division demanding “immediate action” to protect public health and safety.

Predictably, those opposed to the development of affordable, clean-burning natural gas were quick to applaud the news — with ProPublica even declaring in a 38-point headline that EPA’s change of heart constituted “evidence of fracking contamination,” even though EPA never actually said that (and couldn’t have, since it gathered no data) and state experts consistently having shown it to be false. So once again, amidst all the pomp, circumstance and fanfare, we’re left with a couple questions: For starters, what do the data actually indicate is in the water? And second: Is there actually any evidence suggesting that any of it got there as a result of natural gas development?

In an effort to answer the first question, EPA released a series of memos and letters last week – the list is available here — laying out in specific terms what was found in wells tested by DEP on and near Carter Rd. But sift through the dozen or so documents posted on the website, and eventually you stumble across two memos of significantly greater value than the rest. The first is a memo written by technician Donna Ioven to Richard Fetzer, EPA’s “on-scene coordinator” in Dimock. The second is a 10-page letter from Mr. Fetzer to his bosses at EPA.

As you can see by clicking here, the Ioven memo is short, sweet and to the point: not even two pages in length, and almost all of it focused on identifying which specific components were found in which specific residential water wells. Of the eight wells for which DEP collected data, Ms. Ioven writes that four of them contained compounds of potential concern: Resident 4 had high levels of sodium and manganese; same for Resident 6; Resident 7 had manganese; and Resident 8, arsenic. These were the four households selected by EPA for water deliveries.

The Ioven memo is supposed to serve as the factual, technical basis for Mr. Fetzer’s letter to EPA’s Dennis Carney – capturing and reporting what is known and what isn’t, and passing that information up the food-chain for further consideration. But here’s the problem: Fetzer’s letter doesn’t look anything like Ioven’s memo. The latter, as mentioned, is a simple recitation of facts and figures. The former, unfortunately, reads more like a brief filed by a plaintiff’s attorney – attempting to defend EPA’s decision to intervene by going out of its way to link each of the components found in wells to drilling activity (and on several occasions, looking quite silly doing it).

Take, for instance, Mr. Fetzer’s explanation for how arsenic may have found its way into one private well: suggesting in his letter it could have gotten there from “the use and effects of drilling fluids.” But spend about 10 seconds researching the issue online, and you find that arsenic isn’t even used as a component of drilling and/or completing a well. So where did it come from? According to the U.S Geological Survey (4:00 of this video): “Overwhelmingly, the evidence that we have suggests that the arsenic we see in groundwater originates from natural sources.” Unfortunately, this overwhelming evidence appears to be news to Mr. Fetzer.

The Fetzer letter also makes sure to mention that “glycols” were found in one well, once again attempting to blame that on “drilling fluids.”

Glycols are a major ingredient of antifreeze, and much like other industrial processes, are sometimes used in very small percentages in an oil and gas context to prevent scale build-up in the pipe. Thing is, Cabot has already confirmed that it didn’t use any glycols when it drilled and completed its wells in the area more than two years ago. And actually, the one well in which glycols were detected came in at such low levels that EPA didn’t include that household among the four it chose to receive water deliveries. As reported by the Philadelphia Inquirer: “Tests also found glycol, which is used in antifreeze, at safe levels, and 2-methoxyethanol, a solvent, which does not have an established toxicity level. Those houses are not receiving shipments of water.”

So, after all that, apparently what we have is an issue with sodium and manganese. According to Mr. Fetzer, manganese is “known to be a constituent of some specialized drilling fluids.” Which fluids are those? And did Cabot actually use any of them in Dimock? Fetzer doesn’t say, probably because Fetzer doesn’t know. So we posed the question to the operator itself; the answer we got back was a resounding “no.” But, as we were reminded, neither sodium or manganese is considered a health hazard by EPA. In fact, EPA doesn’t even have what’s called a “maximum contaminant level” (or MCL) for either of those two. According to one federal report:

High levels of … manganese do not pose any known adverse health risks. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has not set maximum contaminant levels (MCL) for … manganese in the National Primary Drinking Water Regulations. Secondary maximum contaminant levels (SMCL) recommended in the National Secondary Drinking Water Regulations are set for esthetic reasons and are not enforceable by EPA.”

So there you have it. Boil it all down, condense it, strain it, and reduce it to its irreducible parts, and what you’re left with is a decision by EPA to spend hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars supplying water to people who don’t need it — a decision made less than two months after the agency deemed the water to be safe, using the same exact data that it cited last week in arguing the opposite. Of the four households set to receive water, three of them have elevated levels of two things that EPA itself doesn’t consider hazardous to health. And the fourth? According to federal scientists, that well has something in it of which “overwhelming evidence” indicates a natural origin. Not drilling a well.

But you know what really gets our goat? According to an updated study released by the Center for Rural Pennsylvania last year, more than 40 percent of private water wells tested in the state don’t meet basic health and safety standards for drinking water – for reasons that have nothing to do with oil or natural gas. Considering that more than three million folks across the state rely on wells for their water, that means more than one million Pennsylvanians could be drinking water today that’s unsafe.

All of which begs the question: If this thing weren’t about politics, why isn’t EPA supplying clean water to any of them?

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The Griswolds Go to Pittsburgh

Tuesday, November 22nd, 2011

Sprawling piece on natural gas development in SWPA lands in NYT Sunday Mag; EID sorts through the data that NYT’s Griswold leaves behind

If it’s true that the definition of a good compromise is one in which both sides leave unhappy, it might seem that the 5,700-word piece on Marcellus development in Washington Co., Pa. filed this past weekend in the Sunday magazine of The New York Times comes close to being one heck of a deal.

Writing about the piece on the environmental website Grist – no friend to shale – Sarah Laskow concludes that “anyone who already understands the issue should probably skip it, to avoid getting ticked off.” For what it’s worth, we happen to agree — albeit for different reasons.

On the positive side of the ledger, NYT contributor Eliza Griswold includes about a half-dozen stories from real folks in the Amwell Twp. community whose lives have been made materially better owing to the local development of enormous reserves of clean-burning natural gas from shale. Folks who now can keep their farms, send their kids to college, maybe even retire somewhere someday. Folks who care deeply about the quality and nature of their local environment, and who, despite the hype, have seen no evidence heretofore that Marcellus activity is deleterious to it.

Those are the parts that Grist doesn’t like, preferring instead the ones in which Griswold attempts to paint a picture of natural gas development as scourge to air, water, and land; hoof, hound and equine. But a closer look at the air and water testing data compiled by state regulators and third-party technicians – every bit of it publicly available; very little of it mentioned in this piece — reveals a reality in tiny Amwell Twp. very much at odds with the narrative put forth by the Times.

Below, we take a closer look at some of the claims made in the piece, and see how they stack-up when juxtaposed with the science.

Wrong on the basics

NYT: “’Fracking,’ as it is known, is a process of natural-gas drilling that involves pumping vast quantities of water, sand and chemicals thousands of feet into the earth to crack the deep shale deposits and free bubbles of gas from the ancient, porous rock.”

NYT: “This summer, Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York moved to lift the state’s yearlong moratorium on fracking against vocal opposition from environmentalists and many local residents. Following a series of hearings this month, New York will decide whether to allow fracking early next year.”

Wrong on Amwell Township

NYT: “Beth Voyles, 54, a horse trainer and dog breeder … signed the lease with Haney in 2008. She told Haney that her 11 /2-year-old boxer, Cummins, had just died. Voyles thought that he was poisoned. She saw the dog drinking repeatedly from a puddle of road runoff, and she thought that the water the gas company used to wet down the roads probably had antifreeze in it.”

NYT: “Voyles … called the Department of Environmental Protection to register yet another complaint about the stench. The D.E.P. sent out a water specialist, John Carson. … Voyles claims that Carson refused to take her complaint.”

NYT: “In Amwell Township, your opinion of fracking tends to correspond with how much money you’re making and with how close you live to the gas wells, chemical ponds, pipelines and compressor stations springing up in the area.”

Wrong on disclosure

NYT: “Popular concerns about natural-gas drilling have centered on what chemicals companies are putting into the earth, not least because this list is a proprietary secret.”

NYT: “In 2005, Vice President Dick Cheney spearheaded an amendment to the energy bill, which critics call the Halliburton Loophole. This legislation exempts hydraulic fracturing from the Safe Drinking Water Act and protects companies like Halliburton, of which Cheney was once the C.E.O., from disclosing what chemicals are going into the ground.”

Wrong on the numbers

NYT: “There are more than 4,000 Marcellus wells in Pennsylvania, with projections ranging from 2,500 new wells a year to a total of more than 100,000 over the next few decades.”

NYT: “According to a recent study by Pennsylvania State University, the industry has created 23,000 jobs, including employment for roustabouts, construction workers, helicopter pilots, sign makers, Laundromat workers, electricians, caterers, chambermaids, office workers, water haulers and land surveyors.”

NYT: “Currently, companies operating in Pennsylvania pay no tax to extract gas.”

NYT: “Banks have expressed reluctance to back home mortgages within up to three miles of a well. Whole towns could become brown fields, and home values would drop precipitously.”

Wrong on water management

NYT: “Disposing of the chemical water has meant trucking it to another state or paying local treatment facilities to process it. The facilities, which are not equipped to remove salts, have often sent the frack water back into local rivers.”

NYT: “Thanks to the money [Ray] received from allowing Range Resources to drill, build a compressor station and dig a chemical pond on his land, he has been able to reroof two barns, buy a new hay baler and construct an addition to his house for his 94-year-old mother.”

Wrong on “The Mon”

NYT: “In 2008 … [f]or several months, the Monongahela River, which provides most people in the Pittsburgh area with drinking water, no longer met state and federal standards. Following a request from the State of Pennsylvania, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers found it would require five times the amount of water in their reservoirs to dilute the river. It took five months to clean it up.”

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New Study Underscores Enormous Potential Economic Benefits From NY’s Marcellus Shale

Wednesday, June 8th, 2011

Earlier this week, New York’s state House doubled down on its bad bet of a year ago and sought to extend by another year the state’s moratorium on the use of fracturing technology — at least the kind requiring enough water to access the Marcellus. Such a proposal seeks to only further put out of reach the potentially widespread economic benefits – tens of thousands of jobs, millions in revenue – associated with shale gas production for New York State.

A recent New York Post editorial captures the contours of this debate:

“The longer fracking is verboten in New York, the longer the upstate region loses out on a promising economic boost. Indeed, new drilling operations alone could create thousands of jobs for the economically ailing area.”

Further, and perhaps even more clearly, these facts and economic potentials are echoed in a Manhattan Institute report issued this week. The report analyzed the economic and environmental impacts of shale gas development in New York State as based upon Pennsylvania’s Marcellus activity. The study indicated that a moratorium on drilling provides little environmental benefit while imposing large scale economic cost.

Data was generated on a per-well basis to create an “economic-environmental benefit-cost ratio for a typical Marcellus shale gas well.” The study further notes the importance of understanding the downstream positive externalities of natural gas potentials as an alternative to coal and oil energy generation.

Here are several key findings:

The authors also determine that “Clearly, the economic benefits of shale gas drilling far outweigh the environmental costs.” And it’s true, hydraulic fracturing has never impacted groundwater. And despite claims, EPA administrator Lisa Jackson – our nation’s top environmental watchdog – told Congress this recently when asked about fracturing:

“I’m not aware of any proven case where the fracking process itself has affected water.”

Misunderstanding and misrepresentation of the science and facts surrounding shale gas production has diluted the potential of hydraulic fracturing for New York’s energy and economic future. And New Yorkers need only to look Pennsylvania and West Virginia, where natural gas development is being done in an environmentally responsible way.

Yesterday, under the headline “Gas drilling makes millionaires in Marshall County”, West Virginia Public Broadcasting notes the positive economic benefit drilling has brought into the homes of its residents, as well as its small businesses and community:

Some residents in Marshall County are becoming rich off Marcellus shale drilling. The gas drilling boom is creating an economic upswing throughout the community. Despite the recession, Marshall County is doing better than most counties in the state. It is now the #2 coal producing county in West Virginia. It’s also become a big draw for gas companies looking to tap the natural gas in Marcellus Shale deep underground.

Marshall County Commissioner Donald Mason said this means big money for some residents. “We have seen several people in our county become instant millionaires with the signing of the leases and some of them are already producing. There are rumors that some people are getting as much as $60,000 a month from their gas wells,” Mason said.

And the money from those lease checks is trickling into the community.

Back at Auto Choice in Moundsville, John Hunnel said he’s seen the Northern Panhandle area suffer from a loss in manufacturing jobs like glass and steel over the years. He said the Marcellus shale drilling activity has him feeling pretty optimistic about the future. “Anytime you have different jobs coming in to the area it does help. It brings other businesses along with it which is good, but I think this whole area is going to change dramatically within the next probably 5 to 10 years for sure,” said Hunnel.

Modern shale gas development is a labor-intensive task, for sure, requiring continual man power and thereby generating continued and much-needed employment opportunities. According the Pennsylvania Department of Labor & Industry, there are 141,000 Marcellus related jobs in the Commonwealth, with an average Marcellus wage of $69,996.

New York’s ongoing de facto moratorium – as well as the one passed by the General Assembly – will only continue to stifle the desperately needed economic potential of shale gas production for the state. The economic benefits are too great to be ignored.

As the Manhattan Institute study lays out, “Our analysis of Marcellus development in Pennsylvania suggests that environmentally safe development is possible in New York. Our study finds the net economic and environmental benefits from shale gas development to be considerable, suggesting that the current moratorium is far costlier than its proponents, or even its opponents, realize.”

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Those in Glass Houses Shouldn’t Throw Stones: Pa. Paper Lodges Baseless Claims About Hydraulic Fracturing

Tuesday, June 7th, 2011

Perhaps you caught the editorial in today’s Doylestown (Pa.) Intelligencer under the headline “Cawley vs. DEP: Two stories about natural gas fracking.” True to form, EID is eager to separate the facts from fiction regarding the claims made about hydraulic fracturing in this editorial.

But first, by way of background, here’s what the paper’s hard news section reported on Sunday under the headline “Cawley: No evidence of pollution from fracking”:

Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. Jim Cawley on Friday said that there was no documented evidence of water being affected by the fracking process used in the mining of Marcellus shale natural gas.

Now back to today’s editorial, which plays fast-and-loose with the facts. This from the piece:

Lt. Gov. Jim Cawley may want to check his facts a little more closely the next time he talks about the natural gas mining technique known as fracking.

The former Bucks County commissioner and now chairman of the Governor’s Marcellus Shale Advisory Commission last week told members of the county Transportation Management Association that there “has never been a documented case of water being affected by fracking for Marcellus Shale.”

Cawley’s deputy chief of staff maintained what his boss said was accurate, and that the process of fracking is not in itself risky.

With all due respect, a statement like that is akin to saying coal mining is not in itself risky. Or drilling for oil is not in itself risky. Or a nuclear power plant is not in itself risky.

But as they say, facts are awfully stubborn things. So, with all due respect to the paper’s editorial board members and editors, here are the facts:

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U.S EPA: Not aware of any proven case where HF has affected drinking water

Tuesday, May 24th, 2011

Earlier today, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson testified before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform at a hearing on gas prices and the “Pain At The Pump.” So why are we posting about this on EID? Great question. At the hearing, a Congressman posed the following question to the Administrator: “Is there any evidence that hydraulic fracturing however can affect aquifers and water supplies?” Click on the following video link for the Administrator’s response, which may (or may not) surprise you.

While we often disagree with Mrs. Jackson on a number of issues, today she deserves a hat tip for setting the record straight when it comes to the history and deployment of hydraulic fracturing technology.

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Energy in Depth Issue Alert: Rep. Hinchey, EPA Administrator Jackson, HF, SDWA

Wednesday, May 20th, 2009

On Tuesday, May 19, the office of U.S. Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-N.Y.) issued a press release subsequent to a hearing of the House Interior Appropriations Subcommittee suggesting the congressman had gotten EPA administrator Lisa Jackson to “acknowledge” the need for her agency “to reexamine the Bush administration’s misguided views on the risks associated with hydraulic fracturing.”

Context

In 2005, Congress passed (with the vote of then-Sen. Barack Obama) the Energy Policy Act, a key provision of which sought to clarify Congress’s historical intent on whether the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA) of 1974 was ever designed to regulate hydraulic fracturing.

The answer was no, and in this case, history proved an effective guide: When SDWA was passed in 1974, hydraulic fracturing had already been in use for 25 years. Hydraulic fracturing was never considered for inclusion under SDWA jurisdiction at the time. The Act was amended in 1986, and then again in 1996. At no point in the process was the concept of SDWA regulation over fracturing ever considered a necessity – or even a possibility.

Subtext

Hydraulic fracturing is a commonly used, and increasingly critical, technology for finding and developing oil and gas resources trapped below rock that would otherwise be too deep, too hard and too expensive to access. The technique has been deployed more than a million times over the past 60 years, delivering to the American people more than 600 trillion cubic feet of American natural gas and seven billions barrels of American oil.

In 2008, a report issued by professors from Pennsylvania and New York suggested that the Marcellus Shale formation, a unit of sedimentary rock spread across much of the Appalachian Basin, could contain 516 trillion cubic feet of natural gas – enough to heat more than 60 million homes for 160 years. Without hydraulic fracturing, these resources cannot be feasibly or economically produced.

Politics

Those who oppose the responsible development of American energy have seized on hydraulic fracturing as a means of blocking reasonable access to, and production of, domestic energy resources. The centerpiece of their campaign appears to be focused on blaming hydraulic fracturing for everything from exploding houses in Ohio, to flammable water in Colorado, to hard water deposits in New York (each of these accusations, and others, are debunked here).

Despite these claims, hydraulic fracturing continues to be aggressively regulated by the states, and has compiled an unparalleled record of safety over the 60 years since its first commercial use.

Economic Impacts

More recently, legislation co-sponsored by Rep. Hinchey has sought to destroy this existing state-federal regulatory partnership in favor of an EPA-only approach. Were this and other restrictive regulatory measures to come to pass, a recent analysis showed it could result in the forced closure of more than half of America’s oil wells, a third of its gas wells, cost the federal government $4 billion in lost revenue, slash American oil production by 183,000 barrels per day, and natural gas by 245 billion cubic feet per year.

EPA on Record

In 1995, then-EPA administrator Carol Browner (currently the president’s energy and environment czar) wrote that that her agency saw “no evidence” that hydraulic fracturing “has resulted in any contamination or endangerment of underground sources of drinking water (USDW).”

“Moreover,” she added, “given the horizontal and vertical distance between the drinking water well and the closest gas production wells, the possibility of contamination or endangerment of USDWs in the area is extremely remote.”

In 2004, EPA issued a landmark report examining the question of safety as it relates to hydraulic fracturing, finding “the injection of hydraulic fracturing fluids” poses “minimal threat to USDWs.” In arriving at that conclusion, EPA stated it had “reviewed more than 200 peer-reviewed publications, other research, and public comments.”

States on Record

Recognizing that hydraulic fracturing is both a safe technology and a key driver of local economic development, states such as Alabama, Louisiana, North Dakota, Utah, Wyoming, Oklahoma and Texas have recently taken up or passed resolutions informing Congress and EPA that the current regulatory relationship is working well, and that efforts to disrupt it could produce serious and long-term consequences.

In New Mexico, former U.S. Energy Secretary and current Governor Bill Richardson introduced a plan in February aimed at easing unnecessary compliance burdens, recognizing that thousands of jobs and millions in potential revenue were tied to safe, responsible, state-regulated natural gas and oil production.

Statement from Lee Fuller, policy director for Energy In Depth

“Those familiar with the history surrounding the passage and amendment of the Safe Drinking Water Act understand what this measure was intended to do, and what it clearly was not. Unfortunately, instead of taking on the issue of responsible energy development candidly and on its merits, opponents of natural resource development have decided to target the essential tools needed to safely and efficiently bring this energy to market.”

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