Natural Gas Development Sullivan County, NY

 

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Current News Articles and Blogs On Topic

Updated almost every day.  Reflects a wide and assorted perspective providing both sides of the Natural Gas Development Issue. 

John Kavaller's Opinions & Comments on Topic

My own observations and opinions regarding Natural Gas Development in Sullivan County. As a realtor, father, community member, I am personally opposed to bringing Natural Gas to our county.

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Thursday, July 29, 2010EPA takes a new look at gas drilling, water issues

EPA takes a new look at gas drilling, water issues


Posted In: Energy
By MARC LEVY - Associated Press Writer - Associated Press
Tuesday, July 20, 2010

So vast is the wealth of natural gas locked into dense rock deep beneath Pennsylvania, New York, West Virginia and Ohio that some geologists estimate it's enough to supply the entire East Coast for 50 years.

But freeing it requires a powerful drilling process called hydraulic fracturing or "fracking," using millions of gallons of water brewed with toxic chemicals, that some fear could pollute water above and below ground and deplete aquifers.

As gas drillers swarm to this lucrative Marcellus Shale region and blast into other shale reserves around the country, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is taking a new look at the controversial fracking technique, currently exempt from federal regulation. The $1.9 million study comes as the nation reels from the Deepwater Horizon environmental and economic disaster playing out in the Gulf of Mexico.

The oil and gas industry steadfastly defends the process as having been proven safe over many years as well as necessary to keep the nation on a path to energy independence.

Studies have "consistently shown that the risks are managed, it's safe, it's a technology that's essential ... it's also a technology that's well-regulated," said Lee Fuller, director of the industry coalition Energy In Depth.

"A fair study," Fuller added, "will show that the procedures that are there now are highly effective and do not need to be altered — the federal government does not need to be there."

But because of the oil disaster, conservation groups say the drilling industry has lost it credibility and the rapid expansion of shale drilling needs to be scrutinized.

"People no longer trust the oil and gas industry to say, 'Trust us, we're not cutting corners,' " said Cathy Carlson, a policy adviser for Earthworks, which supports federal regulation and a moratorium on fracking in the Marcellus Shale.

Just six years ago, an EPA study declared the fracking process posed "little or no threat to underground sources of drinking water" and with that blessing, Congress a year later exempted hydraulic fracturing from federal regulation.

Now the agency, prodded by Congress even before the Gulf disaster and stung by criticism that its 2004 study was scientifically flawed and maybe politically tainted, will bring the issues to the heart of the land lease rush in the Marcellus Shale: Canonsburg, Pa., on Thursday and Binghamton, N.Y., on August 12.

EPA hearings earlier this month in Fort Worth, Texas and Denver focused on issues including drilling in the Barnett Shale of Texas, and in Colorado and Wyoming, which have experienced similar natural gas booms. Natural gas is also being recovered from the Haynesville Shale in north Louisiana, the Fayetteville Shale in northern Arkansas and Woodford Shale in southern Oklahoma.

In Texas, where drillers have sunk more than 13,000 wells into the Barnett Shale in the past decade, fear of the cancer-causing chemical benzene in the air above gas fields from processing plants and equipment has spurred tests by environmental regulators and criticism of the state's safeguards. In Colorado, numerous residents contend gas drilling has spoiled their water wells.

Advancements in horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing technology in the late 1990s significantly increased the yield and economic viability of tapping shale gas wells and led to the current natural gas boom, starting in Texas with the Barnett Shale. Fracking is now considered the key to unlocking huge, untapped natural gas reserves across the United States at a time when natural gas is emerging as a greener energy alternative to coal or oil.

The Marcellus Shale is 10 times the size of the Barnett, spanning 50,000 square miles compared with the 5,000-square-mile Barnett. It is also three times thicker than the Barnett at up to 900 feet, and is estimated to have a potential yield of 10 times as much gas (500 trillion cubic feet versus 50 trillion cubic feet).

At stake in the debate over how best to manage and regulate this enormous new natural resource is not just the safety of water supplies but also thousands of jobs, profits for the gas drilling and delivery industry and a bonanza of royalties for landowners.

"We've got to get it right," said Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., a sponsor of the so-called FRAC Act, which would repeal the 2005 exemption and require regulation of fracking by the EPA under the federal Safe Drinking Water Act.

"We allowed coal over many, many decades to be an industry that was so unregulated that it was allowed to do virtually whatever it wanted, and now we have numerous environmentally adverse impacts," he said.

Though the drilling rush into Pennsylvania is barely two years old, more than 3,500 permits have been issued and about 1,500 wells drilled, with thousands more expected. Environmental problems are already bubbling up: methane leaks contaminating private water wells, major spillage of diesel and fracking chemicals above ground, and fish kill in a creek.

A well blowout in north central Pennsylvania last month spewed natural gas and toxic fracking water out of control for 16 hours. State regulators found EOG Resources Inc. of Houston had failed to install a proper blowout prevention system — taking cost shortcuts. The state fined EOG Resources and a contractor more than $400,000.

A wary New York state has had a virtual moratorium on drilling permits for the Marcellus Shale region for two years while it completes an environmental review.

Fear of water pollution is so high that a sweet spot of the Marcellus Shale — the Delaware River watershed in southern New York and northeastern Pennsylvania that provides drinking water for 17 million people from Philadelphia to New York City — is virtually off-limits to drilling for now.

The industry says there is no evidence that fracking chemicals — some of them suspected human carcinogens — contaminate drinking water, wells or aquifers once blasted deep underground.

EPA summarized numerous reports of "water quality incidents" in residential wells, homes, or streams in Alabama, Colorado, Montana, New Mexico, Virginia, West Virginia and Wyoming but said there was inconclusive evidence linking the incidents to fracking.

Hydraulic fracturing, first used commercially in 1949 by petroleum services giant Halliburton Co. of Houston, was developed to eke gas and oil from impermeable rock. Water mixed with chemicals and sand is injected at high pressure to fracture shale, the sand holding fractures open so gas can flow up the well.

Each frack job uses an average of 4 million gallons of water, delivered to a well site by hundreds of tanker trucks. Some of the "produced" wastewater remains in the well — estimates range from 20 percent to 90 percent. What comes back up the well — briny, chemical-laden and possibly radioactive from exposure to naturally existing radon underground — is usually stored in open pits until it's trucked to treatment plants or underground injection wells.

In the northeastern Pennsylvania town of Dimock, state regulators have repeatedly penalized Houston-based Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. for contaminating the drinking water wells of 14 homes with leaking methane and for numerous spills of diesel and chemical drilling additives, including one that contaminated a wetland and killed fish.

Even as Pennsylvania officials work to improve their regulation of drilling, the state's environmental protection secretary does not want to cede authority.

"I'm not ready to turn Pennsylvania's resources over to the federal government," said John Hanger. "Right now, Pennsylvania has just about the very best drilling oversight in the country and we continue to keep working at it every day."

Hanger is quick to criticize the regulatory debacle of the federal Minerals Management Service and its cozy relationship with oil and gas corporations before the Deepwater Horizon explosion on April 20.

"That agency was captured by the drilling industry," he said.

The industry says it believes state oversight is sufficient and worries the new EPA study will lead to new and costly safety and environmental rules that would rob them of decades of profits.

In West Virginia, however, state officials concede they're overwhelmed trying to regulate the Marcellus juggernaut that has added hundreds of Marcellus wells to tens of thousands of traditional, shallow gas wells.

If passed, the FRAC Act would remove what's widely known as the "Halliburton loophole" — which exempted fracking from the Safe Drinking Water Act when the 2005 energy bill was passed.

The EPA, in a statement to The Associated Press, did not criticize its previous study. But given the rapid expansion of the industry and "serious concerns" about the impact of hydraulic fracturing, the agency said it concluded it was necessary to conduct a peer-reviewed study that draws upon best available science, independent experts and the public.

Posted by John Kavaller at 4:37 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: aquifers, Barnett Shale, EPA, FRAC Act, fracking, hydraulic fracturing, Marcellus Shale




Risks to U.S. shale gas production

FACTBOX-Risks to U.S. shale gas production

(Reuters) - Vast U.S. deposits of natural gas from shale are estimated to contain enough gas to meet domestic needs for up to a century. But development of shale 'plays' may be slowed by concern about environmental damage from chemicals used to extract the gas, and by the resulting laws and regulations designed to protect water and air.

Here are some potential risks to shale gas production:

* Groundwater contamination - Hundreds of residents who live near gas wells in different areas of the U.S. complain their water has become cloudy or foul-tasting since the gas industry has drilled wells. Homeowners from Texas to Wyoming to Pennsylvania say they have stopped using water from private wells after suffering upset stomachs, headaches, and rashes from bathing in it. Some farmers say cattle have died after drinking water contaminated with drilling chemicals; others blame the gas industry for cattle born with mutations from toxic chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking", a technique that has enabled a boom in shale gas production. Energy companies say there has never been a proven case of water contamination from fracking.

* Enforcement by state regulators - State governments, which regulate the natural gas industry have stepped up efforts to control development of shale plays. Officials in Pennsylvania - at the center of the massive Marcellus Shale formation - temporarily halted production by driller EOG (EOG.N) in June after a well blowout. Late in 2009, Cabot Oil & Gas was fined and ordered to shut down drilling and fracking in northeastern Pennsylvania until it complied with orders to stop methane leaking into private water wells.

* State legislation to protect air and water - In the Pennsylvania legislature, at least three bills would require disclosure of fracking chemicals, impose a moratorium on drilling until a detailed study establishes whether the process is safe, and prevent the state leasing more land to the gas industry until a study is done. Industry officials argue state regulation is sufficient and that federal oversight is not necessary.

* Federal probe into fracking - In January 2011, the Environmental Protection Agency will launch a two-year national study into whether fracking threatens drinking water. The probe, ordered by Congress, will include an examination of the nature and formulation of fracking chemicals, how they are transported and stored, and how the industry treats, recycles, or disposes of waste water after fracking. In Wyoming, the EPA will in late August release results of its first tests into claims that gas drilling is contaminating water supplies.

* The "FRAC" Act - Federal legislation would require disclosure of fracking chemicals and give the EPA the option of overseeing the natural gas industry. The law would close the so-called Halliburton loophole exempting the oil and gas industry from a federal clean water law.

* Jitters in New York State - Officials mull whether to allow fracking of the state's portion of the Marcellus Shale amid worries the industry could contaminate the New York City watershed, the source of drinking water for some 9 million people. City authorities have urged the state to ban fracking in the watershed. In Philadelphia, the city council has called for a moratorium on fracking in the Delaware River watershed - which supplies water to some 15 million people in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania -- until more is known about the process. American Rivers, an environmental group, this year named the Upper Delaware the most endangered river in the U.S. because of what it said was the threat posed by gas drilling.

* Academic reservations - A team from the University of Pittsburgh is working to aggregate local reports of water or air contamination through its "fractracker" website. At Cornell University, Professor Robert Howarth has argued the combined greenhouse gas emissions of extracting shale gas by fracking exceed those from other fossil fuels after the full production process is taken into account, despite evidence that carbon emissions from natural gas are half of those from coal.

* Local taxation - Lawmakers in Pennsylvania have agreed in principle to impose a production tax on gas from the Marcellus Shale; details will be worked out by Oct. 1. The new tax will bring Pennsylvania into line with most other fossil-fuel producing states.

* Investor concerns - Shareholders at 12 energy companies proposed resolutions at 2010 annual meetings calling for more information on fracking and stronger safeguards against any environmental damage it may cause. None of the proposals passed but all attracted many more votes than usual for social or environmental resolutions. (Reporting by Jon Hurdle; Editing by Sofina Mirza-Reid)


Posted by John Kavaller at 1:40 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: air and water contamination, contamination, hydraulic fracturing, regulations, risks ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Tuesday, July 27, 2010Drilling forum offers science and advocacy

Drilling forum offers science and advocacy


Sullivan County Democrat On-Line July 27, 2010
Part 2 of 2

By Dan Hust

MONTICELLO — Four panelists gave their views on gas drilling at the July 15 county-sponsored forum on drilling’s environmental and health impacts.

This is the second half of the article that originally appeared in this past Friday’s Democrat.

Advocate argues New York isn’t ready

Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) Senior Attorney Kate Sinding has become one of the most-quoted anti-drilling advocates in the country, and as the next speaker after Law, she made no bones about her feelings on the industry.

“Hydraulic fracturing is an inherently violent activity,” Sinding stated. “... You’re going down and pulverizing rock, and that can’t be taken back.

“... When those wellbores aren’t properly constructed,” she added, “they create a perfect pathway for contamination.”

And the wellhead isn’t always what’s called a “Christmas tree.”

“You’ve got big condensate tanks on there,” Sinding explained, with noisy, vibrating equipment operating 24/7.

Plus, “the Marcellus is a very, very salty formation,” she said. “... And New York State doesn’t currently have any facilities licensed to handle wastewater from natural gas drilling activities – neither the salt nor the radioactivity.”

Citing ozone pollution in western rural locales as bad as that in Houston or Los Angeles, Sinding said that “the speed and rate at which wellpads get developed ... is not something we’re at all equipped to deal with.”

She criticized the state for not including studies on cumulative and long-term impacts in its coming update of drilling rules.

“They failed to propose any regulations at all,” she said of the ongoing process. “... They’re just going to do it through permit conditions.”

But her standards are apparently quite high.

“There is no state we can point to that has adequate regulations,” Sinding related.

Noting she’s an advocate, not a scientist, Sinding said the industry needs to start tracking where fracking fluids go once they’re underground – especially if they endanger aquifers, which could render large drinking water supplies unusable for decades.

Plus, with the Utica Shale (underlying the Marcellus) presenting even more opportunities for the oil and gas industry, “that is only the tip of the iceberg in terms of ultimate impacts,” she warned.

Chesapeake weighs in

The only member of the panel to present a positive view of the drilling industry was a member of that industry: Paul Hartman, director of state government relations in New York for Chesapeake Energy Corp.

Though focused on Broome County currently, Chesapeake has been actively leasing properties in the Marcellus for the past two years and is currently the largest leaseholder in the state.

Hartman, however, insisted he’s not a shill for the industry, pointing out his stint as the Nature Conservancy of NY’s director of government relations, where he led a successful campaign to increase the state’s Environmental Protection Fund from $205 million a year to $222 million.

He also has extensive experience as an Albany lobbyist, including for the American Heart Association.

Through the course of his presentation, Hartman promoted the safety practices of Chesapeake and the gas industry in general, noting the lengths to which his company goes to ensure the integrity of the well and surrounding water supplies.

He drew a distinction between the drilling process and the fracking process (which begins after drilling has been completed), and listed the types of acidic chemicals that comprise .5 percent of the water/sand mixture used to prop open the fractured, gas-rich shale.

Though the mixture is different for varying geologies, Chesapeake uses just six of the near-300 additives available for fracking fluid, he added.

As for the millions of gallons of water needed to frack one well, Hartman said the gas industry accounts for only .1 percent of industrial water use in the U.S. Power generation comprises 71.7 percent, he said, followed by 16.2 percent for mining and 12 percent for public water supplies.

“Chesapeake Energy has made a commitment to 100 percent recycling and reusing all our produced water,” he explained, referring to the water/fracking fluid recovered from a gas well. “This is a huge step forward for the industry.”

He acknowledged that a completed wellpad can have more than a wellhead on it (or the six wellheads Chesapeake creates), but he said current technology has shrunk pad sizes from three acres to 1.5.

No water is discharged into the land surrounding the pad, he claimed, and all water sources within 1,000 feet of the well site are regularly tested.

“We go to great lengths to ensure the integrity of the site,” he added.

In the end, “the site is completely reclaimed when a well is no longer productive,” said Hartman.

Like the rest of the industry, he expects NY’s regulations to get tougher, but he feels that’s the role of the state rather than the federal government, which has exempted gas companies from following the Clean Air Act and Safe Drinking Water Act, among others.

“The industry is only as good as the enforcement,” he acknowledged.

But he affirmed Chesapeake is willing to pay more to the state to up its enforcement staff levels.

Some audience questions – like what happens to radioactive drill cuttings when they’re shipped to landfills but exceed acceptable safety levels – Hartman could not answer, but he vowed that Chesapeake will be a good neighbor, transparent and responsive.

“The closer people are to these activities,” he remarked, “we’ve found the more people embrace them.”

While he admitted nothing human beings do can escape impacting the environment, Hartmen felt the advantages outweigh the disadvantages.

“The environmental benefits of natural gas have long been well-known,” he said, pointing out that gas-powered machinery produces 50 percent less carbon dioxide than coal and 30 percent less than oil.

“This is an opportunity for a real environmental impact in our energy,” Hartman stated. “It is not the final answer [to transitioning to green energy], but we have many decades to go.

“... The innovation in this industry is evolving daily.”

For a complete video of the forum and another that preceded it, log on to the county’s website at www.scgnet.us.

Officials are planning one more free forum – on drilling’s economic and community impacts – on Thursday, August 19 at 5:45 p.m., again at the Monticello High School.


Drilling forum offers science and advocacy


Part 1 of 2

By Dan Hust--Sullivan County Democrat On-Line July 23, 2010

MONTICELLO — Four panelists gave their views on gas drilling at last week’s county-sponsored forum on drilling’s environmental and health impacts.

And much of that message urged caution.

“We want to make sure the environment and safety are addressed by the regulatory authorities before drilling is allowed to proceed,” explained County Manager David Fanslau by way of introduction.

“The purpose is to open a dialogue as to how we citizens should best be prepared for the challenges ahead,” added Planning Commissioner Luiz Aragon, the three-hour meeting’s host.

Cornell rock scientist shares observations

The forum began with a presentation by Anthony Ingraffea, a professor with Cornell University’s School of Civil and Environmental Engineering. He is recognized as a leading researcher in rock mechanics, especially fracturing.

He is currently the director of the Cornell Fracture Group, which has provided computer simulators to help the gas and oil industry more efficiently fracture wells. However, he stated he has no financial ties that would constitute a conflict of interest.

Ingraffea did not attack the industry, but he did counter what he feels is its frequent spin on various issues.

“The industry does not know everything it needs to know about massive hydraulic fracturing,” he told a crowd of about 200 inside Monticello High School’s auditorium. “... If we’re not careful, bad things happen.”

A major question on everyone’s minds that evening was whether fracking can impact groundwater and drinking water supplies.

“The laws of physics say it could happen,” Ingraffea related. “Will it happen? No one can guarantee that.”

Though companies could realize profits of $6-$10 million per well, he dismissed the idea that New York State could see the kind of closely-spaced wells prevalent out west.

“What we’re going to see in New York State is not what’s happening in Wyoming or Texas,” he explained.

Instead, he believes there’s no more than a 50 percent chance that in the next half-century the industry will access the estimated 72 trillion cubic feet of recoverable gas underneath the 17 NY counties within the Marcellus Shale – about 76,000 wells in all.

His slideshow illustrated that horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing have enabled the industry to site less wells across the land than in the past, and those vertical and horizontal wells are designed to reach every pocket of gas in a given area.

“This is not your mother’s hydraulic fracturing,” he remarked. “... This is going from a Model T to a Maserati.”

Still, the industry is just ramping up, and Ingraffea said royalties to property owners may not begin to flow for years.

What may change soon, however, is the content of the fracking fluid, as companies are engaged in creating non-toxic mixtures of chemicals, water and sand to prop open the underground fissures containing the gas.

“One of these [companies],” Ingraffea predicted, “is the next Microsoft.”

Responding to audience questions, he does not see a quick switch to air or propane fracking, due to technical and safety limitations.

He acknowledged that drill cuttings contained in fracking fluid can contain high levels of radioactivity, lamenting that no one is currently studying that issue.

Radon, too, is released during the gas production phase, he explained. It’s an odorless, colorless, tasteless, naturally occurring gas that can harm health but has mostly affected workers near wells, he said.

As for drinking water wells, Ingraffea urged listeners to get the highest level of testing conducted prior to drilling beginning (such tests cost about $1,000, he said).

If wells are contaminated, he told the crowd that they can be cleaned up, depending on the type and extent of contamination.

Of great interest to the audience was Ingraffea’s statement that studies have linked minor earthquakes in Texas with drilling in the gas-rich Barnett Shale – specifically due to deep well injections of waste fluids.

Back in New York, he worries more about the state Department of Environmental Conservation not having enough staff to handle the enormous amount of drilling permits expected to be applied for once the state finishes rewriting its rules.

Health effects warrant further study

Dr. Adam Law was the next speaker, an endocrinologist hailing from Cayuga Medical Center in Ithaca.

He remains unconvinced that there is enough scientific info on health impacts to allow drilling to move forward and is an advocate of prohibiting drilling until health studies are complete.

For that to happen, more industry cooperation is needed, said Law, especially in releasing the contents of fracking fluids.

“How can we look for toxicological information if we don’t know what’s being put in the ground?” he pointed out.

Utilizing examples through a slideshow, Law built a case that the human body is an extremely sensitive system that can suffer from even tiny amounts of chemicals diluted in thousands of gallons of water.

“The [fracking] brine is not really water,” he remarked, noting the presence of chlorides, heavy metals and toxins.

He also mentioned air pollution from increased truck traffic and diesel machine operation.

“Our whole region is going to be turned into an industrial zone,” he warned.

His advocacy for tighter regulations and further study of the gas industry is based on the “Precautionary Principle”: don’t undertake an activity where there is reasonable suspicion that it can harm the public health and the environment until it is scientifically demonstrated that such harm can be avoided.

“I have great concerns about this,” he acknowledged of drilling.

So much so that he got the members of the Tompkins County Medical Society in his hometown to advocate for a moratorium, followed by a petition signed by 70 upstate physicians.

In Tuesday’s paper: The Natural Resources Defense Council and Chesapeake Energy Corp give their views.

For a complete video of the forum and another that preceded it, log on to the county’s website at www.scgnet.us.

Officials are planning one more free forum – on drilling’s economic and community impacts – on Thursday, August 19 at 5:45 p.m., again at the Monticello High School.

Posted by John Kavaller at 1:05 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Chesapeake Energy, Clean Air Act, contamination, fracking fluid, Kate Sinding, Marcellus Shale, natural gas drilling, NRDC, pollutants





Monday, July 26, 2010

Affirming Gasland: (Josh Fox responds to criticism of his Movie Gasland)
Due to the length, I have simply linked to the .pdf file for easy reference.


A de-debunking document in response to specious and misleading gas industry claims against the film.

Posted by John Kavaller at 8:00 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Gasland, Josh Fox, rebuttal




Passions on Display at E.P.A. Meeting

Passions on Display at E.P.A. Meeting

July 23, 2010 by Tom Zeller, JR. GREEN Blog via the NYT



More than 1,000 people turned out for a hearing on hydraulic fracturing in Canonsburg, Pa.If the Environmental Protection Agency had hoped that the hundreds of landowners, students, community activists, environmentalists, and oil and gas representatives invited to a hotel ballroom in southwestern Pennsylvania on Thursday night would really stay on point, they were surely disappointed.


The aim of the meeting, which drew well over 1,000 attendees, was to solicit advice from stakeholders on how E.P.A. should focus and design a study of the impact of hydraulic fracturing on groundwater.

The agency’s regional administrator instructed the crowd at the outset that the meeting was not to become a debate on the merits of the practice, which involves injecting a high-pressure cocktail of water, sand and chemicals deep underground to crack the rock and release natural gas deposits.

Much advice was offered, and E.P.A. scientists and regulators took copious notes. Industry supporters, too, were on hand to urge that science trump emotion in any analysis and to point out that hydraulic fracturing has never been definitively linked to groundwater contamination.

But a vast majority of the more than 100 speakers used their two-minute turns at the microphone to unleash furious recriminations at the gas industry, hydraulic fracturing, and state and federal regulators for negligence in allowing it to continue. One resident called the E.P.A.’s pending analysis the equivalent of studying the flammability of Rome while the city was burning, while others offered a litany of personal experiences with ponds, streams and wells — all contaminated, they believe, by nearby natural gas fracking fluids.

"Corporations have no conscience,” said Dencil Backus, a resident of Mount Pleasant Township in Pennsylvania. “E.P.A. must give them that conscience.”

Hydraulic fracturing has been practiced in Pennsylvania and around the country for decades. The gas industry insists that no clear evidence has ever surfaced linking the fluids they use to crack open gas deposits to contamination of drinking water or any other systemic environmental problems.

The E.P.A.’s study — which is just getting started and is expected to be completed in early 2012 — aims to explore the connection further.

Pennsylvania is among several Northeastern states where the natural gas industry is priming for a boom. An industry-sponsored and financed study released this week suggested that the gas play known as the Marcellus Shale could generate some $6 billion in government revenue and create up to 280,000 jobs.

But with oil still washing up on the shores of the Gulf of Mexico, many residents were witheringly skeptical of drillers in general. “If you believe the industry line, it’s all coincidental and it’s not their fault,” Mel Packer, a member of Pennsylvania’s Green Party and a congressional hopeful, said of the dozens of personal stories from landowners complaining of water contamination from nearby gas wells. “I recognize a scam when I hear one.”

Whether the opprobrium is justified or misplaced remains a matter of debate, particularly among those seeking to nudge the nation toward cleaner sources of energy. Many experts consider natural gas, which burns more cleanly than coal or oil, to be a crucial bridging fuel in that process.

“Natural gas has played and will continue to play an important role in our energy portfolio as we transition to a new energy future, and we are fortunate to have domestic resources to help meet our growing needs,” Senator Bob Casey, a Pennsylvania Democrat, said in a prepared statement delivered to the assembly. “But I believe it is important to protect the health and safety of Pennsylvanians as we further develop the Marcellus Shale.”

Posted by John Kavaller at 7:49 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: EPA, Gulf of Mexico, hyraulic fracturing, natural gas, opposition to

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 Wednesday, July 21, 2010New Study Finds Natural Gas in Marcellus Shale Region Worth 280,000 Jobs, $6 Billion in Government Revenue

New Study Finds Natural Gas in Marcellus Shale Region Worth 280,000 Jobs, $6 Billion in Government Revenue


Eric Wohlschlegel
202.682.8114
wohlschlegele@api.org

WASHINGTON, July 21, 2010—Natural gas production in the Marcellus Shale region—if developed—could create 280,000 new American jobs and add $6 billion in new tax revenues to local, state and federal governments over the next decade, a new study released today finds.

“One of the biggest opportunities to create jobs and increase America’s energy security lies within the Marcellus Shale region,” said Jack Gerard, president and CEO of the American Petroleum Institute. “Pennsylvania, New York and West Virginia have enough natural gas to create hundreds of thousands of well-paying jobs and provide Americans with a stable, domestic energy source for generations to come.”

The study, “The Economic Impacts of the Marcellus Shale: Implications for New York, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia,” by Timothy J. Considine, Ph.D. of Natural Resource Economics, expands on a recent Pennsylvania State University study, which found similar economic benefits from developing the Marcellus region—a layer of shale rock underneath much of western Appalachia, from southern West Virginia into southwestern, central, and northeastern Pennsylvania, and the southern tier of upstate New York.

Natural gas production in the Marcellus grew considerably during 2009 adding 57,000 new jobs mostly in Pennsylvania and West Virginia. “This new analysis predicts that many tens of thousands of more jobs could be created in the coming years if public policies do not drastically limit production,” said Considine. "Under the best scenarios the development of Marcellus could mean $24 billion in total economic value to the region, which would positively impact all sectors of the economy including the service industry, construction, manufacturing, health care, and education.”

The study also examines factors that could limit the benefits of natural gas development in the region, including: a possible severance tax in Pennsylvania; the current de facto moratorium on horizontal drilling in New York, estimated at $11 billion dollar in lost economic output; and the effects of a challenging tax and regulatory climate in West Virginia.

"Maintaining production growth is like running on a treadmill. Slowing down drilling and production would negatively impact employment and economic growth. If governments pursue policies that encourage the development of natural gas, the ultimate benefits to the economy, the tax base, and society would be significant,” said Considine.

The study finds that natural gas development stimulates the economy through business-to-business spending and via payments to land owners. The process involves exploration, drilling, building gas processing plants, and pipeline construction. These activities require goods and services from many sectors of the economy, including construction, transportation, iron and steel, and engineering services. Natural gas companies also pay lease and royalty payments to land owners, who in turn pay taxes and spend income on goods and services.

For complete text of the survey and more information - including survey methodology - please go to: The Economic Impacts of the Marcellus Shale: Implications for New York, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia

Poll: Voters in key states overwhelmingly oppose new oil, natural gas taxes

New Study Finds Natural Gas in Marcellus Shale Region Worth 280,000 Jobs, $6 Billion in Government Revenue

Posted by John Kavaller at 5:23 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: and West Virginia, Pennsylvania, The Economic Impacts of the Marcellus Shale: Implications for New York  

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Sunday, July 18, 2010DRBC Approves Gas Permit in Philadelphia Watershed

DRBC Approves Gas Permit in Philadelphia Watershed


Published by Amy Wilson, July 17th, 2010 Government , Impacted Communities , Natural Gas 0 Comments

Delaware is a state I do not know much about. From elementary school and a road trip I remember that its capital is Dover and that Delawareans prize themselves on tasty seafood. My knowledge of Delaware extends beyond that, but I don’t claim to be any sort of expert.

But on Wednesday, I was impressed. That is because on Wednesday, at a hearing on a proposed natural gas development in Wayne County, Pennsylvania, the Commissioner from Delaware was the lone member of the interstate Commission – the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC) – who voted against the Stone Energy water withdrawal permit.

The DRBC is a regional agency with one elected Commissioner from each of the states within its watershed. It has staff people from Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, and a federal representative. DRBC programs address water quality protection, water supply allocation, regulatory review (permitting), water conservation initiatives, watershed planning, and other similar projects.

In this case, they were deciding on the highly contentious Stone Energy permit. If fully approved, the Stone Energy project would be the first permitted, non-test well approved in the Delaware River Basin; a watershed that serves 15 million people, including the Greater Philadelphia area.

Those of us who worry about water contamination from drilling in the Marcellus Shale gas formation, fear that this is a precedent-setting decision. There is a tremendous supply of gas trapped underground within the watershed, but accessing it threatens those who live nearby and downstream. Water contaminated from the undisclosed mix of chemicals (called fracking fluid) used to fracture rock and extract gas, could flow downstream to dozens of small towns; it could further wind its way through the Philadelphia water supply, which I depend on for my drinking water.

To the dismay of the hundreds of gas opponents who organized themselves for Wednesday’s event, the DRBC approved the water withdrawal permit. The company now awaits another decision on a natural gas well pad.

What does this mean? The battle is still on, and the fighting is getting uglier.

Wednesday’s hearing and vote on a water withdrawal permit was not the end of the permitting process, but it has generated a tremendous outpouring of opposition. Held in West Trenton, New Jersey, buses from New York City pulled into the parking lot, filled with New Yorkers keen to protect their water supply. More cars came from New Jersey and more than seven carpools from Philadelphia. The April public comment period delivered 1700 comments and in the past week just one natural gas group delivered 8000 letters opposing the water withdrawal permit and demanding a full moratorium within the watershed.

The hearing was held in a West Trenton Fire House that held between 600 and 700 people. Another 100-200 people were turned away because of a lack of overflow seating. The fact that many of those people had traveled hours on a Wednesday afternoon to attend this hearing didn’t sway Commissioners or Fire House staff people. The doors closed and those of us stuck outside, under the storm clouds, were not allowed to even get to the bathroom indoors. Sign up sheets circulated for those to testify grew long quickly and many testifying were locked out. More than double the number of people who were able to offer testimony signed up, myself included.

After standing outdoors for several hours, we were finally able to enter, but had no hope of speaking up.

In one belated attempt to enter my testimony to public record, I am placing it below. It may not be the official public record, and it is not before the vote has taken place, but I am placing it below as a reminder to the DRBC and the greater public that many of us prepared testimony and were silenced. Shut out despite a vested interest. I estimate that as many as a hundred of us who attended Wednesday’s hearing were had prepared testimony and were not able to be heard.

My testimony:

My name is Amy Wilson. I am testifying because I believe that any and all drilling in the Delaware River Basin threatens to contaminate my drinking water and the drinking water of up to 15 million others.

The careful review of any permit application and a yes vote should be an indication, an assertion even, that what follows is a safe, transparent, sustainable process. It should be an indication that the permit meets all standards and that the Delaware River Basin Commission has faith that the activity will not endanger the community or the ecological integrity of that environment.

And yet, there is no reason to believe that permitted fracking in the Delaware River watershed has any of the above attributes. Fracking in 32 states has resulted in near continuous catastrophes and the Philadelphia City Council unanimously passed a resolution urging the DRBC to enact a moratorium on all fracking in the watershed until an Environmental Impact Statement is complete.

We need a moratorium. Not new regulations, not new so-called exploratory wells. We need a Cumulative Impact Statement; an Environmental Impact Statement; a Health Study; full funding for DEP Programs, including the enforcement program; and full disclosure of all fracking chemicals. Even the EPA has not completed a broad scope fracking study.

A yes vote on the Stone Energy water withdrawal permit invites an outlaw industry with very little regulation and still, an offensively bad track record, to begin fracking in our watershed before impact statements are completed, or even begun. These studies are standard procedure for other industries.

But with the gas industry’s record, I understand why it is evading further study and more stringent regulations. Since June 2008, eight different gas companies paid approximately two million to settle charges of illegal water withdrawals in Pennsylvania streams. As reported by the New York Times, Stone Energy Corporation itself has been cited for “loss of well control” or a blowout, furthermore several of the blown out wells have still not been remediated. Maybe more alarming to watershed residents, Stone Energy has already violated DRBC drilling rules by drilling without a permit and has already been fined 70,000 for its Pennsylvania operations.

I don’t trust Stone Energy and more than that, there is public record that Stone Energy has recklessly operated oil and gas wells. These accidents are not aberrations; they occur industry-wide, nation-wide, day in and day out.

Regulations have produced violations, but they have not provided adequate incentives to drill safely. Proof? In the last seven months DEP inspections at Marcellus Shale sites have found more than 500 violations. In 2009, the DEP found more than 600 violations at drilling sites.

There are too many to detail. In September 2009, there was the now infamous contamination of wells in Dimock, PA. The spill rendered drinking water unusable and has resulted in a civil case against Cabot. More recently, on June 3rd Clearfield County experienced a blowout that resulted in natural gas and wastewater escaping from the well uncontrolled for 16 hours. Then, just days later on June 8th, a methane blast at a West Virginia natural gas well drilling site killed 7 people. These 600 plus Pennsylvania violations were uncovered by a woefully understaffed enforcement program. When a staff of 76, documents more than 600 violations within a year, within a state, anyone knows that the industry is so unscrupulous is it indifferent to any regulations and safety standards. It can no longer be permitted at all.

Permitting water withdrawal paves the way for more well explosions, more leaking pipelines, more open fracking pits, more wastewater trucking infractions, and exposure to toxic chemical compounds, heavy metals, and endocrine disruptors – including, but not limited to, fracking ingredients such as benzene, toluene, kerosene, and formaldehyde.

A yes vote on the Stone Energy water withdrawal permit is the first step on a perilous slope that leads towards expansive gas development and the uncontrolled gas disasters that we’ve seen in every other state with gas operations. We need you, the DRBC, to issue a moratorium on all gas drilling, not approve permits in our watershed.

Posted by John Kavaller at 8:23 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: DRBC, drilling, drilling fluids, drilling industry, natural gas, Philadelphia, Stone Energy, water supply, Wayne County PA


Cornell poll: Most in state see more risk than revenue in gas drilling

Cornell poll: Most in state see more risk than revenue in gas drilling


By Liz Lawyer •elawyer@gannett.com • July 16, 2010, 7:20 pm

The majority of New Yorkers feel the risks of drilling for natural gas in the Marcellus Shale outweigh any revenue that may come from it, according to a poll by the Cornell University Survey Research Institute.

The poll, conducted between Feb. 1 and March 29, covered subjects ranging from medical marijuana to quality of life issues, economic perceptions and the state budget.

Interviewers asked residents which of three statements best reflects their opinion about natural gas drilling in New York State: The revenues that would come to NYS from natural gas drilling outweigh any risk of contaminating the drinking water, the risk of contaminating the drinking water outweighs any revenues that would come to the state from natural gas drilling or do not know enough about the natural gas drilling issue.

Out of a sample of 800 subjects, 53 percent across the state said the risks outweigh the revenues, and 25 percent said the revenues outweigh the risks. Twenty two percent said they did not know enough about the issue to offer an opinion.

The gap was less pronounced upstate, researchers found.

"The results are quite interesting," said Survey Research Institute Director Yasamin Miller. "Though the majority opposed drilling, upstate residents were more in favor of it. The implication is that upstate is just so economically depressed, they're looking at the (drilling) business as an opportunity to bring in jobs and revenue to the area."

Among upstate residents, 43 percent said the risks of drilling outweighed the revenues. Those with this opinion still outnumbered the 35 percent who said the revenue outweighed risks, but the gap was less pronounced than downstate, where 59 percent said the risks outweigh revenues and only 20 percent held the opposite opinion.

In both regions, about the same percentage of people said they didn't have enough knowledge of the issue to form an opinion -- 22 percent upstate and 21 percent downstate.

The poll also found that while people across the political spectrum were more likely to say the risks outweighed the benefits, that trend decreased among conservatives. Those saying risks were a greater concern made up 60 percent of those identifying as liberal, 54 percent of those identifying as moderate and 44 percent of those identifying as conservative. Those saying revenues outweighed risks made up 18 percent of liberals, 24 percent of moderates, and 34 percent of conservatives.

Among those affiliated identifying with a political party, 63 percent of Democrats and 48 percent of independents said the risks were greater than possible revenue, while a plurality of Republicans -- 42 percent -- said revenue possibilities outweighed risks.

Posted by John Kavaller at 8:09 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Cornell Poll, Liquefied natural gas, natural gas drilling, survey, upstate NY

Saturday, July 17, 2010

Cabot seeks to get out of Sullivan (County,NY), Wayne (County, PA)

Cabot seeks to get out of Sullivan (County,NY), Wayne (County, PA)
July 16, 2010 via the Sullivan County Democrat on-line edition
By Dan Hust

SULLIVAN COUNTY — Cabot Oil and Gas, one of the early players in the natural gas leasing effort in the area, has put its entire leased acreage in Sullivan County up for sale.

It’s also doing the same in neighboring Wayne County, PA, likely because of the ongoing regulatory uncertainty in the Delaware River watershed.

Cabot’s director of external affairs, George Stark, told the Democrat this week that the company is selling the leases on its 4,707 acres in Sullivan County and its 11,797 acres in Wayne County in order to focus on operations in Susquehanna County, PA.

That region of Pennsylvania sits within the Susquehanna River watershed, where numerous permits have been given over the past three years to drill into the gas-rich reserves of the Marcellus Shale.

“This year, we’re set to drill 90 wells in Susquehanna County,” Stark explained.

He added that Cabot has invested $500 million so far in Susquehanna and plans to invest another $400 million there this year.

Meanwhile, leasing in Sullivan County has come to a halt as the industry awaits the outcome of rules rewrites by both New York State and the Delaware River Basin Commission (DRBC).

The state Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) is getting ready to release a final Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Statement later this year that will address more recent drilling technologies, including the controversial process of hydrofracking.

And the DRBC has put a moratorium on any water withdrawals within the Delaware River watershed for gas drilling until it can reassess and rewrite its rules pertaining to such. That could take as much as a year, though no specific timetable has been set.

Though production wells draw the most water – some estimates have been as high as four million gallons a day per well – even exploratory wells use some water, so the moratorium has stopped drilling plans on both sides of the Delaware (save for a few pre-existing exploratory wells in Wayne County).

When asked if the regulatory issues are responsible for Cabot’s decision to sell, Stark would not directly answer, only reiterating that Cabot sees great potential in north-central Pennsylvania.

“We’re excited to have the opportunity to invest in Susquehanna County,” he remarked.

Cabot, however, is embroiled in litigation in Susquehanna County, where residents of Dimock are alleging its well-drilling activities have contaminated their water supplies. The state investigated and agreed – forcing the company to pay fines and change its environmental practices – but Cabot continues to do drilling business in that area.

Cabot’s 4,707 acres in Sullivan County are mostly comprised of forested, hunting club land close to the Millennium Pipeline in the towns of Bethel, Delaware, Highland, Tusten and Cochecton.

The leases run with the land and are being advertised by Cabot’s auctioneer, the Oil & Gas Asset Clearinghouse, as its prime value.

A brochure put out by the Clearinghouse says the properties’ collective net revenue interest (NRI) is 85 percent and that the acreage features “dry, pipeline-quality gas” on land “located in proven parts of prolific Marcellus trend.” No drilling has yet been conducted on these properties, however.

Bids can be for all the properties (which includes 14,467 acres in West Virginia) or for just the acreage in a particular state. Bids are due by August 3.

For more information, go to www.ogclearinghouse.com.

Posted by John Kavaller at 9:17 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: BP Deep Water Horizon oil spill, Cabot Oil and Gas Corp, Delaware River watershed, DRBC, Sullivan County NY, Susquehanna County PA, Wayne County PA

Friday, July 16, 2010

Understanding leases, land use and property rights of lease-holders, neighbors and municipalities.

Sullivan County, New York


Understanding Gas Drilling

Property and Landowner Issues

June 29, 2010

Understanding leases, land use and property rights of lease-holders, neighbors and municipalities.

Posted by John Kavaller at 12:09 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: drilling, leaseholders, leases, municipalies, Natural Gas Drilling Map, neighbors, Sullivan County Forums


Thursday, July 15, 2010Natural Gas No Quick Fix for U.S. Energy Woes

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 14, 2010
3:38 PM
CONTACT: Food & Water Watch
Kate Fried, Food & Water Watch: (202) 683-2500, kfried(at)fwwatch(dot)org.

Natural Gas No Quick Fix for U.S. Energy Woes

Food & Water Watch Report Points to Need for Better Federal Regulations; Activists in Delaware River Basin, Colorado and Virginia Fear Risks from Fracking

WASHINGTON - July 14 - In the wake of April's calamitous oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, pundits are pointing to natural gas as the resource to save the U.S. from its energy woes. But a new report released today by the national consumer advocacy group Food & Water Watch suggests that relying on this polluting technology may simply set the nation up for further ecological disasters.

Not so Fast, Natural Gas: Why Accelerating Risky Drilling Threatens America's Water outlines the ways in which the rapid expansion of the oil and gas industry's use of hydraulic fracturing (also known as "fracking") in recent years compromises essential drinking water resources, human health and the environment.

The process of extracting gas from rock formations, fracking relies on a chemical cocktail that can be toxic if leaked into groundwater supplies. The industry is not required by federal law to report the type or quantity of chemicals it uses, and only ten states require disclosure of this information. Analysis of what industry information is available reveals that many of the chemicals used in the process can be harmful to human gastrointestinal, respiratory, and nervous systems, especially if leaked into drinking water supplies.

"Much in the same way that April's oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico caused many to question the risks posed by shore oil drilling, hydraulic fracturing poses a profound risk to our nation's drinking water," said Food & Water Watch Executive Director Wenonah Hauter. "Unlike oil drilling however, it doesn't take a single blowout to create an environmental catastrophe. The dangers of fracking are slow, yet insidious."

Waste generated by the process is also an environmental hazard, especially because it is often injected underground or sent to wastewater facilities that often lack the resources to effectively treat it. In addition to polluting local water, hydraulic fracturing can also be responsible for its depletion. The process can use up to 3.8 million gallons of water to drill a single well. Large-scale extractions of ground and surface water can threaten drinking water supplies and upset the balance of local ecosystems.

"In the debate about natural gas drilling one question looms large," said Tracy Carluccio, Deputy Director of the Delaware Riverkeeper Network. "What are the risks of rushing ahead with the dangerous extraction practices that the industry is using to force gas out of deep shale deposits?"

Despite these questions, and the public health and environmental risks associated with hydraulic fracturing, the practice of using it to extract gas from shale is on the rise. Shale gas grew from 1 percent of the U.S. natural gas energy supply in 2000 to 20 percent in 2010. It is expected to expand further as many companies eye the potential energy reserves trapped within the Marcellus Shale. The first reported Marcellus Shale well in Pennsylvania was drilled in 2003, and by May of 2010, 1,164 wells had been drilled in the portion of the Marcellus Shale under that state alone.

The industry's rapid expansion may be due in part to the federal government's lax oversight. The Energy Policy Act of 2005, for instance, exempts hydraulic fracturing from the section of the Safe Drinking Water Act that protects groundwater from chemical contamination. This may be attributed to the industry's lobbying efforts. The Natural Gas Alliance has spent $1.6 million since 2009 convincing Congress to favor its particular interests.

With the federal government doing little to protect consumers and the environment, opposition against the industry is gaining momentum on the local level. In 2008, New York moved to require companies to reveal the chemicals they use, and Governor Patterson demanded that the state update its environmental review process that approves new hydraulic fracturing projects. Lawmakers in Pennsylvania, Delaware and Texas have established moratoriums on further drilling.

Residents and activists in Colorado, where the process has been in place for more than twenty years, still have concerns. "How many more times are policymakers going to allow industry profits to matter more than public health?" said Josh Joswick, Energy Issues Organizer for the San Juan Citizen's Alliance in Durango, Colorado. "There needs to be public disclosure of what is being injected into our waters."

In regions rich with natural gas deposits that the industry is looking to exploit, activists are encouraging governments to act to protect consumers and the environment from the effects of hydraulic fracturing before it's too late. "With the hydrofracking industry's recent interest in expansion into Virginia, we have an opportunity to take a hard look at what this has meant for communities and natural resources in other states," said Kate Wofford, Director of Shenandoah Valley Network. "Our localities now have a chance to work with the Commonwealth to impose safeguards that will protect water sources and citizens, rather than allowing gas companies to drill first and ask questions later."

Many experts are calling on the federal government to step up its efforts to prevent the natural gas industry from inflicting more damage. The Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals Act, which is currently moving through Congress, would close the loophole that excludes hydraulic fracturing from the regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act.

"The long-term safety of public water is more important than an indefinite energy resource. That is why the federal government needs to act swiftly to protect the public from this reckless industry, and to seek safe, sustainable energy production methods," noted Hauter.

Not so Fast, Natural Gas: Why Accelerating Risky Drilling Threatens America's Water is available here: http://www.foodandwaterwatch.org/water/report/natural-gas/
.###
Food & Water Watch is a nonprofit consumer organization that works to ensure clean water and safe food. We challenge the corporate control and abuse of our food and water resources by empowering people to take action and by transforming the public consciousness about what we eat and drink.

Posted by John Kavaller at 8:37 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: drinking water, enviromental hazards, hydraulic fracturing, public disclosure, Safe Drinking Water Act

Penn, allows to resume gas drilling

2010-07-13 18:25 (UTC)

NEW YORK, July 13 (Reuters) - Penn, allows to resume gas drilling

Following a 40-day suspension, EOG Resources Inc and C.C. Forbes LLC will be able to resume drilling activities in the state, the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection said on Tuesday.

Both companies were suspended due to a June 3 natural gas well lowout in Clearfield County.

In a statement, the DEP said an independent investigation released Tuesday showed 'untrained personnel and the failure to use proper well control procedures were the principal causes' of the June blowout.

DEP Secretary John Hanger said the blowout, which allowed natural gas and wastewater to escape from the well uncontrollably for 16 hours was the result of failures by EOG Resources, the well's operator.

The company and its contractor, C.C. Forbes LLC, lost control of the well while performing post-fracturing well cleanout activities. 'The blowout in Clearfield County was caused by EOG Resources and its failure to have proper barriers in place. This incident was preventable and should never have occurred,' said Hanger.

EOG Resources was ordered to take nine corrective actions and was fined $353,400, while C.C. Forbes, a division of Forbes Energy Services, was ordered to take six corrective actions and fined $46,600. EOG Resources, formerly known as Enron Oil & Gas Co, operates approximately 297 active wells in Pennsylvania, 139 of which are in the Marcellus Shale formation.

In light of the findings, Hanger said his agency had written each company drilling in the Marcellus Shale to ensure they understand proper well construction and emergency notification procedures. The Marcellus Shale, which stretches across parts of Pennsylvania, New York, Ohio and West Virginia, is estimated to have enough gas to meet total U.S. needs for a decade or more and is drawing the attention of major energy companies as well as groups concerned about possible health risks from controversial drilling techniques.

(Reporting by Eileen Moustakis; Editing by Sofina Mirza-Reid)
((eileen.moustakis@thomsonreuters.com; +1 646 223 6074; Reuters

Messaging: eileen.moustakis.reuters.com@reuters.net))Keywords: ENERGY NATGAS/PENNSYLVANIA

Copyright Thomson Reuters 2010. All rights reserved

Tuesday, July 13, 2010How drilling companies won't take no for an answer

How drilling companies won't take no for an answer

Published: Sunday, July 11, 2010, 8:39 AM
Updated: Sunday, July 11, 2010, 3:39 PM

Glenn Coin / The Post-Standard

Riolo stands by his truck next to a drilling field behind his property in Lebanon. "There's nothing you can do to stop it," said Riolo, who was forced to have two 5-acre parcels integrated into the drilling area. He gets about $350 a month in royalties from the gas company.

Share Nick Riolo didn’t want gas drilling beneath his property in the Madison County town of Lebanon, but he had no choice.

Under what the law calls compulsory integration, a gas company can drill under land without permission of the owners if enough of their neighbors have already leased their property to the company.

“There’s nothing you can do to stop it,” said Riolo, who had about 7 acres integrated into a drilling area. “I called a lawyer and he said, ‘You don’t really have a choice.’ ”

While compulsory integration has been going on for years, it’s likely to become more widespread and more controversial if New York allows a new type of drilling to begin next year in deep shale formations. Drilling in the Marcellus and other shales will encompass much larger tracts of land than previous types of drilling did because the gas is scattered throughout a rock formation that runs from Virginia to New York. In addition, the injection of millions of gallons of chemical-laden water at high pressure to fracture underground rocks – called “hydrofracking” — has raised concerns about tainted wells and streams.

Compulsory integration “is a sleeping giant,” said Chuck Geisler, a development sociology professor at Cornell University who specializes in land use policy. “If and when New York state starts issuing permits, this is going to start showing up and it’s going to take us by surprise.”

In southern and Central New York, thousands of land owners are weighing whether to capitalize on the projected underground gold rush or fight the environmental consequences of hydrofracking. In Onondaga County alone, about 1,900 separate parcels are leased to gas drilling companies, said Lindsay Speer, a community organizer who works with Neighbors of the Onondaga Nation.

Many neighbors of those landowners have not signed leases, either holding out for a better deal or refusing to sign at all because they fear damage to the environment or their own wells. Compulsory integration would remove that choice for many landowners if enough neighboring property is already leased.

“I think it really can drive wedges between neighbors who are pro, con and undecided,” Geisler said.

Industry officials and regulators say the law actually protects landowners. Gas companies cannot drill on the land included in a drilling area without the owner’s consent. The law requires gas companies to pay royalties to owners integrated into the drilling, and gives those owners the options of simply receiving royalties or becoming partners in the drilling.

“They are basically being compensated — using a method they choose — for the oil and gas produced from beneath their lands,” said Maureen Wren, spokeswoman for the state Department of Environmental Conservation.

Riolo said he receives about $350 a month in royalties from the gas company, Norse Energy Corp.

The law also guarantees that landowners who want to sell the gas beneath their land won’t be held hostage by a minority of their neighbors, an industry official said.

“If you have a majority of landowners that want to have a well developed and you had a landowner with half an acre, that half-acre holdout could preclude the other landowners throughout the whole 640 acres from having their resources developed and gaining an economic benefit from it,” said Brad Gill, executive director of the Independent Oil and Gas Association of New York. “That would not be fair at all.”

Under existing state law, gas companies draw up a “spacing unit,” an area of up to a square mile, or 640 acres, under which they plan to extract natural gas. If the owners of at least 60 percent of that land agree to let their gas be extracted, the remaining landowners can be required to become part of the unit.

Those landowners — referred to as “uncontrolled owners” — can choose to become a partner in the well, sharing the costs and profits, or can elect to receive simple royalty payments. Those payments would be no less than the lowest percentage paid to anyone else in that unit — typically at least 12.5 percent of the value of the gas attributed to their land.

Compulsory integration has been in place for a long time under traditional gas drilling methods, which generally drill a single, straight well that taps into a large pocket of gas underground.

The newer techniques of high-volume hydrofracking and extensive horizontal drilling in deep shale, however, are more controversial. They involve drilling thousands of feet down into shale, turning and drilling more than a mile horizontally, and injecting millions of gallons of water infused with chemicals to shatter the shale and release gas.

“It’s like the difference between a Model T and a Maserati,” said Tony Ingraffea, a Cornell University professor of civil and environmental engineering.

The state is still drafting regulations on the high-volume hydrofracking, and no permits will be issued until later this year or early 2011, the state DEC said.

Some predict that compulsory integration will come to the forefront of the hydrofracking debate once permits are issued.

“If people get angry enough once the Marcellus shale drilling starts, there will be more of an uproar,” said Jane Welsh, an attorney in Hamilton who represents clients who have been forced into drilling areas. “You’re going to be talking about a lot more land coming in via uncontrolled owners.”

Across Central New York and the Southern Tier, coalitions of homeowners have sprung up to try to negotiate the best deal with companies who want to lease land for drilling.

“One of the major reasons for forming a coalition was compulsory integration,” said Eve Ann Shwartz, a farmer in the town of Hamilton and a founder of a coalition there that represents property owners with a combined 20,000 acres. “I think it’s eminent domain in sheep’s clothing.”

» Contact Glenn Coin at gcoin@syracuse.com or 470-3251.

Posted by John Kavaller at 5:31 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: compulsory integration, fracking, Norse Energy Corp, uncontrolled owners


Monday, July 12, 2010Incubator looking to make mark in shale research

Incubator looking to make mark in shale research
POSTED: July 11, 2010

By MICHAEL RUKAVINA

OBSERVER Staff Writer

The SUNY Fredonia Technology Incubator's primary tenant is start-up companies looking to bring new and exciting ideas into the local business community, but one of its more interesting occupants may be the SUNY Fredonia Shale Research Institute.

While interest in Marcellus Shale continues to grow, particularly in New York State, the institute receives a greater deal of attention.

"Interest in the Marcellus remains high. The state is reviewing the potential environmental impact of Marcellus exploration and production, which is probably not necessarily a bad idea," stated Dr. Gary Lash, Director, SUNY Fredonia Shale Research Institute. "The current thinking is that permits will be issued sometime early in 2011. As people have pointed out, the gas isn't going anyplace."

Lash exploded onto the front lines of the shale study a few years back, along with Terry Engelder of Pennsylvania State University, as the two predicted that 500 trillion cubic feet to 1.3 quadrillion cubic feet of recoverable gas reserves lay within the shale.

The Shale Research Institute inside the incubator, which is engaged principally in basic research regarding these deposits, and not just the Marcellus shale, has received support both financial and in the form of equipment from Chesapeake Energy and EQT Corp.

"Our work is now focusing on relating the milieu of reservoir properties important to exploration and production considerations to the depositional environment of the shale deposits," Lash explained. "The goal is to become much more predictive in understanding the potential distribution in seemingly homogenous shale deposits. This work entails field studies carried out in western New York, subsurface analysis of well logs from across the Appalachian Basin, and laboratory work that includes the simulation of the conditions under which oil and natural gas form."

In March of 2010, it was determined New York state could raise more than $200 million in fiscal year 2010-11 alone by expediting the auction of state land leases and the application approval process under a proposal being advanced by the Independent Oil & Gas Association of New York. The industry recommended funds from the proposal be used to help restore cuts to the Department of Environmental Conservation's Environmental Protection Fund (EPF). In addition, the funds raised could support additional staffing at several state agencies to oversee the review, approval and enforcement/oversight processes for Marcellus Shale applications and operations.

"New York is in a major fiscal crisis, including a budget deficit of more than $8 billion," said IOGA of NY Executive Director Brad Gill. "The oil and gas industry is offering to be part of the solution. Our industry wants to expand in New York and, unlike other industries and corporations, we are not looking for handouts from the state."

Given the status of off-shore drilling of oil, all of the necessary precautions will be taken as the process moves forward.

"Regarding regulations; I would imagine that the ongoing DEC study will modify or supplement existing regulations prior to giving the green light to Marcellus exploration," Lash said. "Understand that Marcellus wells can be drilled in the state at the present time; however, they could not be fracced. The very low permeability of these rocks necessitates fracturing as a means of creating the permeability necessary to conduct gas to the well bore."

The DEC is expecting a new environmental impact statement to regulate expanded natural gas exploration in the Marcellus Shale formation, which extends from New York's Western Catskills and Southern Tier into Pennsylvania and West Virginia. The Marcellus is America's largest natural gas deposit, and it carries the potential to greatly increase New York's energy independence, while vastly improving economic recovery and job creation.

As far as the rest of the incubator is concerned, Director Bob Fritzinger, said tenants have continued to move into over the past few months, however, constant care is taken as to how much is occupied at one time.

"The pipeline remains very strong," he noted. "In terms of how we manage the building, you need to take some care about space, reserving a bit for two applications: new applicants and internal growth. If you completely fill the building, you're constantly declining those requests and you're not really an incubator any more. For us, the art will be managing ourselves up to about 75-80 percent saturation and then working with our tenants on the graduation event so we have a fairly predictable amount of available space. That permits us to continue to market our capabilities, scheduling new applicants into the building as we get them prepped."

Comments on this article may be sent to mrukavina@observertoday.com

Posted by John Kavaller at 10:14 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Chesapeake Energy, Marcellus Shale, SUNY Fredonia Shale Research Institute, SUNY Fredonia Technology Incubator, Western Catskills

Natural Gas Drilling In Sullivan County, NY & Beyond
Articles-Opinions-Blogs from Many Places--Both Pro and Con

Most Current at Top of the Page

Will the test wells be halted?
Federal agencies weigh in

By FRITZ MAYER - River Reporter Newspaper on Line

UPPER DELAWARE VALLEY — There are now five test wells being constructed in Wayne County, but if an environmental group is right, those wells may soon be shut down because they will require review by the Delaware Basin Commission (DRBC).

On June 14, Carol Collier, the executive director of the DRBC, announced from that point forward test wells along with all other wells would require permits from the commission, but nine wells that had already received permits from the state could go forward.

However, on June 25, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife joined with the National Park Service to send a letter to the DRBC urging that the five test wells also be reviewed. According to the environmental group Damascus Citizens for Sustainability (DCS), the action from the two federal agencies compels the DRBC to comply.

DCS issued a press release calling the development a “game changer,” and said under DRBC rules it will be required to shut the wells down until it completes the process of formulating new regulations about how gas drilling will proceed in the basin.

The Northern Wayne Property Owners Alliance (NWPOA), a landowners collective representing gas leaseholders, did not respond to an email seeking comment.

Kate O’Hara of the DRBC said, “The commissioners will consider the letter’s request at the July 14, 2010 DRBC meeting and public hearing.”

In a related development, Newfield Exploration Company and Hess Corporation sent letters to NWPOA lease holders saying that they were suspending payments on the leases until the DRBC completes the rule making process.

According to an article in the Philadelphia Inquirer, the move throws into doubt some $200 million in payments to Wayne County property owners. NWPOA has hired a law firm in Philadelphia to pursue their interests with the DRBC.

Saturday, July 10, 2010Utilities Face the Decision Point of Big Shifts -- to Gas, Renewables and Efficiency

Utilities Face the Decision Point of Big Shifts -- to Gas, Renewables and Efficiency

By JOEL KIRKLAND of ClimateWire
Published: July 9, 2010

With or without a climate bill, electric utilities are shifting their investments to efficiency measures that cut long-term costs and integrate more natural gas and renewable energy into their power supplies, according to a new report.

"The business landscape for electric utilities is shifting quickly," says a report authored by Navigant Consulting for Ceres, a Boston-based coalition of institutional investors and environmental groups. "In turn, the traditional operating paradigm of building large generation facilities to sell ever-increasing amounts of electricity is changing."

The report says drivers of this shifting paradigm include the need to cut greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 80 percent by 2050 and policies in many states making it costly to build more fossil fuel-based electric generation.

The report says costs for renewable energy are coming down significantly, and regulatory policies now allow utilities to count large-scale energy efficiency as the lowest-cost energy resource. Further, utilities are adopting "smart grid" technology to help manage electricity use, and there is more interest in developing plug-in electric vehicles.

Navigant and Ceres also talked about boosting natural gas in the fuel mix for electricity generation.

"Recent technological breakthroughs in extracting natural gas from shale and other 'tight' formations have led to a startling reassessment of the nation's natural gas supplies, previously thought to be dwindling," says the report. "Natural gas is positioned to play a growing role as a complement to variable renewable energy resources. In addition, natural gas can help optimize overall energy efficiency by integrating thermal and electric technologies and end-uses."

Coal, according to this report, faces an array of challenges. Most U.S. coal-fired power plants are at least 30 years old. New U.S. EPA regulations to cut emissions of haze and ozone-causing nitrogen oxides, sulfur dioxide, mercury and other pollutants are expected to push many of those old plants into retirement. Citing a March 2010 study by Bernstein Research, the report says the EPA regulations will likely force the retirement of about one-quarter of U.S. coal-burning generation by 2015.

Mass cancellations of coal-fired plants

The report also counts that 120 coal-fired power plant projects were canceled over the last decade because of environmental and financing issues. Another 50 plants face lawsuits from parties attempting to halt their construction or operation.

There also is mounting evidence that coal as a commodity will become more expensive, according to Navigant and Ceres. They note that a 2008 U.S. Geological Survey study of the Powder River Basin coal fields in Wyoming found that the economically recoverable reserves might be only 6 percent of previous estimates, "raising questions about the long-term price and availability of coal in other areas of the U.S."

Tom King, president of National Grid USA, a major gas distributor and electric utility in New York, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Rhode Island, said coal will always be a part of the fuel mix in certain regions because of its abundance. But in an interview with ClimateWire, he emphasized that the priorities of electric utilities are changing. "Natural gas for the foreseeable future remains a reliable source," he said. "The policy ought to be that we extract the gas."

King's support for using gas for power generation is notable. For years, industrial users of gas and local distribution companies such as National Grid discouraged talk about using more gas for electricity generation. The concern was that it would increase competition for natural gas and drive up the commodity price. Now, as King noted, there is broad awareness that expanding U.S. shale gas fields have dramatically increased the gas supply. One of the hottest gas basins, the Marcellus Shale, sits in his backyard in the Northeast.

A favorable gas price outlook

The natural gas supply, though, depends on favorable gas prices. An analyst at the energy consultancy Wood Mackenzie told delegates at the 2010 Energy Epicenter conference in Denver that U.S. natural gas prices will increase to a range of $6.50 to $7 per million British thermal units (MMBtu) as cost pressures intensify in the next five years. That's around the place that many gas drillers say is needed to sustain production. Natural gas has hovered around $4/MMBtu for more than a year.

Those costs include competition for rigs, the cost of major oil services companies working with gas companies to produce shale gas, and a higher-cost economy. "The core, low-cost unconventional gas plays -- Marcellus, Haynesville and Barnett -- will continue to grow, but within a few years, as the pace of demand growth accelerates, more expensive shale and tight gas supplies will be required," said Jen Snyder, the principal natural gas analyst for Wood Mackenzie. "Economywide inflationary pressures mean that, in nominal terms, prices could reach $8.50/MMBtu."

She added that even in the absence of climate legislation that increases the cost of coal-fired generation, EPA and state regulations could lead to 45 gigawatts of coal-fired power generation being retired by 2020. That would stimulate about 5 billion cubic feet a day of gas demand.

The electric power sector accounts for about 40 percent of U.S. and global carbon dioxide emissions. Cutting those emissions by cutting energy use has been strategy No. 1 for much of the industry, according to this and other recent reports.

But Navigant and Ceres say there are still fundamental hangups to achieving efficiency's full potential: there is a lack of broad enough regulatory support; the utility-sector business model based on electricity sales remains largely in place; and power transmission capacity limits the amount of renewable energy that can be integrated into the system.

"A utility that deals effectively with these trends, and receives sufficient support from regulators and legislators, will be better positioned to success in the 21st century," says the report. "All else equal, such a utility is also more likely to attract lower cost capital, enabling it to earn stronger returns for investors."

Copyright 2010 E&E Publishing. All Rights Reserved.

Posted by John Kavaller at 7:45 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: coal, electric, fossil fuel, natural gas, paradigm shift, renewable energy


Friday, July 9, 2010Big Money Drives Up the Betting on the Marcellus Shale

Big Money Drives Up the Betting on the Marcellus Shale

By JOEL KIRKLAND of ClimateWire via NYT Copyrighted material

Published: July 8, 2010

WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. -- Halliburton is building a permanent outpost here on the edge of a one of the 21st century's biggest energy booms.

Halliburton is a ubiquitous presence in the world's biggest oil fields. For the past two months, it has defended itself against charges that shoddy cement work contributed to a methane blast that sank BP's rig in the Gulf of Mexico and killed 11 people. As long as the well keeps gushing, public anger could weaken America's appetite for offshore drilling.

But far from the Gulf Coast and outside of the media spotlight, Halliburton and the oil and gas industry are spending billions of dollars in preparation for decades of drilling in the Marcellus Shale. The 95,000-square-mile sheet of natural gas-rich sediment sprawls across Pennsylvania, southern New York, West Virginia and eastern Ohio.

Geologists have long known about gas deposits trapped in the 390-million-year-old formation. But only since 2008, and at a rapidly escalating pace, has the oil and gas industry brought to bear the technological and financial resources to crack it.

"Companies see how close the shale gas is to the Northeast consumer markets," says Alay Patel, an upstream research analyst for Wood Mackenzie. "They see a long-term source where the cost of supply is really low compared to what they see in other areas of the Lower 48."

Drillers blast water, sand and chemicals 8,000 feet into the ground, creating the pressure needed to crack the shale and release the gas. On today's industrial drilling sites, plumes of smog-forming pollutants escape from trucks, generators, condensate tanks and compressor stations.

In northern Appalachia, deep-seated public anxiety has set in about the environmental impact of horizontal gas drilling and hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking." Regulators responsible for protecting the clean water supplies of New York City and Philadelphia have called a drilling timeout in the Delaware River watershed.

But rivers of corporate cash continue to flow into the Marcellus and other shale fields. The magnitude of investment this year alone suggests energy companies have no plans to retreat from an ocean of recoverable gas.

At the power plant, a natural gas-burning electricity generator produces half the carbon dioxide emissions of a plant that burns coal. Some advocates for slashing emissions tied to global warming say gas is a plausible alternative for utilities saddled with aging coal-fired power plants.

Plans for 30,000 wells in 10 years

The industry expects to drill some 30,000 Marcellus wells by 2020. Placing a thumb on an accurate figure for how much gas can be recovered from the Marcellus remains a matter of geological guesswork. But if companies develop the shale to its full potential, according to some estimates, it rivals Russia's massive gas fields and the untapped reserves off the coast of Iran and in the Caspian Sea.

On June 25, shareholders for Texas gas producer XTO Energy finalized a $31 billion sale to Exxon Mobil Corp. The deal injects into North America's gas fields the muscle and capital heft of the world's largest integrated energy company. Exxon will become the third-largest gas producer in the prolific Barnett Shale and gain a strong bridgehead in the Marcellus, where XTO controls minerals under 280,000 acres near Williamsport and Pittsburgh.

In early June, Royal Dutch Shell PLC announced that it plans to buy Pittsburgh-based East Resources for $4.7 billion. That sale yields a significant return for one of the nation's richest private equity firms, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. Just a year ago, KKR spent about $320 million for a substantial minority stake in East Resources.

For Exxon and Shell, the bet is that relatively low-cost gas production means a steady revenue stream, as electricity generators in the eastern half of the United States switch from coal to gas to comply with clean air standards and slash carbon dioxide emissions tied to global warming.

Manufacturers Worry of Pitfalls From Utility-Only Climate Bill

Chesapeake Energy Corp. of Oklahoma City boasts the largest Marcellus foothold. It has aggressively built its 1.6-million-acre position since scooping up Appalachian gas producer Columbia Natural Resources LLC for $2.2 billion in 2005. Following drilling tests that reaffirmed strong hunches about the gas formation's potential, Chesapeake signed a joint venture with Statoil in 2008.

The deal handed the Norwegian oil behemoth 600,000 acres of American shale to explore for a tidy sum of $3.3 billion, including a $1.2 billion upfront capital injection to help Chesapeake expand its drilling operation.

Drilling for deals

The Statoil deal paved the way for other joint ventures and buyouts in the shale. Small and mid-sized companies that spent years locking up Marcellus acreage needed the financial resources of bigger partners to develop it. In the past six months, the deal-making has only accelerated.

"The sheer scope and resource potential of the Marcellus is a big draw," says Eric Kuhle, a gas analyst at Wood Mackenzie. "You can capture the upside with these partnerships."

Energy companies from India and Japan are dumping shareholder wealth into Appalachian gas production. In February, Japan's Mitsui & Co. entered a $1.4 billion joint venture with Anadarko Petroleum Corp.

Pittsburgh-based Atlas Energy Inc. in April formed a $1.7 billion partnership with Reliance Industries Ltd., the largest private-sector company in India. The conglomerate is controlled by Indian billionaire Mukesh Ambani, who has been pushing the company to secure lucrative energy investments outside of India.

"In the last few years, we realized we had this extremely valuable asset," says Jeff Kupfer, senior vice president of Atlas. "We needed a lot of capital to develop it." Once Atlas put out a feeler, the Marcellus prospect attracted attention from the world's major oil and gas companies. "There was something in the chemistry with Atlas and Reliance."

Reliance agreed to pay $340 million in upfront cash and to contribute $1.3 billion to develop the Marcellus. In return, Reliance gets a 40 percent share of the venture and can send engineers and field workers to learn about the fracking technology. "They're looking at it as a way to gain exposure and expertise," Kupfer says.

Shale gas underlies North America, Europe and possibly China. In a statement to shareholders a few weeks ago, the Reliance chairman made his take on the gas boom plain. "It is likely to overtake both conventional gas as well as liquid fuels as a source of energy within the next decade," Ambani told investors.

A few days later, on June 23, Reliance agreed to buy a 45 percent stake in Pioneer Natural Resources Co.'s acreage in the Eagle Ford shale field in south Texas for $1.15 billion.

Companies that tested fracking technology in Texas and Oklahoma in the 1990s have spent the past five years locking up access to millions of acres in those states and across Appalachia, Louisiana, Arkansas, Great Plains states and western Canada. In 25 years, according to IHS Cambridge Energy Research Associates and Wood Mackenzie, shale and tight-sand formations will account for more than half of U.S. gas production. The supply potential has expanded by as much as 50 percent.

A shift that surprised the government

It has been a surprising shift. In 2005, both the gas industry and the U.S. government, including Congress and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, had settled on the idea that the United States would import liquefied natural gas from the Middle East, Russia and Africa. As the American economy expanded, imported LNG would make up for declining gas supplies from the Gulf of Mexico and Canada.

Today, the industry boldly promises the shale gas will fill the gap and create a long-term surplus of gas.

The Marcellus is among the five "big shales" identified as the best bets for production. The Barnett in east Texas, Haynesville in Louisiana, Fayetteville in Arkansas, and Woodford in Oklahoma top those shales. Barclays Capital anticipates that once investments targeting Marcellus gas reach full bloom, it could rapidly surpass production out of Arkansas and Oklahoma by the end of 2012 and compete with the mighty Barnett for kingmaker in onshore gas development by 2020.

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The low cost of producing Marcellus gas, its pipeline-ready quality and its proximity to consumers in the Northeast have driven investment. With total production costs around $3.50 to $4 per million British thermal units, according to Barclays Capital, gas companies can make money even if future gas prices languish some.

But if gas prices crater, the boom ends.

Meanwhile, though, it is jobs, jobs and more jobs in Pennsylvania that matter the most.

If gas prices stay in the sweet spot to spur supply and demand, then job creation could be huge, depending on the state's ability to train workers, says Larry Michael, who heads a training program at Pennsylvania College of Technology in Williamsport.

"The optimistic charts are not optimistic enough," Michael says.

The gas rush in southwestern Pennsylvania has claimed a significant slice of Pittsburgh's economy. One in five business expansions is tied to the nearby shale deposits, according to the Pittsburgh Regional Alliance.

From flatboat merchants to steel, oil and coal, Pittsburgh is the embodiment of U.S. industrial grit and natural resource potential. But the slow-moving dilution of the American manufacturing core since the collapse of Steel City has given way to a fresh crop of entrepreneurs and financiers: The gas barons have pushed their way into Pittsburgh's new economy.

The new barons of Pittsburgh

Consol Energy Inc., the coal giant and one of Pittsburgh's corporate icons, said in March that it would pay $3.4 billion for a chunk of Marcellus acreage in its buyout of Richmond, Va.-based Dominion Resources Inc. And in August, former Beatle Paul McCartney will open Consol Energy Center, the future home of the Pittsburgh Penguins.

Back in Williamsport, Jason Fink, vice president of the Williamsport-Lycoming Chamber of Commerce, is the point man for employers. As he drove his SUV from site to site in May, he took a phone call: Does Schlumberger have all the information it needs? Weatherford, a Swiss-based competitor, is setting up shop nearby.

Square-jawed and young, an early-morning bike rider, Fink has spent the past year connecting gas field companies to offices, warehouses and real estate. "It's our proximity to the northeast part of this play," he tells companies, "and the distance between us and Pittsburgh." He also wants to lure back a manufacturing base that dried up in the 1990s. "How we'll position it is this," he explains. "If you use natural gas, be close to where it's at."

Fink stops at the 24-acre Halliburton site, where the first building could be operational in July. On a walk around the site with a ClimateWire reporter, the construction manager who moved east from Texas says his contract for the Marcellus job is for three years. After that, he says, he might stick around.

Perhaps the greatest challenge, Fink acknowledges, is preparing locals to work in the gas industry.

Pennsylvania is the birthplace of U.S. oil drilling, and Fink's father worked for Sun Oil. "These are good-paying jobs, but you got to work it through. It's a long day," he says.

In the Rust Belt, a hard day's work is only a memory to some. "But the gas industry is rooted in 12-hour and 14-hour days for weeks on end," he says. A job fair in May attracted hundreds of men who needed work. Once the companies explained how their industry operates, some stayed to hear more, and some left.

Almost 600,000 people are unemployed in Pennsylvania, and the state struggles to find the economic growth to cover a $1.2 billion budget shortfall. Questions about job growth tied to Marcellus development are at the heart of discussions about recharging the economy.

An industry-sponsored report out of Pennsylvania State University served as ammunition for the gas industry's argument that there will be a lot of jobs and they're here to stay. The report claims that 88,000 jobs directly and loosely tied to the Marcellus -- from drillers to hotel employees -- will have been created in the state by the end of this year, and more than 200,000 jobs will be created by 2020. It estimates about $8 billion in indirect economic stimulus in 2010.

More and more wells are drilled each year in the Marcellus. This year, according to the report, producers expect to drill nearly 1,750 wells, double the number of wells drilled last year. By 2020, gas producers will have drilled roughly 30,000 wells in the four-state gas formation, double the number of wells drilled today in the earliest and most productive shale gas field, the Barnett that surrounds Fort Worth, Texas.

If the drilling rate ramps up at this rate, the Marcellus will produce 13 billion cubic feet a day of gas by 2020, a twenty-sevenfold increase.

Will the prices and the jobs remain high?

But the report rolled out in May has faced withering attacks, primarily because it was paid for by the influential gas drillers' alliance, the Marcellus Shale Coalition, and touted by the Washington-based gas coalition Energy in Depth. The critics contend that the industry tally of the jobs and economic benefits is wildly optimistic and ignores the environmental and social costs. They point out that U.S. Labor Department and state tallies of jobs directly tied to the gas industry are far lower.

Questions remain, says Michael Wood, research director of the Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center. They include the speed by which the gas industry will replace workers imported from Texas, Oklahoma and Calgary, Alberta, with homegrown laborers and technicians.

The Penn State economic study assumes Marcellus development continues unabated. But that only happens if gas prices remain high enough to support drilling costs. And demand will only grow if gas prices remain competitive with low-cost coal used for power generation.

"When it's gone, the state is left holding the tab, cleaning up the environmental damage," Wood says. If anything, he says, the BP PLC oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico underscores that a costly environmental catastrophe isn't out of the question.

"Even with the best protections, things happen."

Former Colo. senator calls for 'aggressive' lobbying campaign

U.N. Foundation President Tim Wirth is expected to urge natural gas producers today to lobby more aggressively for U.S. public policies that encourage electric utilities to retire old coal-fired power plants and burn cleaner natural gas.

"The coal industry has been fiercely effective with Congress and regulatory authorities in defending its turf, and you have to be as well," Wirth says in remarks prepared for a Colorado Oil and Gas Association meeting in Denver.

The former Democratic senator from Colorado doesn't mince words, admonishing the broader gas industry for failing to make a public policy case for gas.

"So far your industry has mostly run nice, positive, feel-good advertising, rather than conducting the persistent, aggressive campaign that will be needed for this transition," he says. "Fortunately, you have some new ammunition: The shale deposits in coal states like Illinois, Indiana, West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania can change both the economies and the politics of those key states -- and therefore of Washington."

Tension in the energy sector about the extent to which state and federal policies should incentivize utilities to retire coal plants and instead use gas is palpable on a national level. Gas burns cleaner than coal, emitting half the amount of greenhouse gases as well as far less ozone and haze-causing nitrogen oxide.

Yet on the national stage, coal has kept a hold on the politics of energy and climate change. Coal interests have opposed climate bills that would increase the cost of using coal. And lawmakers from states that produce or consume a lot of coal have sought federal funding to incentivize "clean coal" projects that develop carbon capture and storage for coal-fired power generators.

If the state of play in the climate debate has as much to do with job creation and the cost of cutting emissions, Wirth says, why not make that part of the argument?

"After all, it's not that the voters love coal," he says, "it's that they love the jobs and the economic benefits that come with it. And natural gas can do better."

Gas industry still using old tactics

Wirth's U.N. Foundation, the philanthropic arm of the United Nations, works closely with a Washington-based group called the Energy Future Coalition. C. Boyden Gray, a White House counsel in the George H.W. Bush administration, and John Podesta, White House chief of staff under President Clinton, both sit on the group's steering committee, which also includes other major players in the development of U.S. energy and environmental policies.

Wirth told ClimateWire yesterday that the Energy Future Coalition is calling on the gas industry and its cohorts in the electric utility industry to reject adversarial tactics that pit natural gas production against environmental regulations, or that pit gas against wind power.

"They have this new fuel and opportunity, but they're unfortunately largely stuck in the old way of doing business," Wirth said.

Wirth compared today's fight over disclosing chemicals used with unconventional gas drilling with food labeling debates that ended decades ago. The decision by the gas lobby to battle disclosure of chemicals injected into the ground during the hydraulic fracturing process needlessly alienates the public.

"If gas companies don't disclose, they'll get into a fight with the public that will ultimately revolve around their right to operate," he said in the interview.

In Denver, Wirth and the coalition will urge gas producers to throw their weight behind natural gas use in heavy-duty trucks, a plan famously sought by the Texas oil magnate T. Boone Pickens; alternative fuel use, including natural gas, in urban vehicle fleets; and a large-scale transition from old coal-fired plants to gas plants for electricity generation.

For 20 years, the coal industry has lobbied to keep aging power plants open. Gas prices are low, Wirth said, so it's time to start talking about signing long-term supply contracts with utilities. Combined-cycle gas plants run at only about 40 percent of their full capacity, and there is greater spare gas capacity in the Southeast.

Emerging debate over fuel-switching

Coal-fired generation accounts for about 45 percent of U.S. electricity use. Some utilities, including Colorado's largest utility, Xcel Energy Inc., have started a slow-moving shift away from cheap coal to a combination of natural gas, wind and solar power and demand-side efficiency.

Colorado lawmakers and Gov. Bill Ritter (D) worked closely with Xcel earlier this year to craft legislation that enabled a relatively smooth transition away from coal-fired generation.

"It's a great model for the rest of the country," Wirth said. "And the industry ought to be working to make it a usable model."

Fuel-switching to gas is emerging in large part because of tougher U.S. EPA restrictions on air pollutants, state environmental mandates, cautious optimism that natural gas prices will remain competitive with coal, and a sense that Congress at some point plans to mandate cuts in greenhouse gas emissions.

Colorado is a major gas producer out of its Piceance Basin fields west along I-70 between Glenwood Springs and Grand Junction. To get at the tight gas deposits, some of the drilling requires the hydraulic fracturing used in the nation's major shale basins.

Wirth's comments come at an inflection point in the energy debate. Congress and the White House are deciding whether to pursue a climate bill that would put a price tag on carbon dioxide emissions that contribute to global warming. According to a recent Massachusetts Institute of Technology report and other energy policy researchers, a policy that increases the cost of burning coal would directly affect gas.

Gas could go from supplying about 20 percent of U.S. power generation to 40 percent or more by 2040, according to MIT. Nearly all of that would come at the expense of coal.

Copyright 2010 E&E Publishing. All Rights Reserved.

Posted by John Kavaller at 8:51 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Anadarko, Atlas Energy Inc., Delaware River watershed, fracking, Halliburton, joint ventures, Reliance, Royal Dutch Shell, The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, untapped reserves


Pennsylvania county residents divided on pipeline company proposal

Pennsylvania county residents divided on pipeline company proposal

Great Bend, Pennsylvania (Platts)--8Jul2010/521 am EDT/921 GMT

While a natural gas production boom in the Marcellus Shale may enrich
poor rural counties in Pennsylvania, it's carving deep divides in the
mountains of Susquehanna County in the northeast corner of the state.

Hundreds of county residents packed the bingo hall at the volunteer
firehouse in Great Bend on Wednesday, most to speak out against a gas
gathering and transmission company's application to become a public utility --
a designation that would place it under additional regulation, but also give it the right of eminent domain.

"Natural gas is not a public utility," New Milford resident Bruce
McNaught testified Wednesday at the first of two state Public Utility
Commission hearings into Laser Marcellus Gathering Company's application to be certified as a public utility.

"A pipeline crossing my land negates everything that I have worked for in acquiring my property, the way I manage it, the placing of a conservation easement," McNaught, a consultant to the Pennsylvania Game Commission, told the commission. "I already feel discriminated against by a gung-ho, gas-frenzied community," McNaught said, adding that he has refused to lease his mineral rights.

Laser wants to build a system in Susquehanna to gather up to 400,000
Mcf/d from Marcellus wells drilled in the county and move that gas to the
Millennium Pipeline in New York. The $50 million project would include a
mainline running from Millennium south to Tennessee Gas Pipeline's interstate system, according to Tom Karam, CEO of Delphi Midstream Partners. Karam and several other investors are in the process of buying Laser Marcellus.

Karam, a Scranton native, is a former top executive of pipeline giant
Southern Union and ran water and gas utilities in Pennsylvania.

From long-haired writers to well-dressed teachers to plumbers in
motorcycle T-shirts and boots, resident after resident trooped before PUC
Administrative Law Judge Susan Caldwell to object to the pipeline's request to be designated a utility.

Retired librarian Hilary Caws-Elwit of Friendsville told Caldwell that
the PUC should reject Laser's application because it serves no public purpose.

While Laser's application says the company will provide gas to county
residents, she said that promise is an empty one -- there are no utilities in the county to deliver the gas.

"The gas being extracted is not benefitting Susquehanna County," former teacher Nancy Wottrich of New Milford said. "It is being shipped away from here and traded on the open market as a commodity, and for the immense profit of a very few."

But not everyone was opposed. Farmer Jim Barber of Jessup testified that he's not only leased his mineral rights but has contracted with Laser to run pipe through his farm. "It doesn't matter how many wells you drill if you have no pipeline," he said.

A lack of pipeline routes and capacity will starve landowners of royalty income that could save their farms and their lifestyles, Barber said.

"Everyone who doesn't have a gas well is a malcontent," county resident Chuck Bower said outside the fire hall. "Folks that didn't get them are mad.

It's going to upend the whole county. The have-nots are becoming the haves."

Karam said he believes being a regulated public utility is the correct
path for gas transmission companies operating in the Marcellus. "Pipelines are best with a policeman on the beat," Karam said, noting that Laser's January application to the PUC came because state law isn't clear on the status of gathering pipelines. Eminent domain powers exist for a public utility, Karam acknowledged, but are rarely used in his experience managing thousands of miles of pipeline. "It's not the way to do business."

Karam said he can recall less than a handful of times public domain was used by any of the pipeline companies he worked for.

The PUC commissioners have urged state lawmakers to rewrite
Pennsylvania's laws to give them some control over pipeline operations. But at an April hearing on regulating gas in Pennsylvania, several commissioners said they had no interest in hearing rate cases from any more than the 3,100 utilities they already regulate.

While it won't be until the end of the year when Caldwell makes her
recommendation on Laser's application to the five PUC commissioners,
Wednesday's hearing may offer a preview of what US Environmental Protection
Agency regulators will hear later this month. EPA has scheduled an August 12 hearing in Binghamton, New York, on the scope of a study the agency is
preparing on the environmental effects of hydraulic fracturing, the key method of extracting gas from the massive shale play.

--Bill Holland, bill_holland@platts.com

Similar stories appear in Gas Daily.
See more information at
http://www.platts.com/Products.aspx?xmlFile=gasdaily.xml

Posted by John Kavaller at 8:22 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Eminent Domain, Laser Marcellus, Millennium, public utility, PUC, Susquehanna County PA


Thursday, July 8, 2010Natural gas natural alternative for oil giants

Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION

Natural gas natural alternative for oil giants
By: The Economist

5/07/2010 1:00 AM

The bad news is we didn't hit oil," ran the old wildcatter's joke. "The good news is we didn't find gas."

Potentially dangerous and always more difficult to manage than pouring liquid into a barrel, natural gas used to give oil companies a headache. Now gas is dominating the thoughts of western oil bosses and, increasingly, their firms' portfolios.

Seven of the eight projects Exxon Mobil completed last year were for natural gas developments. Two of the three it has scheduled for this year are also gas-related. Royal Dutch Shell says that by 2012, half its output will come from gas.

The current high oil price still makes crude the prize for any self-respecting major. But the West's big oil companies are growing gassier.

In part, this is because oil is getting harder to find, for geological and political reasons. Global oil production will peak within a few decades, if not before. And the remaining "easy oil," which can be extracted without fuss or expense, is increasingly out of bounds for western firms.

Almost 90 per cent of it is in the hands of national oil companies which have, with few exceptions, blocked western giants from their riches. This is forcing Big Oil into trickier and pricier areas, notably deepwater fields such as those in the Gulf of Mexico and off Africa's west coast, and unconventional reserves such as Canada's tarsands. Hence the appeal of gas, and a string of deals in Australia and America.

In March, Shell joined PetroChina to buy the Australian assets of gas specialist Arrow Energy for AUS$3.5 billion ($3.2 billion). ConocoPhillips paid $5 billion in 2008 for another Australian gas firm, Origin Energy.

Chevron is spending almost $40 billion to build a liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant off the coast of Australia, one of more than a dozen such projects in the country. Almost all of them include a western major as a leading shareholder.

In America, meanwhile, the majors are being lured by the opening of vast new unconventional gas reserves, which have scarcely begun to be tapped.

In May, Shell said it would pay $4.7 billion to buy East Resources, a shale-gas firm with access to the Marcellus shale, a large deposit of gas close to the markets of the country's East Coast.

Total and BP have joined projects started by Chesapeake Energy, a shale-gas producer long on expertise and short on cash. And in December, Exxon Mobil offered $41 billion for XTO Energy, another shale-gas specialist. That deal, approved on June 25, will give rise to another wave of asset-buying in the sector, says accountancy firm Ernst & Young.

Gas is also getting cheaper to develop. The cost of gas developments has come down -- that of an offshore floating LNG terminal has fallen by half in the past two years, for example -- while the growing inaccessibility of easy oil has made oil projects more expensive.

Some of the majors' biggest oil developments look frighteningly complex. The Kashagan oilfield in the Caspian Sea, one of the biggest discoveries in decades, was due to enter production in 2005.

Now the target is 2012 and the cost could exceed $100 billion. The disaster at BP's well in the Gulf of Mexico may increase costs as regulations are tightened.

And although the national oil companies have mostly excluded the majors from their oil projects, foreign expertise and capital is needed for complex natural gas projects.

Qatar is now the world's dominant LNG exporter, but it got there through partnerships with the majors. Iran, by contrast, has failed to make a viable export business out of its reserves, the second-largest in the world, thanks to withdrawal of western money and know-how.

Russia's Gazprom needed Shell to get its LNG business started on Sakhalin Island. It selected Total, another LNG expert, to help develop the huge Shtokman field in the Barents Sea.

The costs of natural gas developments vary wildly. An LNG export plant can cost tens of billions of dollars, rivaling oil projects in expense and complexity. Eni, an Italian oil giant, has joined Russia's Gazprom in a project to pipe gas from Russia to Central Europe. Their investment could exceed $20 billion.

At the other end of the scale, new shale-gas fields expand incrementally, with the addition of small wells costing as little as $5 million each. But both kinds of investment are far less exposed to the vagaries of the commodity markets than big oil projects. LNG plants go ahead only after the developer secures enough long-term contracts, some lasting 20 years or more, to underpin the project.

Oil projects look increasingly pricey and risky and they will always depend on a volatile oil market. Natural gas offers long-term reserves growth, relatively stable returns and lower risk (though there are, to be fair, environmental concerns about possible contamination of water sources as a result of shale-gas extraction).

Most of all, however, the majors' dash for gas is a bet on demand and climate-change policy. The International Energy Agency says oil consumption has peaked in the West and could rise globally by just 0.5 per cent a year to 2030. But Exxon Mobil expects gas consumption to be 55 per cent higher in 2030 than it was in 2005.

Even this could be conservative. Philippe Boisseau, head of Total's gas and power division, says the potential for gas consumption in China, for example, is much bigger than assumed. Only a lack of import infrastructure is constraining demand growth there, he argues.

Industrialization and electrification in the developing world will require a lot of new power stations. If governments begin to punish the fuels that emit the most carbon dioxide, a good portion of that electricity will come from gas.

A $30-a-ton carbon tax would make gas, which is about half as polluting as coal when burned, the preferred fuel for new power stations. Double the tax, and gas would remain competitive with nuclear and wind power, too, says Exxon Mobil.

Efforts by the world's governments to cut carbon emissions have stalled, but the oil majors are voting with their drill bits. The future, they believe, will be less oily and a lot gassier.

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition July 5, 2010 B6

Posted by John Kavaller at 9:19 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: big business, Exxon-Mobil, Liquefied natural gas, oil companies, PetroChina, shale gas extraction, Shell, XTO


Senator Joe Addabbo Calls for a Moratorium on Hydrofracking in Upstate Watershed...

Tuesday, July 6, 2010
Senator Joe Addabbo Calls for a Moratorium on Hydrofracking in Upstate Watershed...

Wants Halt to Drilling that Affects NYC Drinking Water until EPA Impact Study Is Completed

To protect the drinking water for almost nine million New Yorkers, NYS Senator Joseph P. Addabbo, Jr., is sponsoring a bill that calls for a moratorium on drilling for natural gas or “hydrofracking” in the upstate watershed. Currently, the bill sits in the Environmental Conservation committees in both the Senate and the Assembly. It may come up for a vote in the Senate before the end of the current legislative session, scheduled to resume the week of July 12.

What is hydrofracking and how could it affect our drinking water even though it takes place over 100 miles away? Earlier this year, Brian Dooley, President of the Glendale Property Owners Association and Addabbo’s constituent, educated the Senator about the process. Dooley explained that while New York City has some of the cleanest, safest and most reliable drinking water in the country, the safety of the city’s drinking water is in danger, put in jeopardy by big business oil companies who want to drill for natural gas dangerously close to New York City’s upstate watershed using a process known as hydraulic fracturing, also called hydrofracking.

This drilling process uses toxic chemicals under high pressure in water to break up rock formations deep underground releasing the natural gas. The targeted material for this natural gas drilling runs through approximately eight states including Pennsylvania and upstate New York and is known as the Marcellus Shale. The hydrofracking drilling method requires millions of gallons of water that the United States Department of Energy considers one of the most toxic industrial byproducts produced by gas and oil drilling.

“Let me be clear, I am not against drilling, but I am totally against a process that certainly has questionable ingredients that should not be in our water. Recently, I met with Josh Fox, writer and director of the movie Gasland, to discuss this issue and my education and concerns about hydrofracking grew,” explains Addabbo.

The Senator warns: “Imagine not being able to use your water for fear of drinking carcinogens, plastics and toxins. The danger of hydraulic fracturing so close to the New York City watershed is easy to imagine. Toxic byproduct can seep into our drinking water and turn our once pristine water into a severe health risk. According to a report prepared by Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer, entitled Uncalculated Risk, seven states across the country have experienced serious incidents of water contamination and explosions near hydraulic fracturing mines.”

“To protect our drinking water, I have introduced and sponsored legislation to place a moratorium on hydraulic fracturing in New York State and would keep the state Department of Environmental Conservation from issuing drilling permits, until 120 days after an impact study is completed by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. [The study began in March and a completion date has not been set, but is expected to take up to two years.] We need to slow down and take time to fully understand a report currently being prepared by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation regarding the potential dangers of hydraulic fracturing and its possible effects on the New York City watershed. The unknown, long-term effects of the components of hydrofracking could be dangerous, if not fatal. Why take a chance with our precious drinking water? We should be certain that New York City’s water supply will not be damaged,” adds Addabbo.

Concludes the Senator: “The risks are simply too high to just recklessly move forward with hydraulic fracturing. Almost nine million people in New York City rely on clean, safe, unfiltered surface water collected in the watershed. We cannot put the health of New York City residents at risk. The harm to our city’s and state’s infrastructure, economy, and most importantly, public trust -- far outweigh any benefits of moving forward immediately with hydrofracking.”

“In the wake of the BP oil spill in the Gulf, we have seen first-hand the effects of ignoring common-sense safety measures. While I know that upstate landowners stand to make huge amounts of money from the gas companies as they lease their land to allow the drilling and that the process creates jobs, I believe it is irresponsible and dangerous to permit drilling so near our water supply without taking the time to fully understand its ramifications.”

Senator Addabbo urges New Yorkers to work together to protect our precious drinking water. Concerned New Yorkers are invited to go to the Senator’s Web site at http://www.nysenate.gov/senator/joseph-p-addabbo-jr to sign his petition in support of his legislation calling for a moratorium on hydraulic fracturing. For additional ways to protect our city’s drinking water, please call the Senator’s district offices at 718-738-1111 or 718-497-1630, or email him at addabbo@senate.state.ny.us.

Posted by John Kavaller at 9:12 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: carcinogens, drilling, drinking water, hydrofracking, Jr., NYS Senator Joseph P. Addabbo, toxic industrial byproducts, upstate watershed

Monday, July 5, 2010I can’t see taking the gas companies’ word that they won’t pollute the water supply:

Jul 4th, 2010 at 9:28 am by susie

I can see both sides. But I can’t see taking the gas companies’ word that they won’t pollute the water supply:

What is unfolding here is a mammoth clash between neighbors with starkly contrasting visions about the land. It is a virtual range war, waged at public meetings and on the Internet, expressed mostly in insults but occasionally through small acts of vandalism.

Last month, the Delaware River Basin Commission, a multistate agency based in Trenton, declared a moratorium on drilling any gas wells in the upper Delaware watershed – even nonproducing exploratory wells – until it can approve new drilling regulations.

The reason: These rural highlands drain into the protected waters of the upper Delaware River.

Though the DRBC maintains that it is not opposed to the “appropriate development” of natural gas, many landowners here who have signed gas leases regard the commission’s move as a stealth ban, an intrusion by unelected out-of-state officials to deprive them of their property.

“The DRBC is trying to take something away from me,” said Bob Rutledge, whose 500-acre farm has been in his family since the 1800s. “This is America. We still own mineral rights.”

But local residents who believe that gas drilling poses an imminent health threat applauded the DRBC’s action.

“We have property rights, too,” said James Barth, who owns 20 acres in Berlin Township, surrounded by neighbors who have leased their land for gas drilling.

At its root, the battle here is kind of a red state/blue state conflict – a cultural chasm dividing newcomers, old-timers, and those with opposing economic interests.

Wayne County is in New York City’s ever-expanding orbit – the population has increased 28 percent in two decades, to 51,337 – and many new homeowners were attracted to the sublime upper reaches of the Delaware, designated a national scenic and recreational river.

“We have our little islands of serenity,” said Barbara Arrindell, a stained-glass artist and executive director of the anti-drilling group Damascus Citizens for Sustainability.

Since it was founded two years ago, Damascus Citizens has developed some clout. Its urbanized, media-savvy leadership has enlisted allies in New York City and Philadelphia, portraying natural gas as Armageddon for public drinking-water supplies.

Thanks partly to the lobbying effort of Damascus Citizens, the national advocacy group American Rivers last month named the upper Delaware the nation’s “most endangered” river.

The organization’s voice was further amplified last month by the HBO premiere of Gasland , a documentary by New York filmmaker Josh Fox, who vacationed as a youth at his family’s cabin in Damascus Township. Fox dedicated the movie to Damascus Citizens.

John Hanger, secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, called Gasland “fundamentally dishonest.” But the soft-spoken Arrindell, who is credited in the film as a consultant, said it was an accurate reflection of her views, as well as those of her passionate colleagues.

Pat Carullo, a Staten Island, N.Y., native who moved to Wayne County after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, goes crimson with rage at the mention of hydraulic fracturing, the extraction technique that involves huge injections of water, chemicals, and sand deep into a well. He compares it to the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

“Look at the gulf!” shouted Carullo, a Damascus Citizens cofounder who speaks in high-volume sound bites. “We’re fighting for our lives here! Look at my hands. They’re shaking! It’s no game here!”

Posted by John Kavaller at 8:10 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Damascus Citizens for Sustainability, Delaware River Basin Commission, DRBC, drilling, pollute water, public drinking supplies, Wayne County PA

Saturday, July 3, 2010Pa. misfires in bid to identify drilling chemicals

Pa. misfires in bid to identify drilling chemicals

By MARC LEVY- Associated Press Writer
July 1, 2010 8:35pm EDT

HARRISBURG, Pa. — State environmental regulators said Thursday they misfired in a bid to catalog chemicals used by the drilling industry to extract natural gas from the rich Marcellus Shale reserve.

Department of Environmental Protection spokesman Tom Rathbun said a list of chemicals provided to The Associated Press shortly after a blowout at a natural-gas well inadvertently included all chemicals used at well sites, not just those injected into wells.

"It was an effort to be transparent and give complete public disclosure, and unfortunately it didn't work out that way," Rathbun said.

A blowout at a well in a remote area about 90 miles northeast of Pittsburgh on June 3 shot explosive gas and polluted water as high as 75 feet into the air before crews were able to tame it more than half a day later. The gas never caught fire, and no injuries were reported, but state officials had worried about an explosion before the well could be controlled.

The AP wrote about the list of chemicals earlier this week.

Rathbun said the list includes chemicals that have other purposes, such as cleaning drilling equipment. Some are considered harmful to human health in large enough quantities, even though many are present in consumer products.

The department will continue to try to assemble a list of chemicals that are being injected underground, based on information the drilling companies are required to provide, Rathbun said.

Chemicals used in a drilling process called hydraulic fracturing are injected underground at high pressure to break up the shale some 5,000 to 8,000 feet down and prop open the cracks to allow the gas trapped inside to flow up the well to the surface.

Environmental advocates worry the chemicals are poisoning underground drinking water sources. However, department officials say they know of no examples in Pennsylvania or elsewhere.

Industry officials say the chemicals are heavily diluted by water, accounting for less than 1 percent of the fluid that is blasted underground.

The chemicals are used to reduce friction, kill microorganisms and break down mineral deposits in the wells. Various well services firms make different proprietary blends of the solutions and supply them to drilling companies, which blend them with water at the well sites before pumping them underground.

The companies typically keep the recipes of those solutions secret, but Rathbun said the department is seeking the approval of a new regulation it says would force the companies to disclose those recipes to the agency.

Among the chemicals on the list are naphthalene, toluene and xylene - although various industry representatives said this week that they are not aware of the chemicals' use in drilling.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency classifies naphthalene as a possible human carcinogen. Toluene and xylene are linked by the federal government to central nervous system depression.

A list of 260 hydraulic fracturing chemicals compiled by the New York state Department of Environmental Conservation and included in the agency's proposed permitting requirements for drilling in the Marcellus Shale includes all three. The New York list was made public last September.

Some geologists believe the Marcellus Shale reserve, a hotly pursued gas formation primarily under Pennsylvania, West Virginia, New York and Ohio, could become the nation's most productive natural-gas field. There are more than 1,000 Marcellus Shale wells in Pennsylvania alone, some of them within view of homes, farmhouses and public roads.

Associated Press writer Mary Esch in Albany, N.Y., contributed to this report.


Read more: http://www.centredaily.com/2010/07/01/2072715/pa-misfires-in-bid-to-identify.html#ixzz0scBpS9xJ

Posted by John Kavaller at 6:49 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: chemicals, drilling industry, fracking, misfire, mistake made, PADEP

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Thursday, July 1, 2010Chemicals Used In Hydraulic Fracturing

Information Obtained Here

Chemicals Used in the Hydraulic Fracturing Process in Pennsylvania
Prepared by the Department of Environmental Protection
Bureau of Oil and Gas Management
Compiled from Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS) obtained from Inustry

Updated June 10, 2010
Chemical Product Name
2,2-Dibromo-3-NitrilopropionamideBio Clear 1000/Bio Clear 2000/ Bio-Clear 200/BioRid20L/ EC6116A
2-methyl-4-isothiazolin-3-oneX-Cide 207
5-chloro-2-methyl-4-isothiazolin-3-oneX-Cide 207
Acetic AcidFe-1A Acidizing Composition/ Packer Inhibitor
Acetic Anhydride Fe-1A Acidizing Composition
AcetyleneGT&S Inc./ Airco
Alcohol EthoxylatedC12-16 NE-200
Alkyl benzene sulfonic acidTetrolite AW0007/ FR-46
Ammonia (aqueous)FAW-5
Ammonium BifluorideABF 37%
Ammonium PersulfateAP Break
Ammonium Bisulfite Techni-Hib 604/ Fe OXCLEAR/ Packer Inhibitor
Ammonium chlorideSalt Inhibitor
Ammonium Salt (alkylpolyether sulfate)Tetrolite AW0007
Amorphous silicaTerraProp Plus/ Bituminous Coal Fly Ash ASTM C618
Benzoic AcidBenzoic Acid
Boric AcidBC-140/ Unilink 8.5
Boric OxideXLW-32
Calcium ChlorideDowflake
Calcium OxideBituminous Coal Fly Ash ASTM C618
carboxymethylhydroxypropyl guar blendUnigel CMPHG
Choline ChlorideClay Treat-2C
CinnamaldehydeENVIROHIB 2001
Citric AcidFerrotrol 300L/ IC-100L
Complex polyamine saltClay Master-5C
Crystalline Silica: Cristobalite
Crystalline Silica: QuartzSilica Sand/ / Atlas PRC/ Best Sand/ Bituminous Coal Fly Ash ASTM C618
Cupric chloride dihydrateFerrotrol 280L
Cured resinLiteProp 125
CyclohexanesCS-2
DazometICI-3240
Diethylene GlycolScaletrol 720/ Scaletrol 7208

d-Limonene
MA-844W
EnzymeGBL-8X
EO-C7-9-iso-, C8 rich-alcoholsNE-940/ NE-90
EO-C9-11-iso-, C10-rich alcoholsNE-940/ NE-90
Ethoxylated AlcoholFRW-14/ SAS-2/ Flomax 50/ WFR-3B
Ethyl AcetateCastle Thrust
Ethyl AlcoholFAW-5/ Castle Shop Solv/ Dallas Morris
EthylbenzeneNDL-100/ PARANOX/ Uniflo II
EthylbenzeneNDL-100/ PARANOX/ Uniflo II
Ethylene GlycolENVIROHIB 2001/ ICA-2/ LEB 10X/ Scaletrol
720/ Sceletrol 7208/ CC 300/ Clachek A/ Clachek
LP/ Ironsta II B/ NCL-100/ BC 140/ NCL-100/
Flomax 50/ NCL/ Scalehib 100/ Unihib O/ Unilink 8.5
Formic AcidENVIROHIB 2001
Gluconic AcidInterstate ICA-2
GlutaraldehydeAlpha 114/Alpha 125/ ICI-150
GlycerolBio Sealers
Glycol EthersENVIROHIB 2001/AMPHOAM 75/ PARANOX/ Uniflo II/ Unifoam/ WNE-342LN
Guar GumPROGUM 19 GUAR PRODUCT/ Unigel 19XL/ Benchmark Polymer 3400/ WGA-15/ Unigel 5F
Hydrochloric AcidHydrochloric Acid (HCL)/ TETRAClean 542/ Muriatic Acid
Hydrochloric Acid 3% – 35%Hydrochloric Acid 3% – 35%
IsopropanolAFS 30 Blend/ FAC-1W/ FAC-3W/ MA-844W/ NE-23/ NE-940/ Flomax 50/ Tetrolite AW0007/
FMW25 Foamer/ CS-2
Isopropyl AlcoholNFS-102/ WFT-9511/ LT-32/ AR-1/ Flomax 50/ NDL-100/ Unibac/ Uniflo II/ Uniflo/ Unihib O/
WNE-342LN
Methanol
AFS 30 Blend/ NE-200/ Activator Superset-W/ CI-14/ FAW-5/ GasFlo/ Inflo-250W/ LT-32/ NE-940/
XLW-32/ Tetrolite AW0007/ FMW25 Foamer/ 40 HTL Corrosion Inhibitor/ NE 100/ HAI-OS Acid
Inhibitor/ Unibac/ NE-90/ Packer Inhibitor

Methyl AlcoholClearbreak 400/ Super Surf/ Castle Shop Solv
Methyl SalicylateBio Sealers
n-butanolAirFoam 311
NitrilotriacetamideSalt Inhibitor
Phenolic ResinAtlas PRC
Polyethylene GlycolNE-940/ EC6116A/ NE-90
Polyethylene Glycol MixtureBio Clear 2000/ Bio-Clear 200
Polyoxylalkylene sulfateFMW25 Foamer
Polysaccharide BlendGW-3LDF
Potassium CarbonateBF-7L
Potassium ChlorideDowflake
Potassium HydroxideB-9, pH Increase Buffer/ BXL-2
Propargyl AlcoholCI-14/ HAI-OS Acid Inhibitor
Propylene GlycolSAS-2/ WFR-3B
SilicaS-8C, Sand, 100 mesh/ Montmorillnonite clay
Sodium BicarbonateK-34
Sodium BromideBioRid 20L
Sodium HydroxideCaustic Soda/ ICI-3240/ BioRid B-71
Sodium PersulphateHigh Perm SW-LB
Sodium Xylene SulfonateFAC-2/ FAC-3W
Sulfuric AcidSulfuric Acid
SurfactantsAFS-30/ GasFlo/ Inflo-250W
TalcAdomite Aqua
Tetrakis(hydroxymethyl)phosphonium sulfateMagnacide 575 Microbiocide
Tetramethyl ammonium ChlorideClay Treat-3C
Trimethyloctadecylammonium chlorideFAC-1W/ FAC-3W


Posted by John Kavaller at 9:28 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: chemicals, drilling fluids, fracking fluid, hydraulic fracturing

Tuesday, June 29, 2010Think before revving-up the Marcellus gas engine

Viewpoints

OP-ED: Think before revving-up the Marcellus gas engine
Updated: 06/29/2010 11:05:04 AM EDT

Pennsylvania is strategically located to reap a windfall associated with Marcellus Shale. But any mineral extraction strategy must be buffeted by balanced and sensible environmental stewardship and sane revenue strategies.

Natural gas is not the magic bullet to cure our fiscal and energy woes, and we need to avoid putting all of our eggs into the Marcellus Shale basket. We know what happens when coal companies abandon mines. And Pennsylvania rate payers remain at significant financial exposure as our five nuclear stations continue to store thousands of tons of nuclear waste with no forwarding address.

Let's try something different and learn from previous mistakes. Simply put, we need to invest in sanity. Here's a novel idea: Why not balance fiscal, environmental and local share issues before we spend what we don't have, mortgage future generations, and lock out municipal input and oversight?

The resources that have been identified are vast by any standard. Large scale drilling will occur in the Marcellus Shale formation from the southern tier of New York through West Virginia. Penn State estimated that the reserves are anywhere from 168 trillion to 516 trillion cubic feet.

The industry is quick to point out that a severance tax, which is proposed in Gov. Ed Rendell's state budget, will exacerbate a corporate net income tax of 9.5 percent, and could cripple an industry that is just starting.

But environmental groups released a study that claimed Pennsylvanians
favor a severance tax that could raise $632 million a year within five years. Jan Jarrett, CEO of PennFuture noted: "The Marcellus Shale offers us a tremendous opportunity to expand our supply of domestic fuel ... But it also offers a tremendous risk to the land, water and wildlife that makes Pennsylvania so special."

Is it possible that both sides are right? We cannot let this issue degenerate into a win-lose sum game nor can we afford for Marcellus Shale to become a three-sided coin flip. Any middle ground must necessarily factor what isn't talked about: local share. We can not bulldoze local communities by cannibalizing their infrastructure, and leaving behind a fractured environmental and economic legacy, while revenues are deposited into the state coffers.

Dr. Timothy W. Kelsey of Penn State's Cooperative Extension provided a fair, balanced and sobering assessment of the fallout from gas exploration in his study, "Potential Economic Impacts of Marcellus Shale in Pennsylvania: Reflections on the Perryman Group Analysis from Texas." Among his observations were the possibility that local communities may get hammered by the existing tax structure, experience resource depletion, and lack the ability to implement local land use regulations.

"Tax collections by the state government will increase in Pennsylvania through the corporate income tax and sales tax, yet these collections will have little direct benefit to the local jurisdictions who will face higher service costs due to natural gas exploration. In other words, local jurisdictions with natural gas wells very likely will face higher demands for services and thus higher costs, and yet receive little new revenue to pay for those services. The result likely will be higher local taxes (paid for by everyone, not just those directly benefiting from lease or royalty revenues), or cuts in other services."

We can't tax our way into prosperity, and we should not sell off our resources without factoring externalities, clean up costs and water use. Among the proposals we should consider to arrive at an equitable compromise are: a graduated severance tax; accelerated depreciation; establishment of an external sinking fund for cleanup costs and site remediation; a memorandum of understanding between the state and local municipalities for local revenue sharing; and an arbitration panel to reconcile local land use with state mandates as well as true up costs for water extraction.

We're not going to get a second bite at the Marcellus Shale apple. We better pull out all of the economic and environmental worms before we are tempted to devour a pomegranate.

-- Eric Epstein is chairman of TMI-Alert, a nonprofit organization dedicated to the promotion of safe-energy alternatives to nuclear power.

Posted by John Kavaller at 9:03 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Dr. Timothy W. Kelsey, Marcellus Shale, mineral extraction, severance tax


Sunday, June 27, 2010More than livelihoods are at stake with drilling

More than livelihoods are at stake with drilling

By Steve Israel
Times Herald-Record
Published: 2:00 AM - 06/27/10

What could gas drilling mean for nearby Broome County, which sits on the same gas-rich Marcellus shale as Sullivan and Ulster counties? More than $7 billion in economic activity and $400 million in wages and benefits over the next 10 years.

This is according to an economic impact study commissioned by the county and conducted by two University of Texas economics professors, who did a similar study in Texas.

With numbers like those, you can bet there will be plenty of chances for business opportunities – and rip-offs – when drilling begins here. About 8,000 acres of Sullivan land are already leased for drilling, according to the county's Division of Planning and Environmental Management, with tens of thousands more controlled by landowner groups that want to negotiate leases, including one group with 70,000 acres of Sullivan and Delaware county land and another with some 15,000 acres in and around Bethel.

Business is already booming in Broome and Chenango counties, where thousands have leased their land, and the controversial method of horizontal drilling called hydraulic fracturing – or “fracking” – is in full swing just south of the state line in Pennsylvania. Just the fact that gas companies are leasing an acre of land for anywhere from $50 to $6,000 an acre there tells you about the chances for profit.

With the influx of workers from places like Texas, Oklahoma and West Virginia, housing is so scarce that rents for apartments have tripled, according to Elmira attorney Chris Denton, who represents some 5,000 landowners in leasing deals and will speak at the first of three gas-drilling forums Sullivan is hosting.

Because of all the damage inflicted on roads by huge trucks hauling water, chemicals and heavy equipment, one trucking company owner just asked Denton whether he should buy some 50 more trucks.

Denton – who calls gas drilling “a game changer” – says his reply is instructive for just about every aspect of drilling, from how it affects the environment to how much landowners get for their land.

“It really is a complex business transaction masquerading as a lottery ticket,” he says.

This is why Denton and others with experience in the business end of gas drilling warn that buyers should always beware of the so-called “experts” who try to sell their services when drilling begins.

The president of the Chenango County Farm Bureau has been investigating drilling for 10 years and says he's yet to find anyone who knows it all.

“The technology changes. The laws change. There's no such thing as a standard lease,” say Bradd Vickers, who offers this bottom line: “The gas company wants to get in and get out and get the gas as quick as possible, and our role is to hold their feet to the fire. Whether you choose to lease or not, you should get as much information as possible to see all sides of the issues and evaluate all objectives.”

sisrael@th-record.com

Posted by John Kavaller at 8:44 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Broome County NY, Chenango County NY, economic impact, horizontal drilling, Marcellus Shale, Sullivan County NY


Sullivan couple fears destruction of paradiseSurrounding farmland is leased for drilling

Sullivan couple fears destruction of paradiseSurrounding farmland is leased for drilling

Cecily Fortescue and Arnie Friedman live on property surrounded by undeveloped farmland that has been leased for gas drilling, and they're not sure what to do about it.

For the Times Herald-Record/Michael D. Bloom
By Steve Israel
Times Herald-Record
Published: 2:00 AM - 06/27/10

Cecily Fortescue and Arnie Friedman thought their little slice of paradise would stay heaven forever. They were tucked in 300 acres of a natural Catskill mountain quilt of lush green farm fields and thick dark forests near Callicoon.

It was all owned by a farmer neighbor who so protected that land – and the 2-acre nugget they bought from him – he wouldn't even sell them a couple of acres as a right-of-way. Fortescue and Friedman so trusted their neighbor to preserve their western Sullivan County land from development, they left it to him in their will.

Then the farmer died. He left all that land to his wife and son. And they did what so many are doing in Sullivan, but what was unthinkable to Fortescue and Friedman. They leased that 300 acres surrounding them for gas drilling.

Now Fortescue and Friedman, who drive a Subaru Forester with a “No Drilling” bumper sticker, find themselves in a predicament that's becoming all too familiar to many folks who moved to Sullivan for the open spaces of farms and fields and who oppose drilling. They're surrounded by a landscape that may one day be etched with gas drilling rigs and rumbling drilling trucks – a landscape that may one day include their slice of it.

‘Surrounded'

And they're not sure what to do about it – especially since they've heard about the water and noise pollution from gas drilling in Dimock, Pa., which may be a few hours away from their Delaware River town, but sits on the same gas-rich Marcellus shale as their land and the rest of Sullivan County.

“We're absolutely surrounded,” says Friedman, a retired film editor who's worked on features for outlets like HBO.

“And we're less than a mile from the (natural gas) pipeline,” says Fortescue, a potter and public-radio show host, referring to the pipeline that makes gas drilling in western Sullivan even more lucrative for gas companies.

And because of current state regulations, a well could be drilled horizontally thousands of feet beneath their land, starting from their neighbors' land, even if they don't sign a lease. They could even receive royalty payments.

Good neighbors

Fortescue and Friedman are especially perplexed because as much as they love their land, they like their neighbors, the Henke family, who didn't want to comment for this article. The late Mike senior would see strange headlights heading down the isolated shale road to Fortescue and Friedman's home at night and call to make sure they were safe. His son plowed that steep road four times last winter – and had to be forced to take money. Fortescue – a native of England – makes chutney for uncle Jim Henke.

Plus, Fortescue and Friedman say they understand the dilemma of farmers like their neighbors – many of whom say they will lose their land if they can't lease it for the tens of thousands of dollars gas drilling may bring. After all, Mike senior had to drive a school bus in the morning before he worked his land.

“They're under enormous pressure,” Fortescue says, sitting on a deck overlooking a mountainous vista of green fields and forests.

But when it comes to talking to their neighbors about their drilling dilemma – and specifically their will – they haven't really broached the subject.

“There are three things you don't talk about,” says Friedman, “sex, religion and politics. And now there's a fourth, gas drilling.”

Besides, what could they say?

“No one can deny you the right to lease your land,” says Fortescue.

So Cecily Fortescue and Arnie Friedman savor what may be the last summer without gas drilling. They hope state lawmakers will vote for a moratorium that may delay drilling for at least year. They also hope that if Attorney General Andrew Cuomo gets elected governor, the state may change its energy policy.

But if he doesn't? And the state finalizes its regulations and begins issuing permits next year?

“I don't think we know what we're going to do,” says Friedman, pointing to their green slice of paradise.

“What can we do?” says

Posted by John Kavaller at 8:25 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: drilling, farmers, natural gas, natural gas pipeline, state regulations

Thursday, June 24, 2010Groups to Lawmakers: Do Not Stand in the Way of Expanded Natural Gas Exploration

Groups to Lawmakers: Do Not Stand in the Way of Expanded Natural Gas Exploration


ALBANY, NY (06/23/2010)(readMedia)-- A coalition of business and economic development groups, led by the Independent Oil & Gas Association of New York, today appealed to the New York State Legislature to oppose legislation to establish a statutory moratorium on gas drilling in New York.

Thirty-three groups, including chambers of commerce and other pro-business and pro-taxpayer groups, implored lawmakers to allow the State Department of Environmental Conservation to complete its review of the environmental impact statement governing natural gas exploration.

"We need your support for this compelling economic development opportunity, one that could benefit the State and localities significantly for years to come," the groups wrote. "We believe that the way forward to the safe development of the Marcellus Shale is now clear. We should embrace our state's ability to bring New York-produced gas to New York customers, and by so doing create new opportunity and prosperity in our own state."

One bill, A.10490-A (Englebright)/ S.7592-A (Addabbo), would impose a moratorium on hydraulic fracturing until 120 days after the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency completes yet another study on the technique. Another bill, S.8129-B (Thompson)/ A.11443-B (Sweeney) would block all permits for horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing in the Marcellus Shale until at least May 15, 2011.

The Marcellus is perhaps the largest natural gas reserve in the United States with the potential to dramatically increase America's energy independence while vastly improving economic recovery and job creation.

"We ask you to let the process proceed with the DEC continuing the review and revisions to the SGEIS. There are no permits being issued at this time. There is no need for a statutory moratorium," the signers wrote. "We believe that New York cannot afford to turn away or postpone the tremendous opportunity for economic resurgence and a clean energy supply presented by the Marcellus Shale."

To view the letter, visit www.marcellusfacts.com.

Supporting Organizations include:

Independent Gas & Oil Association of NY

Delaware County Board of Supervisors

Greater Binghamton Chamber of Commerce

Greater Syracuse Chamber of Commerce

Independent Power Producers of NY

Manufacturers Association of Central New York

National Federation of Independent Business

New York Construction Materials Association

New York State Economic Development Council

New York State Petroleum Council

New York State Motor Truck Association

Railroads of New York, Inc.

Southern Tier Economic Group

The Business Council of New York State, Inc.

Unshackle Upstate

Finger Lakes Railway

The New York, Susquehanna & Western Railway Corporation

Owego Harford Railway

Delaware & Hudson Railway/Canadian Pacific Railway

Clarendon & Pittsford Railroad Company

New York & Ogdensburg Railroad Company

Northeast Gas Association

Joint Landowners Coalition of New York, Inc.

B & H Rail Corporation/Livonia, Avon, Lakeville Railroad Corporation

Western New York & Pennsylvania Railroad Company

Chesapeake Energy Corporation

Energy In Depth

New York & Atlantic Railway

New York Building Congress

Associated General Contractors of NYS

New York & Lake Erie Railroad

Marcellus Shale Coalition

New York State Pipe Trades Association

Posted by John Kavaller at 4:48 PM 0 comments Links to this post

Westchester Legislators Call For Ban On Marcellus Shale Drilling

Legislators Call For Ban On Marcellus Shale Drilling 24 June 2010


White Plains, NY - The Board of Legislators has made official its opposition to proposed natural gas drilling projects in the Catskill Delaware region of the Marcellus Shale rock formation.

A resolution approved unanimously, sponsored by Peter Harckham (D – Katonah), urges Governor Paterson and the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC) to ban hydrofracking – or drilling, for natural gas within the areas of the Shale that coincide with the Catskill and Delaware watersheds, where New York City and Westchester get 80 - 90% of their drinking water. Legislators are also asking that a moratorium be placed on hydrofracking throughout the state pending further comprehensive and independent review of the technology, which involves the use of chemicals that can infiltrate source and groundwater, and pose other environmental and public health hazards.

“There are just too many unanswered questions about the safety of this technology, the chemicals used in the process, the amounts of water used and contaminated, as well as other risks to the environment,” said Harckham, who chairs the Board’s Energy & Environment Committee.

"The technology behind hydrofracking is imperfect at best,” echoed committee member Legislator John G. Testa (R – Peekskill). “Moreover, the injection of toxic chemicals and the environmental damage they could cause is too great to allow its use in New York.”

Hydrofracking, or hydraulic fracturing, is a process used to release natural gas from rock. After deep wells are drilled, large quantities of water and chemicals – some identified as carcinogenic – are pumped into the rock, fracturing it and thereby releasing gas. The Marcellus Shale rock system, which stretches down from western New York into Virginia, has been increasingly eyed for hydrofracking because of its untapped and considerable gas reserves. Energy security and independence, as well as economic development have been cited in support of proposals to drill. Opponents, however, argue that the possible drawbacks involved – not only environmental, but fiscal and economic in nature – warrant further consideration.

“Based on facts as presented so far, it is clear that drilling in New York’s portion of the Marcellus Shale has more downside than upside,” explained former Environment Chair Mike Kaplowitz (D – Somers). ”The environmental, economic and quality of life costs exceed any conceivable energy benefits. If the Catskill and Delaware watersheds required filtration as a result of hydrofracking in their vicinity, we could incur a $10 billion expense.”

Today, water from the Catskill and Delaware watersheds is unfiltered, due to a “Filtration Avoidance Determination” from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Lawmakers fear that hydrofracking permit conditions currently proposed under the state could allow companies to undergo hydrofracking in these watersheds without providing adequate safeguards for the Westchester and New York City drinking water supplies. If water quality were sufficiently compromised, the EPA could lift its determination, requiring New York City to build a water filtration plant estimated to cost at least $10 billion to construct and hundreds of millions of dollars to operate annually. Those costs would get passed onto Westchester residents. Westchester purchases its water from the city.

“The permit conditions as they stand fail to adequately monitor groundwater near gas wells and fail to detect or remediate contamination,” argued Legislator Bill Burton (D – Ossining). “These are two problems that absolutely must be addressed before projects that entail this method of drilling move forward.”

“The idea that we could not only end up doing irreparable harm to our environment, but adversely affect the watershed region to the extent that billions of taxpayer dollars would have to be allocated to large-scale water treatment capital projects – is staggering,” said Legislator Alfreda Williams (D – Greenburgh), who also sits on the Environment & Energy Committee.

Concern over inadequate monitoring of groundwater, air quality and the consequences of these and other impacts point to another major argument expressed in the Board’s resolution: the state’s preemptory power over local governments vis-à-vis regulating the gas and mining industries.

“Aside from the issues of toxic chemicals, threatening the water supplies of millions of people and other potential environmental degradation,” said Harckham, “NYS Environmental Conservation Law supersedes local regulation of oil and gas, preventing localities from controlling gas and oil well drilling operations in their own neighborhoods – and we have a serious problem with this breach of home rule.”

Westchester joins other counties like Tompkins, Cortland, and Onondaga in calling for a hold on drilling until details surrounding hydrofracking, its employment in the state and impacts are better defined.

Posted by John Kavaller at 4:44 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: air quality, groundwater, hydrofracking, Marcellus Shale, New York City watershed, Westerchester County NY

Wednesday, June 23, 2010Sullivan County Hosts Public Forums on “Understanding Gas Drilling”

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

June 18, 2010
6:30 PM

Sullivan County Hosts Public Forums on “Understanding Gas Drilling”

Monticello – County Manager David P Fanslau announced today that the Sullivan County Legislature will present a series of public forums on natural gas development of the Marcellus Shale within Sullivan County and the surrounding region. “This three-part series of panel discussions is being organized by the Sullivan County Division of Planning and Environmental Management and was developed with input from a community advisory group that included representatives from various stakeholder groups – business, local government, environmental groups and citizens with a range of perspectives on this issue,” said Fanslau.

This series of Public Forums, “Understanding Gas Drilling,” will take place at Monticello High School, 237 Route 42 in Monticello, NY, on the following dates: Tuesday – June 29, Thursday – July 15, and Thursday – August 19. All events run from 5:45 PM to 8:30 PM, are free and open to the public.

Each session will be comprised of a panel of experts followed by time for questions from the public. These events are geared to all members of the community. Anyone interested in learning more about gas drilling, how it affects our region and the status of regulations in New York State should attend. “The goal for these public forums is to present a balanced picture of what can be expected from gas drilling in Sullivan County and how we as citizens should be informed and prepared for the choices that lie ahead,” says Sullivan County Legislature Chairman Jonathan F. Rouis.

“This series is intended to benefit residents of Sullivan County who might be considering signing a gas lease for their land as well as others with general concerns about how drilling will take place and what effects natural gas development could have on the environment. Panelists will address issues affecting both individual property owners – whether and how to lease – and the broader community, for example the prospects for job growth in the local economy and the potential for increased demands on municipal services, said Luiz C. Aragon, Commissioner of Planning and Environmental Management.

Each of the three events is designed to address a different set of topics through a panel of professional experts and others with relevant experience.

The first Public Forum, scheduled for Tuesday, June 29, will cover “Property and Landowner Issues. “ Panelists include Chris Denton, an attorney from Elmira, New York, who specializes in representing property owners and landowner coalitions in negotiations over the technical terms of natural gas leases. Bradd Vickers, President of the Chenango County Farm Bureau, has spoken, written and worked extensively with farmers in Central New York on the issues landowners need to consider in signing a gas lease. Both Denton and Vickers participated in a panel organized by the Division of Planning at Sullivan West High School in August 2008. Todd Mathes, an attorney with the Albany law firm of Whiteman Osterman and Hanna, LLP, specializes in environmental and municipal law in New York State. He has written on the complexities involved in local governments exercising home-rule powers with regard to natural gas development, from managing town roads to limited zoning and land use controls.

The second Public Forum, scheduled for Thursday, July 15, is sub-titled, “Environmental and Health Concerns.” The panel of speakers will examine potential health and environmental risks associated with natural gas development, the state of current New York State regulations, and industry practices designed to mitigate potential hazards. Panelists include Dr. Anthony R. Ingraffea, the Dwight C. Baum Professor of Engineering at Cornell University, who has researched and analyzed the fracturing processes involved in gas shale deposits. Dr. Adam Law, MD, a specialist in endocrinology and metabolic medicine and President of the Medical Staffat Cayuga Medical Center in Ithaca, New York, will present his concerns over the lack of information regarding risks to human endocrine and metabolic function contained in New York State’s draft Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Statement (DSGEIS) covering natural gas development in the Marcellus Shale. Kate Sinding, an attorney and Deputy Director of Urban East Program of the Natural Resources Defense Council, will provide an analysis of the proposed environmental regulations contained in the DSGEIS. Paul Hartman, Director of Government Relations in New York State for Chesapeake Energy Corporation will speak to his company’s approach to mitigating risks through drilling practices and other operations that comprise the natural gas extraction process.

The third Public Forum, scheduled for Thursday, August 19, will focus on “Economic and Community Impacts,” exploring the diverse predictions and empirical data on economic “gain” and “strain” among communities that have experienced natural gas development, most recently in the northeast but also over the past decade and longer in western states. Speakers include Jannette Barth, an economist with her own consulting firm, J.M. Barth & Associates of Croton-on-Hudson, who has examined potential economic gains and unforeseen costs in New York and Pennsylvania. Anthony J. Ventello, Executive Director of Progress Authority of Bradford and Susquehanna Counties, based in Towanda, Pennsylvania, oversees economic development programs for this two-county region experiencing rapid growth of natural gas exploration and extraction. Jeffrey Jacquet is a Ph. D. candidate in the Department of Natural Resources at Cornell University; he is a member of Cornell Cooperative Extension’s “Marcellus Shale Team” and has examined regional economic trends related to natural gas development in Wyoming, Texas and most recently north-central Pennsylvania. Craig Sautner, a resident of Dimmock, Pennsylvania, will speak from direct experience on his community’s challenges with gas drilling.

All three of these sessions will be moderated by Planning Commissioner Luiz C. Aragon and will provide an opportunity for the public to ask questions of the panelists.

For additional information, contact the Sullivan County Division of Planning and Environmental Management, Tel. 845-807-0527, or Email: planning@co.sullivan.ny.us

David P. Fanslau, M.G.A., ICMA-CM
County Manager
County of Sullivan
100 North Street
P.O. Box 5012
Monticello, NY 12701
845-807-0450 - voice
845-807-0460 - fax

Posted by John Kavaller at 7:54 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Economic and Community Impacts, Environmental and Health Concerns, experts, forums, Property and Landowner Issues, Sullivan County NY, Understanding Gas Drilling

Monday, June 21, 2010 Debunking GasLand - The Movie

DEBUNKING GasLand THE MOVIE


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Josh Fox makes his mainstream debut with his fictional rant film targeting natural gas – but how much of it is actually true?"

One glaring error in the film is the suggestion that gas drilling led to the September fish kill at Dunkard Creek in Greene County. That was determined to have been caused by a golden algae bloom from coal mine drainage, (from CONSOL Energy discharge), NOT natural gas drilling.

Attached below are 2 reports from the Colorado Oil and Gas Conservation Commission. The Commission investigated the Markham and McClure water wells, each referenced in the movie Gasland. Sample results showed that the water wells contained naturally occurring biogenic methane gas. In each case, the Commission found that the complaints were unrelated to oil and gas activities.

For an avant-garde filmmaker and stage director whose previous work has been recognized by the “Fringe Festival” of New York City, HBO’s decision to air the GasLand documentary nationwide later this month represents Josh Fox’s first real foray into the mainstream – and, with the potential to reach even a portion of the network’s 30 million U.S. subscribers, a potentially significant one at that.

But with larger audiences and greater fanfare come the expectation of a few basic things: accuracy, attention to detail, and original reporting among them. Unfortunately, in the case of this film, accuracy is too often pushed aside for simplicity, evidence too often sacrificed for exaggeration, and the same old cast of characters and anecdotes – previously debunked – simply lifted from prior incarnations of the film and given a new home in this one.

“I’m sorry,” Josh Fox once told a New York City magazine, “but art is more important than politics. … Politics is people lying to you and simplifying everything; art is about contradictions.” And so it is with GasLand: politics at its worst, art at its most contrived, and contradictions of fact found around every bend of the river. Against that backdrop, we attempt below to identify and correct some of the most egregious inaccuracies upon which the film is based (all quotes are from Josh Fox, unless otherwise noted):

Misstating the Law

(6:05) “What I didn’t know was that the 2005 energy bill pushed through Congress by Dick Cheney exempts the oil and natural gas industries from Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act, the Superfund law, and about a dozen other environmental and Democratic regulations.”

This assertion, every part of it, is false. The oil and natural gas industry is regulated under every single one of these laws — under provisions of each that are relevant to its operations. See this fact sheet for a fuller explanation of that.

The process of hydraulic fracturing, to which Fox appears to be making reference here, has never in its 60-year history been regulated under the Safe Drinking Water Act (SDWA). It has, however, been regulated ably and aggressively by the states, which have compiled an impressive record of enforcement and oversight in the many decades in which they have been engaged in the practice.

Far from being “pushed through Congress by Dick Cheney,” the Energy Policy Act of 2005 earned the support of nearly three-quarters of the U.S. Senate (74 “yea” votes), including the top Democrat on the Energy Committee; current Interior secretary Ken Salazar, then a senator from Colorado; and a former junior senator from Illinois named Barack Obama. In the U.S. House, 75 Democrats joined 200 Republicans in supporting the final bill, including the top Democratic members on both the Energy & Commerce and Resources Committees.
(6:24) “But when the 2005 energy bill cleared away all the restrictions, companies … began to lease Halliburton technology and to begin the largest and most extensive domestic gas drilling campaign in history – now occupying 34 states.”

Once again, hydraulic fracturing has never been regulated under SDWA – not in the 60-year history of the technology, the 36-year history of the law, or the 40-year history of EPA. Given that, it’s not entirely clear which “restrictions” in the law Mr. Fox believes were “cleared away” by the 2005 energy bill. All the bill sought to do was clarify the existing and established intent of Congress as it related to the scope of SDWA.

Interest in developing clean-burning natural gas resources from America’s shale formations began to manifest itself well before 2005. The first test well in the Marcellus Shale in Pennsylvania, for example, was drilled in 2004. In Texas, the first wells in the prolific Barnett Shale formation were spudded in the late 1990s. But even before natural gas from shale was considered a viable business model, energy producers had been relying on hydraulic fracturing for decades to stimulate millions of wells across the country. The technology was first deployed in 1948.

The contention that current energy development activity represents the “largest … drilling campaign in history” is also incorrect. According to EIA, more natural gas wells were developed in 1982 than today. And more than two times the number of petroleum wells were drilled back then as well, relative to the numbers we have today. Also, while it may (or may not) be technically true that fracturing activities take place in 34 states, it’s also true that 99.9 percent of all oil and gas activity is found in only 27 U.S. states (page 9, Ground Water Protection Council report)

(32:34) “The energy task force, and $100 million lobbying effort on behalf of the industry, were significant in the passage of the ‘Halliburton Loophole’ to the Safe Drinking Water Act, which authorizes oil and gas drillers exclusively to inject known hazardous materials, unchecked, directly into or adjacent to underground drinking water supplies. It passed as part of the Bush administration’s Energy Policy Act of 2005.”

Not content with simply mischaracterizing the nature of existing law, here Fox attempts to assert that the law actually allows energy producers to inject hazardous chemicals “directly into” underground drinking water. This is a blatant falsehood. Of course, if such an outrageous thing were actually true, one assumes it wouldn’t have taken five years and a purveyor of the avant-garde to bring it to light.

The subsurface formations that undergo fracture stimulation reside thousands and thousands of feet below formations that carry potable water. These strata are separated by millions of tons of impermeable rock, and in some cases, more than two miles of it.

Once again, to characterize the bipartisan 2005 energy bill as having a “loophole” for hydraulic fracturing requires one to believe that, prior to 2005, hydraulic fracturing was regulated by EPA under federal law. But that belief is mistaken. And so is the notion that the 2005 act contains a loophole for oil and natural gas. As stated, hydraulic fracturing has been regulated ably and aggressively by the states.

(1:32:34) “Diana DeGette and Maurice Hinchey’s FRAC Act [is] a piece of legislation that’s one paragraph long that simply takes out the exemption for hydraulic fracturing to the Safe Drinking Water Act.”

Here Fox is referring to the 2008 iteration of the FRAC Act, not the slightly longer (though equally harmful) 2009 version of the bill. The legislation does not, as its authors suggest, “restore” the Safe Drinking Water Act to the way it was in 2004. It calls for a wholesale re-writing of it.

Page 2 of 3
Here’s the critical passage from the FRAC Act: “Section 1421(d)(1) of the Safe Drinking Water Act is amended by striking subparagraph (B) and inserting: (B) includes the underground injection of fluids or propping agents pursuant to hydraulic fracturing operations related to oil and gas production activities.”

Why would you need to “insert” new language into a 36-year-old statute if all you were looking to do is merely “restore” it?

Misrepresenting the Rules

(1:00:56) “Because of the exemptions, fracking chemicals are considered proprietary … The only reason we know anything about the fracking chemicals is because of the work of Theo Colborn … by chasing down trucks, combing through material safety data sheets, and collecting samples.”

With due respect to eminent environmental activist and former World Wildlife Fund staffer Theo Colborn, no one has ever had to “chas[e] down a truck” to access information on the materials used in the fracturing process.

That’s because there’s actually a much easier way to obtain that information: simply navigate to this website hosted by regulators in Pennsylvania, this one from regulators in New York (page 130; it will take a few moments to download), this one for West Virginia, this one maintained by the Ground Water Protection Council and the U.S. Department of Energy (page 63), and this one on the website of Energy In Depth.

(1:03:33) Dr. Colborn: “Once the public hears the story, and they’ll say, ‘Why aren’t we out there monitoring’? We can’t monitor until we know what they’re using. There’s no way to monitor. You can’t.”

According to environmental regulators from Josh Fox’s home state of Pennsylvania, “Drilling companies must disclose the names of all chemicals to be stored and used at a drilling site … These plans contain copies of material safety data sheets for all chemicals … This information is on file with DEP and is available to landowners, local governments and emergency responders.”

Environmental regulators from Fox’s adopted state of New York also testify to having ready access to this information. From the NY Dept. of Environmental Conservation (DEC) information page: “The [state] is assessing the chemical makeup of these additives and will ensure that all necessary safeguards and best practices are followed.”

According to the Ground Water Protection Council (GWPC), “[M]ost additives contained in fracture fluids including sodium chloride, potassium chloride, and diluted acids, present low to very low risks to human health and the environment.” GWPC members include state environmental officials who set and enforce regulations on ground water protection and underground fluid injection.

Mischaracterizing the Process

(6:50) “[Hydraulic fracturing] blasts a mix of water and chemicals 8,000 feet into the ground. The fracking itself is like a mini-earthquake. … In order to frack, you need some fracking fluid – a mix of over 596 chemicals.”As it relates to the composition of fluids commonly used in the fracturing process, greater than 99.5 percent of the mixture is comprised of water and sand. The remaining materials, used to help deliver the water down the wellbore and position the sand in the tiny fractures created in the formation, are typically components found and used around the house. The most prominent of these, a substance known as guar gum, is an emulsifier more commonly found in ice cream.

From the U.S. Dept. of Energy / GWPC report: “Although the hydraulic fracturing industry may have a number of compounds that can be used in a hydraulic fracturing fluid, any single fracturing job would only use a few of the available additives [not 596!]. For example, in [this exhibit], there are 12 additives used, covering the range of possible functions that could be built into a fracturing fluid.” (page 62)

In the documentary, Fox graphically depicts the fracturing process as one that results in the absolute obliteration of the shale formation. In reality, the fractures created by the procedure and kept open by the introduction of proppants such as sand are typically less than a millimeter thick.

(50:05) “Each well completion, that is, the initial drilling phase plus the first frack job, requires 1,150 truck trips.”

Suggesting that every well completion in America requires the exact same number of truck trips is absurd. As could be guessed, the number of trips required to supply the well site with the needed equipment and personnel will vary (widely) depending on any number of factors.

As it relates to a source for Fox’s identification of “1,150 truck trips,” none is given – although it appears he may have derived those numbers from a back-of-the-envelope calculation inspired by a chart on page 6-142 of this document from NY DEC. As depicted on that page, the transportation of new and used water supplies, to and from the wellsite, account for 85 percent of the trips extrapolated by Fox.

Unrepresented in this chart is the enormous growth in the amount of produced water that is currently being recycled in the Marcellus – with industry in Pennsylvania reusing and recycling on average more than 60 percent of its water, according to the Marcellus Shale Coalition.

According to GWPC: “Drilling with compressed air is becoming an increasingly popular alternative to drilling with fluids due to the increased cost savings from both reduction in mud costs and the shortened drilling times as a result of air based drilling.” (page 55)

(51:12) “Before the water can be hauled away and disposed of somewhere, it has to be emptied into a pit – an earthen pit, or a clay pit, sometimes a lined pit, but a pit – where a lot of it can seep right back down into the ground.”

The vast majority of energy-producing states – 27 in total, including all the ones to which Fox travels for GasLand – have explicit laws on the books governing the type of containment structures that must be used for temporarily storing flowback water. A number of producers today choose to store this water in steel tanks, eliminating all risk of that water re-entering the surrounding environment.

GWPC (May 2009) “In 23 states, pits of a certain type or in a particular location must have a natural or artificial liner designed to prevent the downward movement of pit fluids into the subsurface. … Twelve states also explicitly either prohibit or restrict the use of pits that intersect the water table.” (page 28-29)
GWPC (April 2009): “Water storage pits used to hold water for hydraulic fracturing purposes are typically lined to minimize the loss of water from infiltration. … In an urban setting, due to space limitations, steel storage tanks may be used.” (page 55)

Flat-Out Making Stuff Up

(53:36) “The Pinedale Anticline and the Jonah gas fields [of Wyoming] are directly in the path of the thousand year old migration corridor of pronghorn antelope, mule deer and sage grouse. And yeah, each of these species is endangered, and has suffered a significant decline of their populations since 2005.”

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0 for 1: Three species of the pronghorn antelope are considered “endangered,” none of which are found anywhere near the Pinedale Anticline. Those are: the Sonoran (Arizona), the Peninsular (Mexico), and the Mexican Pronghorn (also of Mexico). According to the Great Plains Nature Center: “The great slaughter of the late 1800s affected the pronghorns … Only about 12,000 remained by 1915. Presently, they number around one million and the greatest numbers of them are in Wyoming and Montana.”

0 for 2: Only one species of mule deer is considered “endangered”: the Cedros Island mule deer of Mexico (nowhere near Wyoming). The mule deer populations are so significant in Wyoming today that the state has a mule deer hunting season.

0 for 3: The sage grouse does not currently have a place on the endangered species list, according to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (FWS) – and “robust populations of the bird currently exist across the state” of Wyoming, according to the agency. Interestingly, FWS recently issued a press release identifying wind development as a critical threat the sage grouse’s habitat.

That said, producers in the area have taken the lead on efforts to lessen their impact and reduce the number of truck trips required to service their well sites. As part of that project, operators have commissioned a series of independent studies examining additional steps that can be taken to safeguard the Anticline’s wildlife.

(31:32) “In 2004, the EPA was investigating a water contamination incident due to hydraulic fracturing in Alabama. But a panel rejected the inquiry, stating that although hazard materials were being injected underground, EPA did not need to investigate.”

No record of the investigation described by Fox exists, so EID reached out to Dr. Dave Bolin, deputy director of Alabama’s State Oil & Gas Board and the man who heads up oversight of hydraulic fracturing in that state. In an email, he said he had “no recollection” of such an investigation taking place.

That said, it’s possible that Fox is referring to EPA’s study of the McMillian well in Alabama, which spanned several years in the early- to mid-1990s. In 1989, Alabama regulators conducted four separate water quality tests on the McMillian well. The results indicated no water quality problems existed. In 1990, EPA conducted its own water quality tests, and found nothing.

In a letter sent in 1995, then-EPA administrator Carol Browner (currently, President Obama’s top energy and environmental policy advisor) characterized EPA’s involvement with the McMillian case in the following way: “Repeated testing, conducted between May of 1989 and March of 1993, of the drinking water well which was the subject of this petition [McMillian] failed to show any chemicals that would indicate the presence of fracturing fluids. The well was also sampled for drinking water quality, and no constituents exceeding drinking water standards were detected.”

For information on what actually did happen in Alabama during this time, and how it’s relevant to the current conversation about the Safe Drinking Water Act, please download the fact sheet produced last year by the Coalbed Methane Association of Alabama.

(1:28:06) “Just a few short months after this interview, the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection suffered the worst budget cuts in history, amounting to over 700 staff either being fired or having reduced hours and 25 percent of its total budget cut.”

DEP press release, issued January 28, 2010: “Governor Edward G. Rendell announced today that the commonwealth is strengthening its enforcement capabilities. At the Governor’s direction, the Department of Environmental Protection will begin hiring 68 new personnel who will make sure that drilling companies obey state laws and act responsibly to protect water supplies. DEP also will strengthen oil and gas regulations to improve well construction standards.”

Recycling Discredited Points from the Past

Weston Wilson (EPA “whistleblower”): “One can characterize this entire [natural gas] industry as having a hundred year history of purchasing those they contaminate.” (33:36)

Mr. Wilson, currently on staff at EPA’s Denver office, was not part of the team of scientists and engineers that spent nearly five years studying hydraulic fracturing for EPA. That effort, released in the form of a landmark 2004 study by the agency, found “no evidence” to suggest any relationship between hydraulic fracturing and the contamination of drinking water.

Wilson has a well-documented history of aggressive opposition to responsible resource and mineral development. Over his 35-year career, Mr. Wilson has invoked “whistleblower” status to fight dam construction in Colorado, oil and gas development in Montana, and the mining of gold in Wyoming.

Wilson in his own words: “The American public would be shocked if they knew we make six figures and we basically sit around and do nothing.”

Dunkard Creek: Fox includes images of dead fish along a 35-mile stretch of Dunkard Creek in Washington Co., Pa.; attributes that event to natural gas development. (01:23:15)

Fox’s attempt to blame the Dunkard Creek incident on natural gas exploration is contradicted by an EPA report – issued well before GasLand was released – which blamed the fish kill on an algal bloom, which itself was fed by discharges from coal mines.

EPA report: “Given what has been seen in other states and the etiology of this kill, we believe the toxin from this algae bloom led to the kill of fish, mussels, and salamanders on Dunkard Creek. … The situation in Dunkard Creek should be considered a chronic exposure since chloride levels were elevated above the criteria for long periods of time.” (issued 11/23/09)

Local PA newspaper calls out Fox: “One glaring error in the film is the suggestion that gas drilling led to the September fish kill at Dunkard Creek in Greene County. That was determined to have been caused by a golden algae bloom from mine drainage from a [mine] discharge.” (Washington (Pa.) Observer-Reporter, 6/5/10)

Mike Markham: Fox blames flammable faucet in Fort Lupton, Colo. on natural gas development

But that’s not true according to the Colorado Oil & Gas Conservation Commission (COGCC). “Dissolved methane in well water appears to be biogenic [naturally occurring] in origin. … There are no indications of oil & gas related impacts to water well.” (complaint resolved 9/30/08, signed by John Axelson of COGCC)

Context from our friends at ProPublica: “Drinking water with methane, the largest component of natural gas, isn’t necessarily harmful. The gas itself isn’t toxic — the Environmental Protection Agency doesn’t even regulate it — and it escapes from water quickly, like bubbles in a soda.” (Abrahm Lustgarten, ProPublica, 4/22/09)

Lisa Bracken: Fox blames methane occurrence in West Divide Creek, Colo. on natural gas development.

That assertion has also been debunked by COGCC, which visited the site six separate times over 13 months to confirm its findings: “Stable isotopes from 2007 consistent with 2004 samples indicting gas bubbling in surface water features is of biogenic origin.” (July 2009, COGCC presentation by Margaret Ash, environmental protection supervisor)

Email from COGCC supervisor to Bracken: “Lisa: As you know since 2004, the COGCC staff has responded to your concerns about potential gas seepage along West Divide Creek on your property and to date we have not found any indication that the seepage you have observed is related to oil and gas activity.” (email from COGCC’s Debbie Baldwin to Bracken, 06/30/08)

More from that email: “These samples have been analyzed for a variety of parameters including natural gas compounds (methane, ethane, propane, butane, pentane, hexanes), heavier hydrocarbon compounds including benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, xylenes (BTEX), stable isotopes of methane, bacteria (iron related, sulfate reducing, and slime), major anions and cations, and other field and laboratory tests. To date, BTEX compounds have not been detected in any of the samples.”

Calvin Tillman: Fox interviews mayor of DISH, Texas; blames natural gas development, transport for toxins in the air, benzene in blood.

Tillman in the press: “Six months ago, nobody knew that facilities like this would be spewing benzene. Someone could come in here and look at us and say, ‘You know what? They’ve sacrificed you. You’ve been sacrificed for the good of the shale.’” (Scientific American, 3/30/10)

A little more than a month later, Texas Dept. of State Health Services debunks that claim: “Biological test results from a Texas Department of State Health Services investigation in Dish, Texas, indicate that residents’ exposure to certain contaminants was not greater than that of the general U.S. population.” (DSHS report, May 12, 2010)

More from the agency: “DSHS paid particular attention to benzene because of its association with natural gas wells. The only residents who had higher levels of benzene in their blood were smokers. Because cigarette smoke contains benzene, finding it in smokers’ blood is not unusual.”

Posted by John Kavaller at 6:55 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Clean Water Act, Gasland, hydraulic fracturing, Josh Fox, Liquefied natural gas

Gasland: Will New York Be the Next Casualty of the Halliburton Loophole?

Gasland: Will New York Be the Next Casualty of the Halliburton Loophole?

When the Sundance award-winning film, Gasland, begins nationwide broadcast on HBO this Monday, the curtain will rise on Act II of the health tragedy wrought by the insurgent fossil fuel race to profit. This exquisitely crafted documentary feels like America's Nuremberg, as ordinary heartland citizens rise up to indict gas giants, who, they claim, have been on the loose since 2005, when former Vice-President Dick Cheney crafted the so-called Halliburton Loophole.

The Halliburton Loophole expressly exempts oil and gas companies, from customary safety measures, health safeguards, regulatory oversights, penalties and liabilities that most Americans assume are in place to protect citizens, health and resources. As the film depicts, since 2005, the companies have ratcheted into high gear around the country, using a fuel collection practice, called "fracking" linked to drinking water contamination and health harm. Now they have their sights set on New York, with Albany lawmakers currently meeting behind closed doors to either grant or withhold permission to drill in New York, until after the EPA completes safety studies. In the next few days, the Albany decision could effect the health and water supplies of people in New York City, Philadelphia, New York State, New Jersey and Eastern Pennsylvania where two weeks ago an exploding gas well spewed forth 35,000 gallons of toxins for 16 hours. Moreover, film-maker Josh Fox (who will appear on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart on June 21st) says that if New York just says: no, it could start a nation-wide trend to halt unsafe fuel prospecting.

Fracking drills deep into the earth to bring forth gas (and radiation) mixing nearly 600 toxic, proprietary chemicals with millions of gallons of public water. Though natural gas is marketed as the "safe" energy source compared with coal, according to an Environmental Working Group report, one single well contains chemicals sufficient to "contaminate more than 100 billion gallons of drinking water." When film-maker Josh Fox tracks the hundreds of truckloads used to convey the process into (and out of) a region, the numbers reveal that nearly half of these chemicals are left behind to evaporate into the air, and seep into wells, aquifers, streams, and creeks that flow into rivers. Due to the exemption from Superfund Cleanup, no remediation is required of drillers.

According to people Fox interviewed in Colorado, Texas, Wyoming, Utah, New Mexico and Pennsylvania (states which have already submitted), those seduced by a promised sliver of massive profits, wake up to find that this environmental equivalent of unprotected sex, can all too often contaminate household drinking water, with carcinogens and neurotoxins (found by lab tests.)

In scene after scene of Gasland, families (in rural areas with once pristine water) turn on the kitchen tap. What comes out is darkened, opaque, smelly, chemical-laden water--that explodes into flames when ignited by a match. Yard high flames shoot up from streams and rivers. Many adults and children report health problems, such as persistent headaches, asthma, chronic pain, neurological illnesses, brain tumors and leukemia, which they attribute to drinking and bathing in post-fracking water. Animals lose hair, waste away, and die. In exchange for non-disclosure agreements, the gas companies now truck in drinking water to many households with contaminated water.

Nevertheless, in Gasland, the companies declare before Congress that unprotected fracking is safe. They deny any connection to these widespread problems because there is no "proof." And they have a point. For example, when a gas drill was installed near a rancher's property, his well water turned black overnight. But beyond this circumstantial evidence, without government agencies charged with oversight, what proof can the average citizen provide?

Just as in the Gulf crisis, some contend that proofs of safety should be required prior from industries using unsafe practices. Many assume that government regulatory policies and inspectors are in place to enforce rules that protect public resources and health. But they aren't. For example, New York, where drillers poise to install over 500 gas wells, has 16 inspectors and an environmental oversight agency, which government officials admit is riddled with conflicts of interest.

The Halliburton Loophole exempts oil and gas companies from the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, the Clean Drinking Water Act, and the Superfund Act. In Albany, the Abbabbo-Engelbright bill number S7592, being voted on this week, imposes a moratorium on gas drilling until after a slated EPA study is done. Environmental groups urge calls to Albany now to ask Senator Malcolm Smith, the Senator President, is at 518-455-2701 or 212-298-5585 and Senate Majority Conference Leader John. L. Sampson is at 518-455-2788 and 718-649-7653 to support a one and/or a two year moratorium.

Since New York City's water supply is unfiltered, New York is at a crossroads: Trust the drillers or use protection? City residents, lulled by promises that the upstate reservoir areas will be drilling-free, "have no real assurance that this promise will hold," says NRDC attorney, Kate Sindig. Unless the state-wide ban passes before Albany's immanent six-month recess, fracking will proceed. Sindig predicts that "they will begin drilling in areas outside the reservoir watershed, and then make their move into the watershed. Once they are here, it will be hard to contain them. New York City residents should be very worried."

With this major decision pending, Gasland is a cliff-hanger for everyone alarmed by the erosion of protections seen in the Gulf crisis. Will New Yorkers, (many of whom are unaware of the vote) be the next to succumb? or the first to put the brakes on the industries exempted by the Halliburton Loophole?

Stay tuned. Watch Gasland preview.

Posted by John Kavaller at 6:12 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: chemical laden, Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, fracking, Gasland, Gulf Crisis, Halliburton Loophole, Josh Fox, toxic chemicals

TROUBLED PROMISE: Little oversight, looming problems for Pa. gas industry

As the nation remains riveted by the deadly explosion and ongoing environmental catastrophe of a deep-water oil rig accident in the Gulf of Mexico, the need for oversight, public information and disaster-response plans in efforts to extract the Earth's fuel resources has come into sharp focus.
In Pennsylvania, the troubled promise is in the Marcellus Shale, a natural gas-rich geological formation below three-fifths of the state that holds enough recoverable gas to satisfy all of America's gas needs for more than a decade.
A six-month investigation by The Times-Tribune, including a review of thousands of pages of Department of Environmental Protection documents made available through a Right-to-Know request and interviews with regulators, citizens and scientists, shows the limits of the current regulatory environment to prevent contamination of the state's land and water during deep gas drilling in the shale.
It reveals costly environmental and safety errors made by a growing industry that has become the state's economic hope, and details the often frustrated efforts of regulators to police it using outdated laws and incomplete information.
The investigation found:
- There have been hundreds of spills at natural gas well sites in the commonwealth over the last five years, the vast majority of which have never been publicized by the DEP.
- The massive effort to exploit the shale has left an indelible mark on the landscape and communities in the state's Northern Tier and southwestern region, bearing both economic benefits and environmental costs. Experiences in those regions offer a preview of gas development in the seven counties of Northeast Pennsylvania, where a dozen Marcellus Shale operators hold leases to drill.
- Despite industry claims that it discloses all of the chemicals it uses in the gas extraction process, DEP documents from a series of spills in Susquehanna County show that the industry's disclosure is incomplete and insufficient for determining contamination in soil and water.
- A growing chorus of scientists is arguing that not enough is known about the effect widespread gas drilling will have on water supplies, air quality and human health to justify the intensive development of the resource already taking place.
"There's a massive industrialization experiment happening in West Virginia and Pennsylvania right now," said Anthony Ingraffea, a Cornell University engineering professor who has studied rock fractures in oil and gas wells for two decades.
"It might sound cruel to say this, but people in New York are very happy to see that West Virginia and Pennsylvania jumped in with both feet, eyes closed, as quickly as they could.
"We're learning from your mistakes. You're the guinea pigs."
Two goals
Among the six states underlain with Marcellus Shale, Pennsylvania has the largest portion of the gas-bearing rock and the most current wells. It will be wedded to the industry for the century and the 380,000 to 760,000 wells the industry estimates it may take to drain the shale's promised reserves.
The state has already benefited from a tremendous investment, including $1.8 billion in up-front lease bonuses paid to property owners in 2009 alone in exchange for the right to prospect below their land.
But Pennsylvania has never performed a comprehensive study of the accumulated impacts of drilling on a community or a watershed.
It has never declared a high-value watershed - like those around the reservoirs that feed Syracuse and New York City - off limits to gas extraction, as New York State has effectively done.
And Pennsylvania has never attempted to stop or slow the deep drilling since the first Marcellus well was sunk six years ago, unlike New York, which has imposed a moratorium on Marcellus Shale drilling as the state crafts an environmental impact statement, and unlike the interstate commission that regulates water quality in the Delaware River Basin.
Calls for caution have increased after a Marcellus Shale well in Clearfield County blew gas and waste fluids uncontrollably for 16 hours on June 3. State Sen. Jim Ferlo, D-38, Allegheny County, introduced legislation last week to pause drilling on both private and public lands in the state for a year.
Industry groups say calls for a moratorium are misguided. They emphasize that the gas companies' economic interests are naturally aligned with environmental interests.
"The only thing that differentiates you as a corporation is your image, your reputation, your costs and workforce, and innovation," Kathryn Klaber, the head of the Marcellus Shale Coalition, said. "Environmental compliance is a much bigger part of who you are."
Matt Pitzarella, a spokesman for Range Resources, one of the largest Marcellus Shale leaseholders in the state, simplified the equation: "We will make more money if we do it the right way," he said.
But last week, at a hearing about the Clearfield County well accident, DEP Secretary John Hanger said he is "not pleased" with the industry's environmental performance and that his own agency is not yet up to his highest standards.
"This industry's got to be better," he said. "There's too many leaks, there's too many spills, there's too many incidents of gas migrating."
He has a goal for the industry and his regulatory agency to be world class, he added. "We're not there."
The commonwealth's environmental regulator must balance simultaneous aims: "to produce the gas and protect the environment as we do that," Mr. Hanger often repeats.
In the field, those directives can become more complicated.
In early 2009, after witnessing a string of diesel spills at Cabot Oil and Gas Corp. drilling sites in her small Susquehanna County township, resident Victoria Switzer appealed to one of the state's environmental regulators to impose stiff fines and stop the accidents before they worsened.
At the time, there were two inspectors to police the proliferating wells being drilled in Northeast Pennsylvania counties. Then as now, drillers were expected to report any spills to DEP, as required by law.
But as he stood near her home in Dimock Twp. the regulator told Mrs. Switzer that the agency had to moderate its penalties or risk being sued by the gas companies - taking inspectors out of the field and into courtrooms to defend their decisions.
Worse, he said, the agency feared that if it was too hard on the gas companies, they might stop reporting their spills.
'We could stand to catch our breath'
Difficult decisions about how and when to curb an industry that is acclimating to the state's current and changing laws have become commonplace for the state's environmental oversight agency.
According to Scott Perry, head of DEP's Bureau of Oil and Gas Management, the regulatory agency does not have the legal right to hit the brakes on the whole industry the way New York has done.
Instead, the agency can restrict individual companies that have committed particularly severe violations after the fact - a tool it infrequently uses.
In April 2010, the department selectively halted drilling operations by Cabot in a 9-square-mile area, and stopped issuing permits for it to drill elsewhere, after it found the company failed to correct problems with its wells that caused methane to seep into residents' drinking water in Dimock.
In his testimony last week, Mr. Hanger asked legislators to craft a law with "crystal clear language" giving DEP the authority to withhold permits from operators with unsafe practices, since its current authority could be open to challenge by companies.
Even without a law, "we don't hesitate to take those actions when they are required," he said.
But last fall, legal hurdles apparently contributed to DEP officials' decision to reject the most stringent options for stopping Cabot's operations, even as the company experienced its 19th, 20th and 21st spills at its drilling sites in the rural township in less than two years.
Over two days in September, pipes and hoses carrying a water and chemical mixture across a steep hayfield breached three times, dumping about 8,400 gallons of the fluid around a Cabot well site and allowing up to 1,900 gallons of it to leak into a wetland and creek.
In internal e-mails in the days after the spills, Jennifer Means, the oil and gas program manager in DEP's Williamsport office, wrote that she "wholeheartedly endorsed" either revoking drilling permits the company was already issued or halting pending permits "to slow down their future activity."
It "would go a long way with the public" whose "biggest frustration... is the rate at which they are allowed to continue given all these incidents," she wrote.
"Also - we could certainly stand to catch our breath."
But after the agency's top attorney warned about procedural hurdles to suspending permits under state law, the department decided not to take that step.
It opted instead to issue a narrower order that curtailed - but did not halt - the company's operations, and allowed Cabot to resume full development after three weeks.
'Self regulation doesn't work'
Like the offshore oil rigs that have come under national scrutiny, Marcellus Shale drilling operations are regulated by laws and agencies that rely heavily on the industry's cooperation in policing itself.
In Pennsylvania, Marcellus Shale gas producers are responsible not only for reporting their own spills, but for leading their clean-up operations and, with guidance from state regulators, for assessing the damage done by their mistakes.
At the Marcellus Shale Policy Conference in Pittsburgh last month, Mr. Hanger called for stronger rules to help prevent drilling from polluting the state's streams and air. "Self-regulation doesn't work," he said.
But even proposed rules to improve the requirements of the cement and steel casing that protects an aquifer from a natural gas well will still rely on the companies to perform their own quarterly inspections of the integrity of their wells.
Shortly before those new regulations were prepared for public comment, Mr. Hanger said a mixture of company reporting and department inspection is appropriate.
"We make it very clear to companies that hold permits that filing misinformation or wrong information or deliberately inaccurate information is a very serious matter," he said. "Any company that is sloppy or, even worse, deliberately false, is almost surely going to get itself into very deep and hot water. They don't want to go there."
'We're changing lives'
Marcellus Shale gas operators, many of which have national or international operations and are publicly traded companies, frequently surpass the state's safety and environmental requirements - a fact state regulators often mention to calm public concern about the safety of the process.
At twilight on a May evening, George Stark stood wearing a hard hat and safety glasses at the foot of a state-of-the-art drilling rig ablaze with stadium light in a Dimock field.
Cabot's newly hired public relations manager pointed out the safety features on the rig, contracted from Patterson-UTI Drilling Company, including a system of tanks and filtration devices, called a "closed-loop" system, that makes it so used fluids and mud can be reused on-site without ever flowing into a lined earthen pit.
The pits are prone to leak, like the one at a Cabot site in the same township that DEP found contaminating groundwater weeks earlier. Pits at 29 of the 364 Marcellus wells drilled in the state this year were improperly constructed or maintained, according to DEP records.
Cabot has been operating in Dimock since 2006, but the series of wells being drilled with the Patterson rig are the first the company developed using a closed-loop system - a best practice that is not required by Pennsylvania law.
Beneath the rig, workers placed a giant mat of black, heavy plastic on the acres of flat earth - a guarantee that most anything spilled on site would not hit the ground. The company had been using that best practice for about eight months.
Earlier in the evening, on a tour of a reclaimed well site where deer nibbled on clover near tanks and a metering station hooked up to a completed well, Mr. Stark listed highlights of the investment Cabot has made in Susquehanna County: The company has leased more than a third of the county's total acreage. It paid property owners $75 million in 2009 alone to acquire the right to drill on their land. Between 2006 and 2009, the company spent $500 million on its operations in the county. In 2010, it expects to spend $400 million more.
"We're changing lives," he said, "in a positive way."
Tough love and tough rules
Not everyone agrees with Mr. Stark.
After speaking with Dimock residents who have experienced water contamination from Cabot's drilling, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. drove through the township's winding roads to a barbecue stand in a trailer parked on the side of Route 29 - one of the businesses in the township that has been born or altered to cater to the industry workers.
Mr. Kennedy, president of Waterkeeper Alliance and a professor at Pace University School of Law's Environmental Litigation Clinic in New York state, drew a comparison between the confused and apparently insufficient regulation of offshore oil drilling, with the regulation of onshore energy extraction, like Marcellus Shale production.
Unfortunately, he said, "I think that's a template for what's happening all across the country."
The best technologies and enforcement practices necessary to minimize mistakes by natural gas drillers are well known, he said, but they are rarely adopted by governments and imposed on the industry.
"What they need is tough love from the regulators and from themselves," he said as he drove.
"They need restraint. They need tough rules that allow them to make money, and big money, but force them to do it in a way that's not going to penalize the public."
Mr. Kennedy said the gas industry's record of mistakes is contributing to a growing public reaction against gas extraction in Pennsylvania and drilling regions across the country. That is unfortunate, he said, because natural gas is a cleaner-burning alternative to traditional fossil fuels and will play a critical role in leading the country away from oil and coal and toward green energy solutions.
"Nobody's going to believe that about them when they're doing these kind of shenanigans," he said.
"Nobody's going to believe that they're good guys when they're blowing up people's houses and poisoning their wells."
Contact the writer: llegere@timesshamrock.com
Published by thetimes-tribune June 20, 2010

Visit The Sullivan County Catskills Now


Posted by John Kavaller at 6:57 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Cabot Oil and Gas Corp., disclosure, John Hanger, Kathryn Klabler, leaseholders, Marcellus Shale, natural gas, PA DEP, Pennsylvania, Range Resources, spills, Susquehanna County

Saturday, June 19, 2010Gas Pipeline Filing Puts Eminent Domain on Table

Pipelines, like this one that was being installed in Terry Township earlier this year, may be able to rely on eminent domain to access right-of-way. This issue is expected to be argued before the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission in July. Photo by David Keeler

Gas Pipeline Filing Puts Eminent Domain on Table - by Wes Skillings - 6/17/2010

The process of installing natural gas pipelines on the Marcellus Shale is in its infancy, but usually it is a matter of negotiating a right-of-way, or easement, across your property based on so much per linear foot or by rod (16.5 feet). The pipeline company gets permanent rights to the easement, traditionally a swath 50 feet wide (25 feet on each side of the line), and the landowner isn’t allowed to build anything on it or even plant trees and shrubs encroaching the right-of-way.

Since the most lucrative money crop in our area right now consists of gas leases, royalties and pipeline installation, not too many landowners seem to be objecting. Those who do still have the option of following Nancy Reagan’s dictate and “just say no.” However, we are being alerted that all could change because one pipeline company has made application to the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission (PaPUC) to be registered as a public utility.

That would bring in the specter of wielding the force of eminent domain, or the taking of the land for the public good, for gas gathering lines from the wells to the transmission lines. Transmission lines, or the ones that carry the gas interstate, already have eminent domain going for them, thanks to federal regulations, but the so-called gathering lines (intrastate), in Pennsylvania at least, still require negotiations with property owners.

What may change all of this, as we have already been alerted to by letter writers to this newspaper, is the application by Laser Marcellus Gathering Company, LLC (Laser Marcellus) for a certificate of public convenience from PaPUC “to operate as an intrastate natural gas pipeline providing gathering and transportation services to unaffiliated producers.” The specific plan, as outlined by Laser Marcellus to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), is to build a 30-mile pipeline (12- to 16-inch diameter) to connect gas wells in western Susquehanna County and the Southern Tier of New York to the Millennium Pipeline at a location in Broome County, NY, for starters. Subsequent pipeline construction phases are even more ubiquitous, adding delivery points to the Tennessee Gas Pipeline and the Stagecoach Natural Gas Storage Facility in Pennsylvania.

The bottom line is that this is new stuff to PaPUC and granting that public application, which is supported by other pipeline companies, could open the door for property owners who say no to being forced to surrender right-of-way via eminent domain. The PaPUC reports that this application is currently in its Office of Administrative Judge and hearings on this matter are not scheduled until July.

Eminent domain, it should be noted as clarification, is not just a matter of grabbing right-of-way from a property owner without compensation. It is a process in which the case is taken before the court or a regulatory body, which determines a fair market value for the easements.

There is a wide range of payment—between $5 and $25 per linear foot for pipeline easements now—but the typical rate being reported is between $12 and $15.

As for Laser Marcellus, it has an office in Montrose to deal with its plans or the Marcellus in Susquehanna County, it is assumed, but public record shows that its parent company owns 590 miles of pipelines in Texas. Eminent domain for pipelines is already a hot-button issue in Texas, where we often turn to peer into the future because gas drilling on the Barnett Shale there is a decade ahead of us. However, the natural gas pool in this region, including the Marcellus and the even deeper Ithaca Shale, is already being described as the largest repository in the world.

In Texas, where the industry is regulated by the Railroad Commission of Texas, all pipelines classified as “common carriers” have the statutory right of eminent domain. All oil and gas products are defined as common carriers and, interestingly enough, so is salt brine and mineral solutions that could fit the definition of well waste water. The natural extension of all of this is not just the prospect of a huge network of pipelines transporting natural gas, but also underground conduits for other materials related to gas wells and injection wells. That is, of course, if Pennsylvania follows the lead of Texas.

There are already six pipelines registered as public utilities in Pennsylvania, according to the PUC. They can already take right-of-way easements based on fair market value via eminent domain. The difference with the application by Laser Marcellus is that this power could be transferred to gathering pipelines, and who knows how many local landowners that might affect in this region?

In the meantime, and shortly before filing its application with PaPUC, Laser Marcellus filed with FERC, asking for a declaration that it not be subject to that agency’s jurisdiction. The reason? The proposed pipeline project in Susquehanna County (21 miles) and New York (nine miles) “performs a ‘gathering’ function rather than a transmission function…”

A look at the description of the project given to FERC by Laser Marcellus is revealing as to the scope of the project and remembering that this just describes the first of three construction phases:

“The initial phase will consist of approximately 30 miles… of 12- or 16-inch diameter pipe running from Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania, to an interconnection with Millennium Pipeline Company, LLC (Millennium) in Broome County, NY. In addition to the initial six existing wells in Susquehanna County… Laser Marcellus states that it anticipates an additional 40 wells will be connected to the system in Pennsylvania.

“As for the New York segment of the line, Laser Marcellus states that it expects to connect with 80 to 100 wells along the nine-mile length at such time as New York allows wells to be drilled in the Marcellus Shale Formation.”

Posted by John Kavaller at 8:56 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Eminent Domain, FERC, Gas Pipeline, Marcellus Shale, Millennium Pipeline, Susquehanna County, The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission

Friday, June 18, 2010EPA schedules 4 public meetings on fracking

EPA schedules 4 public meetings on fracking

Published: 3:52 PM - 06/18/10
Last updated: 3:53 PM - 06/18/10

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Environmental Protection Agency is planning a series of public meetings to collect information on fracking, a process used to increase the flow of oil and gas from underground.

Fracking, or hydraulic fracturing, uses injections of water and chemicals to break up underground shale formations so oil and gas can be more easily recovered.

However, the practice has drawn criticism because of concerns it could affect supplies of drinking water.
The public meetings will be held:

- July 8 at the Hilton Fort Worth in Fort Worth, Texas.
- July 13 at the Marriott Tech Center in Denver, Colo.
- July 22 at the Hilton Garden Inn in Canonsburg, Pa.
- Aug. 12 at Binghamton University, Binghamton, N.Y.

Visit The Sullivan County Catskills Now

Posted by John Kavaller at 4:52 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: drinking water, EPA, fracking, hydraulic fracturing


Partnership to partner with area groups to get ready for drilling


By Dan Hust--Sullivan County Democrat On-Line

MONTICELLO — The Sullivan County Partnership for Economic Development has entered into an agreement with its counterparts in two neighboring counties to create an information “clearinghouse” on natural gas drilling.

At least one drilling opponent, however, has already questioned whether it’s a move to counter environmental groups and gain more traction for the drilling industry.

Partnership officials have indicated it’s both.

“Anything positive about it [drilling] doesn’t get any credible look-see,” said Partnership President Tim McCausland. “We want all the questions to be answered, too ... but we don’t want hysteria and personal attacks to be part of it.”

Citing massive economic benefits in Pennsylvania, McCausland and Board Chairman Josh Sommers told the Industrial Development Agency’s (IDA’s) board last week that more accurate information is needed, inferring that some of the groups fighting drilling are not presenting all the facts.

Indeed, the resolution approved by the Partnership’s board on June 1 hints at such:

“Whereas, the general population throughout this region of New York State and Pennsylvania have raised reasonable concerns regarding pollution, cumulative impacts and safety about natural gas exploration; and

“Whereas, there exists a need to disseminate accurate information about the natural gas industry that is based on sound research; and

“Whereas, there is a need to have a clearinghouse that can provide research-based information in order for the residents to make sound business and environmental decisions...”

With only one abstention out of more than 20 votes, McCausland said the resolution passed overwhelmingly, committing the Partnership to a “loose coalition” with economic development agencies in Delaware County, NY and Wayne County, PA, where drilling is imminent.

The other two agencies, he said, had already passed the same resolution.

“We just want to be ready with the best information we can,” he explained. “If we don’t have readiness, we’ll be in a bad position.”

McCausland pointed out that a study identified up to 150 new job types being created from drilling, leading to a need to offer training for locals interested in such jobs.

Catskill Citizens for Safe Energy member Bruce Ferguson agrees that readiness is warranted, but he told Sommers in a series of e-mail exchanges that the Partnership seems to be pushing drilling, wondering who within the Partnership stands to gain from it.

“You twice refer to drilling as a ‘game changer,’ which is precisely what many of us fear,” Ferguson wrote. “A great many reputable scientists, economists and public health professionals are deeply concerned that inherently dangerous hydraulic fracturing can compromise public health, contaminate our air and water, destroy property values, and devastate other sectors of the economy.”

Ferguson intimated the Partnership’s resolution and corresponding educational campaign could heighten the divisiveness often found in drilling debates these days.

“Am I to presume that some of my tax dollars will be used to fund this campaign?” he wondered.

Sommers replied that he sees no problem with Partnership members benefitting from economic development in the county, gas drilling included. A code of ethics, he added, requires disclosures of conflicts of interest.

“If a new business comes to our area as a result of our efforts and a member, including a board member, profits from a relationship with that new business, then we have fulfilled our mission,” Sommers wrote to Ferguson. “That is what we are here to do. By encouraging new business, creating jobs and increasing tax revenues, we help businesses profit.”

McCausland said the Partnership sometimes undertakes initiatives that may be controversial – the Yukiguni mushroom factory in Wurtsboro is a recent example – but he promised that it won’t distribute falsehoods.

“Not everybody is for it – we understand that,” he said, adding that he’s OK with a deliberative regulatory process. “... There’s work to be done, and if it takes time, it takes time.”

He lamented that Catskill Citizens has targeted the Partnership “as the enemy and are acting accordingly.”

But he said the Partnership shares Catskill Citizens’ desire for ensuring the environment’s safety – and as for tax dollars, the Partnership’s $200,000 budget only gets about $75,000 from the IDA and some monies from the county, since it’s considered an independent contract vendor.

“The rest is membership dollars,” he explained.

http://catskillcountryrealestate.com

Posted by John Kavaller at 4:39 PM 0 comments Links to this post


New York in No Rush to Join Gas Drilling Boom

New York in No Rush to Join Gas Drilling Boom

Date Published: Thursday, June 17th, 2010

New York state is taking a cautious approach to hydraulic gas drilling in the Marcellus shale region. According to a New York Times article, the state is working on some fairly tough regulations for the its fledgling industry, and has added extra protections for some of New York’s most environmentally sensitive regions. What’s more, lawmakers in the state are considering bills that could delay hydraulic gas drilling in the state for a year or more.

The Marcellus Shale is a formation rich in natural gas that lies beneath parts of West Virginia, Pennsylvania, New York, Ohio and Maryland. The area has seen the rapid expansion of hydraulic fracturing in recent years. This process, also called fracking, involves injecting water, sand, and a cocktail of chemicals at high pressure into rock formations thousands of feet below the surface. This opens existing fractures in the rock and allows gas to rise through the wells. The practice makes drilling possible in areas that 10 to 20 years ago would not have been profitable. Hydraulic fracturing, is currently used in 90 percent of the nation’s natural gas and oil wells.

The process involves a relatively new technology, and is not without risks. This month alone, there have been two major accidents in the Pennsylvania-West Virginia region involving Marcellus Shale drilling. One of them involved a well explosion.

The major concern with shale gas drilling is the chemicals used in the process. Because the federal Energy Policy Act of 2005 exempted hydraulic fracturing from regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act, shale gas drillers don’t have to disclose what chemicals they use. According to the Environmental Working Group, fracking has already been linked to drinking water contamination and property damage in Colorado, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wyoming.

New York state’s Marcellus Shale region encompasses the entire watershed in the Catskills that provides New York City with all of it drinking water. New York City doesn’t filter its water, thanks to a waiver from the federal Environmental Protection Agency. Instead, it has spent about $1.5 billion since 1997 to protect the watershed. City officials and environmental activists are worried that fracking in the Marcellus region will endanger New York City’s water.

For now, gas exploration in the region is on hold while the sate Department of Environmental Conservation drafts regulations for hydraulic drilling. Those regulations are expected to be ready sometime this year.

According to The New York Times, New York state legislatures are considering two bills that would make that defacto moratorium explicit for the most intense drilling technologies upstate. One would extend the current moratorium until 120 days after the release of a federal study of the industry’s impact on water quality, while another would impose a one year moratorium.

Earlier this week, the bill that would impose the one-year moratorium received the backing of key lawmakers in the Senate and Assembly. The measure, which will mainly affect the Southern Tier, passed the Senate Environmental Conservation committee on Monday, but it was unclear if or when it would be brought to a vote of the full Legislature. If passed, the bill will suspend hydraulic fracturing for the extraction of natural gas until June 1, 2011.

Posted by John Kavaller at 10:25 AM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Energy Policy Act of 2005, fracking, hydraulic fracturing, Marcellus Shale, Safe Drinking Water Act
Thursday, June 17, 2010Smart Moves on Drilling in New York

Our Towns

Smart Moves on Drilling in New York
By PETER APPLEBOME
Published: June 16, 2010

Columnist Page

While neighboring Pennsylvania and other states have rushed pell-mell into the Northeast’s version of an energy boom — making some people richer and some environments poorer — and while concern has steadily risen about the evolving industrial practices used to extract gas from shale, New York and Gov. David A. Paterson have held back. Instead of jumping in, the state has written fairly tough regulations that are still being tweaked and has added extra protections for the most sensitive areas, particularly the upstate watershed that provides drinking water to nine million people in New York City and its suburbs and exurbs to the north.

Now, with the catastrophic oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and the federal moratorium on deepwater drilling in the background, the next act is approaching here. State legislators are considering two bills that would extend and make explicit the current de facto moratorium on the most intense drilling technologies upstate.

One bill would delay new drilling for a year from now. One would extend the current moratorium until 120 days after the release of a federal study of the industry’s impact on water quality. The study timetable is uncertain. And around year’s end, the State Department of Environmental Conservation is expected to release guidelines on gas drilling. All that’s at stake is the regulation for what could be tens of thousands of gas wells — each using millions of gallons of chemically treated water — and the economic landscape for much of upstate.

Gas drilling isn’t new in New York. There are 13,000 active wells in the state; the industry says the first gas well was drilled at Fredonia in 1821. What’s new is the combination of hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling in the rich gas deposit known as the Marcellus Shale, which runs roughly 600 miles — including in parts of Virginia, West Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania and New York. The process includes injecting millions of gallons of chemically treated water as much as 10,000 feet underground to break up shale and release the gas within.

Even some proponents of drilling say the D.E.C.’s measured pace has been wise. But the relative amity has pretty much reached its limit.

Anthony R. Ingraffea, an engineering professor at Cornell and a critic of drilling, says large-scale gas development is inconsistent with the upstate environment of agriculture, tourism and recreation. And he says no state has adequate regulations on drilling, particularly the disposal of the polluted water that either has to be kept on site or trucked to processing plants. He said escalating problems in Pennsylvania were indications that New York was wise to learn from the mistakes of others.

IN Pennsylvania, a recent well blowout sent gas and water polluted with drilling fluids as high as 75 feet in the air, and the Delaware River Basin Commission, citing risks to water resources, has temporarily banned new permits for natural gas drilling in the Delaware River watershed.

“What we’ve had in the past is child’s play compared to wells drilled today,” Mr. Ingraffea said. “The gas industry wants to run in and develop as swiftly as they can, and only after the fact do they realize the harm that’s been done.” Many landowners, frustrated with the pace of development, are increasingly vocal about wanting drilling to begin and are borderline apoplectic about the prospects of a moratorium.

“It’s an awful idea,” said Scott Kurkoski, a lawyer for the Joint Landowners Coalition of New York, which represents 37 landowners groups whose members own 800,000 acres. He said the failure to develop gas was an economic hardship to landowners and to the state. Proponents of drilling say that while New York has dithered, drilling in Pennsylvania has created 44,000 jobs and has had a $1.8 billion economic impact. He added: “If there was a legitimate, rational reason to study this further, it would be one thing, but this has already been studied to death. The calls for a delay are coming from people who don’t want to see it happen in New York.”

The proposed one-year moratorium is billed as a compromise. With the stakes rising on both sides, the methodical pace thus far may have been the easy part. Still, with those gulf images seared into people’s minds, now more than ever, getting things right might take precedence over getting things fast.

E-mail: peappl@nytimes.com

Posted by John Kavaller at 4:14 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: DEC, Gov. David Paterson, Gulf of Mexico, Joint Landowners Coalition of New York, Pennsylvania

DEP leader talks Marcellus drilling, impact across the state, York County

DEP leader talks Marcellus drilling, impact across the state, York County

By BRENT BURKEY
Daily Record/Sunday News
Updated: 06/16/2010 10:28:55 AM EDT

A new rule regulating fracturing waste water related to Marcellus Shale drilling is needed to protect drinking water sources, including in York County and other downstate communities, the head of the state's chief environmental authority said.

A review board vote on the new rule is scheduled for this week.

John Hanger, secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, is advocating to set the amount of total dissolved solids (TDS) discharged from drilling facilities and others at 500 milligrams per liter.

Water in watersheds that provide drinking water currently can only have 500 milligrams per liter or less of these materials, which include salts and other dissolved chemicals, under federal law.

There is currently no specific regulation on the concentrations drilling companies can discharge into waterways, Hanger said, only on what the end concentration becomes in the watershed.

The brine solution used in drilling can contain up to 300,000 milligrams per liter of dissolved salts and chemicals, Hanger said.

If this source of dissolved solids is not explicitly regulated, overall watersheds could quickly exceed the limits for safe drinking water under federal law, considering how big Marcellus drilling is getting.

Hanger said that while most Marcellus well drilling is in upstate Pennsylvania, drinking water sources for many central Pennsylvania communities, including the Susquehanna River, contain water that originally flowed from northern counties. There is no practical way to filter these chemicals out, he said.

Hanger said the rule has been passed by the state's Environmental Quality Board and a vote by the Independent Regulatory Review Board was scheduled for Thursday.

Environmental committees in the state House and Senate also review such rules, and the legislature could pass a law to block the new rule, Hanger said.

Currently, the law is supported by stakeholders in drinking water systems, and sportsmen and environmental groups, namely Trout Unlimited, Hanger said.

Pushback is coming from the drilling industry and other business interests, he said.

Hanger also answered several other questions about Marcellus Shale gas drilling during a recent interview to promote the new rule:

Question: The Marcellus Shale formation has been around for millions of years under Pennsylvania. Why is drilling just ramping up in recent times? Or, why are we just hearing about it now?

Answer: Natural gas has been present in the Marcellus rock formation for millions and millions of years. But the ability to develop it is recent because of improvements in drilling technology that have been necessary to reach and use the resource.

The gas is between 5,000 feet and 8,000 feet below the surface, and once the depth is reached, complicated techniques to break apart the shale to release the pockets of gas are needed.

Only recently has it become economically viable to do so, but there is estimated to be enough gas in the formation to provide the entire country with natural gas for about 15 years, Hanger said.

It is now considered one of the biggest and best gas reserves in the world, and billions of dollars are flowing into Pennsylvania to exploit the resource, from Europe to India to Japan, he said.

Q. Marcellus drilling takes place outside York County and other counties where a lot of people live. Why should we care about the issue here?

A. First, if the water upstate is polluted, water in York County and other downstate areas is polluted, too. The Susquehanna River and other watersheds are very vulnerable (many of their feeder streams are in Marcellus regions) unless the new rule on total dissolved solids (TDS) is put in place.

Second, he said people in York County like to hunt, fish and swim in and around public waters, and like to go to state parks. All of that is at stake if gas policies are not handled properly to protect the environment.

Also, York County residents and others pay a lot of taxes, and there is a potential funding source from Marcellus drilling that can help fix roads or incarcerate dangerous criminals.

A tax on extraction, which is attracting so many companies from all over the world, could fund these activities and more, he said. Not having a tax is unfair to the people of York County and elsewhere, he said.

Q. Is Marcellus drilling expected to eventually lower natural gas prices for utility customers in Pennsylvania?

A. The companies that own natural gas sell to the highest bidder in the free market, so there is no special price break for Pennsylvanians.

However, the new supply of gas helps put downward pressure on overall gas prices because of the rules of supply and demand. Hanger said some recent price drops likely show this to be true.

Posted by John Kavaller at 2:51 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: brine, John Hanger, Marcellus Shale, natural gas, PA DEP, Susquehanna River, watersheds

Wednesday, June 16, 2010Delaware River Basin Commission Home Page

Delaware River Basin Commission Home Page

Links to important information on Natural Gas Development in, on, and along the Delaware River Corridor. An excellent resource.

Posted by John Kavaller at 3:13 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Delaware River Basin Commission, DRBC

DRBC Executive Director Carol R. Collier announced on June 14, 2010 that she has supplemented her May 19, 2009 determination to include natural gas exploratory wells.

DRBC Executive Director Determination Extended to Include Natural Gas Exploratory Wells (June 14, 2010)


DRBC Executive Director Carol R. Collier announced on June 14, 2010 that she has supplemented her May 19, 2009 determination to include natural gas exploratory wells.

"My 2009 determination that sponsors of natural gas extraction projects in shale formations must obtain commission approval before commencing such projects expressly did not cover wells intended solely for exploratory purposes," Collier said. "Today, I am extending the provisions of my 2009 determination to include exploratory wells, subject to reservations for exploratory well projects already approved by the states on or before June 14, 2010."

By this supplemental determination, all natural gas well project sponsors, including the sponsors of natural gas well projects intended solely for exploratory purposes, must first apply for and obtain commission approval before commencing any natural gas well project for the production from or exploration of shale formations within the drainage area of Special Protection Waters in the Delaware River Basin.

"For the purpose of this determination, any natural gas well drilled in or through shale is assumed to be targeting a shale formation and is subject to this determination, unless the project sponsor proves otherwise," Collier added. All other aspects of the 2009 determination remain in effect.

Today's action recognizes the risks to water resources, including ground and surface water that the land disturbance and drilling activities inherent in any shale gas well pose. "In light of the commission's May 5, 2010 decision to finalize natural gas regulations before considering project approvals, this supplemental determination removes any regulatory incentive for project sponsors to classify their wells as exploratory wells and install them without DRBC review before the commission's natural gas regulations are in place," Collier said. "It thus supports the commission's goal that exploratory wells do not serve as a source of degradation of the commission's Special Protection Waters."

"Where entities have invested in exploratory well projects in reliance on my May 2009 determination and information from DRBC staff, there are countervailing considerations that favor allowing these projects to move ahead," Collier stated in her supplemental determination. "I am informed that since May of 2009, Pennsylvania has issued a limited number of natural gas well drilling permits within the Delaware River Basin targeting shale formations, while New York State has not issued any natural gas well permits targeting shales in the basin since that date. In contrast to the thousands of wells projected to be installed in the basin over the next several years, the risk to basin waters posed by only the wells approved by Pennsylvania since May 2009 are comparatively small. Not only are these wells subject to state regulation as to their construction and operation, but they continue to require commission approval before they can be fractured or otherwise modified for natural gas production. In light of these existing safeguards and the investment-backed expectations of the sponsors of these projects, this supplemental determination does not prohibit any exploratory natural gas well project from proceeding if the applicant has obtained a state natural gas well permit for the project on or before June 14, 2010."

Any person adversely affected by this action may request a hearing by submitting a request in writing to the commission secretary within 30 days of the date of this supplemental determination in accordance with the DRBC's Rules of Practice and Procedure.

Posted by John Kavaller at 3:08 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Carol R. Collier, DRBC, DRBC's Rules of Practice and Procedure, exploratory wells, natural gas, supplemental determination from DRBC

Will New York Rebel Against Fracking?

June 10, 2010, 2:17 pm

Will New York Rebel Against Fracking?
By PETER APPLEBOME--from Green-blogs-NY Times on-line

A well blowout that shot gas and water polluted with drilling fluids as high as 75 feet into the air in Pennsylvania is a vivid reminder how a new generation of gas drilling is becoming more of a presence in the Northeast.

Discussion of whether the main result will be jobs and royalty payments or environmental degradation still remains surprisingly below the radar screen in New York State, aside from the upstate communities that will probably be affected. But the issues are already a huge fact of life just across the Delaware River in Pennsylvania.

Gas drilling in the Northeast is hardly new. It has gone on for a century in New York, where there are 13,000 active wells. What’s different is the combination of horizontal drilling and a process called hydraulic fracturing, which injects huge quantities of chemically laced water underground to break up shale deposits and free the gas trapped in it.

Conventional drilling used in the past needed about 80,000 gallons of water per well, according to the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. Hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling uses millions of gallons laced with a cocktail of chemicals drawn from more than 260 possible elements, many toxic.

And that is augmented by an industrial constellation of trucks making hundreds of trips to and from each well, pipelines, upgraded roads, storage tanks, impoundment ponds and other elements that make each well a substantial industrial site.

That’s why many environmentalists say that the assurances about the long history of drilling have no relevance to the new world of gas — especially upstate, with its farms, fishing, tourism and abundant surface water.

There have already been severe pollution cases in Pennsylvania, most conspicuously in Dimock, where state officials ordered Cabot Oil and Gas to permanently shut down some of its wells, pay fines of nearly a quarter-million dollars and permanently provide drinking water to 14 families whose water was ruined by the gas drilling. It is just one of a series of drilling-related accidents, spills and incidents of contamination in the Marcellus Shale, which runs across much of New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia and other states.

New York has received some praise for taking a relatively deliberative approach, including severe regulatory burdens that will probably eliminate any drilling near the watersheds serving New York and Syracuse. Officials say that state draft regulations overseeing all aspects of the drilling operations are among the toughest in the nation. It includes disclosure of fracturing fluids, water well testing before drilling to establish a baseline for water quality, controls on water consumption, mitigation planning and other measures.

On the other hand, New York currently has 16 inspectors who are supposed to monitor what are expected to be thousands of wells, and critics say the state is totally unprepared for the amount of drilling likely to come its way.

There have been few more contentious issues upstate in years. Many hard-pressed landowners see drilling as an economic godsend in desperate times, and some argue that with effective leases and environmental protection, gas drilling is allowing farmers to stay on their land, which is environmentally superior to selling it off piecemeal for suburbanization.

The issues figure to get increasing visibility through the airing of “Gasland,” a scathing new documentary on the environmental costs of gas drilling. It won the special jury prize for documentary at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival and is to be broadcast on HBO on June 21. Its director, Josh Fox, says the notion of gas as a clean alternative is a dangerous myth.

Lee Woodmansee, a Pennsylvania landowner near Milanville whom Mr. Fox visited at the outset of his journey, said that in his area, more than 1,000 property owners had banded together and spent thousands of dollars on legal fees to develop a tough lease that was signed by the Hess Corporation. The group, the Northern Wayne Property Owners Alliance, represents families who for the most part have been stewards of land in Wayne County for the past 200 years.

“They are in favor of strong regulations, proactive and systematic well inspections, ‘best practices’ in drilling — and they think that drilling is possible with a minimum of problems and without destroying the Delaware or the beautiful mountains that I grew up in,’’ he wrote in an e-mail message.

He added: “The local landowners in Pennsylvania also see the anti-drilling people sitting in their well- heated homes (often from gas) using electricity (often from gas) and decrying anyone who drills for gas — in their backyard. It’s akin to complaining about killing steers while eating one’s steak.”

Mr. Fox has his doubts. “The culture of the industry is ‘We get what we want,’ and hopefully the culture of New York is that protection of the environment will overcome that,’’ he said.

“When you get a prescription medicine in America, you get a warning of what the side effects are,” he said. “With gas drilling, we see water contamination, air pollution and health effects, but a landman can come in your kitchen and tell you that you’ll barely know it’s there. Well, once you sign that paper, they own you.”

Posted by John Kavaller at 12:29 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: Cabot Oil and Gas Corp, Hess Corp., hydraulic fracturing, Marcellus Shale, Milanville PA, Northern Wayne Property Owners Alliance, royalty payments, Wayne County PA, well blowout

Bill to halt hydro-fracturing close to Assembly vote

Bill to halt hydro-fracturing close to Assembly vote

By Jon Campbell •jcampbell.gannett@gmail.com • June 4, 2010, 6:45 pm
From Press Connects.com Greater Binghamton Area

ALBANY -- A bill that could place a lengthy moratorium on natural-gas drilling in the Marcellus Shale formation came one step closer to making it to the Assembly floor for a vote after it was approved by the Environmental Conservation Committee this week.

In all, 10 bills relating to potential drilling in New York's portion of the Marcellus Shale were moved out of the Assembly Environmental Conservation Committee this week, four of which have sponsorship in the Senate.

Gas companies and some landowners are eager to begin drilling in the Marcellus Shale. Environmentalists are worried about the effect hydro-fracturing could have on water supplies. "Fracking," as it's called, is the process gas companies use to fracture the shale and release the natural gas from the rock formation. During this process, fracking fluid -- a cocktail of water and chemicals -- is injected into the well under high pressure.

With strong support from environmental groups, the committee approved a bill by a 22-7 vote that would place a moratorium on fracking. The bill, sponsored by Assemblyman Steven Englebright, D-Setauket, Suffolk County, and Sen. Joseph Addabbo, D-Queens, was sent to the Rules Committee, likely its final stop before reaching the Assembly floor.

If passed by the Legislature and signed by Gov. David Paterson, the moratorium would be enacted until 120 days after a federal environmental-impact study on the practice is finalized. The report was started in March and could take years to complete.

Other bills approved by the committee include legislation that would ban the storage of drill cuttings and flowback water from drilling and fracking for more than 45 days, ban drilling at state parks, and require that gas companies disclose what materials they are using during the fracturing process.

"This is a series of bills that takes up different measures to ensure that when New York state engages in hydro-fracking and horizontal drilling that it will be done in a safe and healthy manner," said Assembly Environmental Conservation Committee Chair Robert Sweeney, D-Babylon, Suffolk County, who voted in favor of all 10 pieces of legislation.

"None of these bills prohibits drilling, but we have certainly seen what has happened in other states ... because the necessary safeguards weren't put into place, and we would like to ensure that those things don't happen in New York state."

Assemblywoman Donna Lupardo, D-Endwell, voted against the moratorium bill in committee. She said she wanted to wait until the state Department of Environmental Conservation returns its final environmental impact statement later this year before extending a moratorium. Drilling permits won't be issued until the statement is finalized under an order from Paterson.

Lupardo said she was also concerned that the moratorium, which would place a ban on horizontal gas drilling and hydro-fracking, could allow gas companies to drill vertically.

"We may be opening ourselves up to permitting numerous vertical wells as a result of this moratorium that would be more disruptive to the environment than the type of drilling that we anticipate, which uses far less space with multiple drill sites on it," Lupardo said.

The moratorium bill and three others moved by the committee currently sit in the Senate's Environmental Conservation Committee.

One bill would hold the gas companies liable for any complications or contamination caused by drilling or hydro-fracking and another would allow municipalities to enforce and create regulations and zoning restrictions that the companies must follow. The third bill would ensure that property owners who are involuntarily integrated into a drilling unit receive royalties of at least 18.75 percent, or the highest royalty rate in the unit.

The bills will not be on the agenda for the Senate committee's next meeting on June 15, committee chair Sen. Antoine Thompson, D-Buffalo, said through a spokesman, who declined further comment.

Thompson has not taken a stance on Marcellus Shale drilling or fracking, and the bills likely wouldn't be added to the agenda until he does, said Ken Houston, the spokesman.

The state Independent Oil & Gas Association spoke out against the bills, calling on lawmakers to "reject any and all bills that would further delay or halt the expansion of natural gas exploration in New York State.

"These bills would be a major setback and detriment to the industry," said Brad Gill, executive director of the association. "They are premised in fear and false information spread by the organized obstructionists who routinely and adamantly oppose progress of all kinds, and who have very little understanding of our industry."

Many of the bills received strong support from environmental groups, but one said they would like to see a more comprehensive approach from the Legislature.

"Our concern is that these bills are very piecemeal," said Katharine Nadeau, program director for Environmental Advocates of New York. "What Environmental Advocates is calling for, and has been calling for, is a full package of legislation to address all of the issues -- the air issues, the community impacts, the water issues -- that surround natural-gas drilling."

But Assemblyman William Parment, D-Jamestown, Chautauqua County, who voted against moving all 10 bills out of committee, thinks the environmental groups are just trying to obstruct the process.

"It just seems to me that when you continue to block development of cleaner resources, you are in fact encouraging national policy to send our young men and women to Iraq and Iran to fight over a couple of barrels of oil," he said.

Posted by John Kavaller at 12:25 PM 0 comments Links to this post
Labels: drill cuttings, drilling, Gov. David Paterson, Marcellus Shale, moratorium _____________________________________
Marcellus Shale: sGEIS timeline allows time to educate
Written by Jennifer K. Levine on April 22, 2010 – 5:16 am
In remarks made during an Earth Day event, DEC Commissioner Grannis stated that natural gas drilling involving horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing will likely not begin until spring or summer of 2011. The DEC is in the process of reviewing almost 14,000 comments and formalizing final regulations on the drilling practice. These final regulations are loosely scheduled to be released in the late summer/early fall of 2010.
Rather than become frustrated by the delay, the industry should use this time to its advantage. Here is an opportunity for drilling and development advocates to go on the offensive and step up efforts to educate leaders and the citizens of New York about the benefits of Marcellus Shale development. For too long we have sat on the sidelines and allowed the lies and misinformation to go largely unchallenged until they are repeated so often they are perceived as reality. Today’s Times Union editorial (4/22/10) is a perfect example of how the industry is continually portrayed as reckless and environmentally oblivious. While the TU acknowledges that the well contamination in Dimock, PA did not result from hydraulic fracturing as confirmed by the Pennsylvania DEP, they continue to portray the industry as profit-driven scavengers, while the editorial ignores the benefits that natural gas development will bring to the state. Energy companies will profit from development of the Marcellus Shale, but so will landowners, many counties and the entire state. New Yorkers need to know that it is possible to strike a balance between drilling for natural gas and protecting the environment.
This lull is an opportunity to inform leaders in Albany and around the state about the economic benefits that will result from development of the Marcellus Shale. Drilling opponents will continue to spread misinformation. Now is the time for us to go on the offensive so that when the sGEIS is finalized we will have won the hearts and minds of New Yorkers.

____________________________________________________________________


From: Central NY Real-Time News
By Delen Goldberg / The Post-Standard April 20, 2010, 4:01PM
Environmental Conservation Commissioner Pete Grannis says hydrofracking likely to begin in New York in spring or summer 2011
Syracuse, NY -- High-volume horizontal natural gas drilling, more commonly known as hydrofracking, will likely begin in New York next year, state Department of Environmental Conservation Commissioner Pete Grannis said during a visit today to Central New York.
Grannis predicted the DEC will finish drafting regulations that companies will have to follow to receive drilling permits by fall. He said he expects drilling to begin by spring or summer 2011.
Hydrofracking involves shooting millions of gallons of water, chemicals and sand into wells to break up underground shale rock and create microscopic pathways for natural gas to escape. Advocates want to use the technique to tap into the Marcellus Shale, one of North America’s largest natural gas fields. Opponents say the practice poses too great a risk for environmental damage and ground water contamination.
Grannis said the state is working hard to ensure regulations will protect the environment. He said he’s particularly mindful of concerns raised by local residents and elected officials about the possible impacts gas drilling could have on Central New York’s pristine water supply.
“We will not let drilling begin until the environmental protections are in place,” he said.
Gas and oil companies already have filed about 60 drilling permit applications with the DEC. Grannis said companies will have to resubmit those applications to conform with the new regulations the DEC will set. ____________________________________________________________________________
Gas drilling debate rages in Delaware River watershed
By: MICHAEL RUBINKAM
Associated Press
04/18/10 2:55 PM PDT
From the San Franciso Examiner On Line edition 4-18-2010
Standing in the way is a loose coalition of sporting groups, conservationists and anti-drilling neighbors. They contend that large-scale gas exploration so close to crucial waterways will threaten drinking water, ruin a renowned wild trout fishery, wreck property values, and transform a rural area popular with tourists into an industrial zone with constant noise and truck traffic.
Both sides are furiously lobbying the Delaware River Basin Commission, the powerful federal-interstate compact agency that monitors water supplies for 15 million people, including half the population of New York City. The commission has jurisdiction because the drilling process will require withdrawing huge amounts of water from the watershed's streams and rivers and because of the potential for groundwater pollution.
The well on Matoushek's 200-acre spread in the northern Pocono Mountains is up first. The commission is reviewing an application by Stone Energy Corp. of Lafayette, La., to extract gas from the well — the first of what could be thousands of applications by energy companies to sink wells in an area roughly the size of Connecticut.
Stone Energy's application has already generated more than 1,700 written comments to the DRBC. The company, which paid a $70,000 penalty for drilling the Matoushek well without DRBC approval in 2008, has already received a permit from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection.
Eager gas companies have leased more than 300 square miles of watershed land, conservation officials estimate.
"This is certainly just the start. There's a lot of acreage out there, and a lot of people interested in leasing their land," said Tracy Carluccio, deputy director of the anti-drilling Delaware Riverkeeper Network.
The Marcellus shale is a rock formation 6,000 to 8,000 feet beneath Pennsylvania, New York, West Virginia and Ohio, including about 36 percent of the Delaware River basin. New drilling techniques now allow affordable access to supplies in the Marcellus and other shales in the U.S. that once were too expensive to tap.
Energy companies combine horizontal drilling with hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," a technique that injects vast amounts of water, along with sand and chemicals, underground to break up the shale and release the gas.
While gas companies refuse to identify the chemicals they use — claiming that is proprietary information — critics cite contamination problems in other natural gas drilling fields. They worry that unregulated fracking can taint drinking water, deplete aquifers and produce briny wastewater that can kill fish. In Dimock, Pa., about 40 miles west of the Matoushek well but outside the Delaware basin, state environmental regulators say that cracked casings on fracked wells have tainted residential water supplies with methane gas.
The Environmental Protection Agency announced last month that it will study the impact of fracking on the environment and human health. The EPA said in 2004 there was no evidence that fracking threatens drinking water quality, but critics, including a veteran engineer in the Denver regional EPA office, argued that report's methodology was flawed.
The industry contends environmental concerns are overblown. It says the drilling techniques are safe and that there has never been a proven case of groundwater contamination caused by fracking — in part because fracking occurs far below the water table. Congress exempted hydraulic fracturing from federal oversight in 2005.
Dozens of people told the DRBC at a recent public hearing why they oppose the watershed drilling. A few supporters called it an economic boon and a property-rights issue.
Richard Kreznar, who owns property in the Pennsylvania riverfront community of Damascus, said gas drilling primarily benefits large landowners and exploration companies.
"After the Delaware River and the stream next to my house are messed up, what compensation will I get? Who will put it back together again?" he asked DRBC staff.
Lee Hartman, the Delaware River chairman for Trout Unlimited, worries that large water withdrawals required for fracking will create low stream flows in the Delaware's tributaries, damaging fish habitat. For the Matoushek well, Stone Energy wants to take 700,000 gallons a day from the Lackawaxen River's narrow west branch.
Hartman and others say the DRBC should first study the cumulative environmental impacts of drilling in the Delaware watershed, and pass drilling regulations, before it allows any gas extraction to take place. The agency has asked for $250,000 in federal funds for a study, but commissioners have not said whether they will wait before voting on Matoushek's well.
Opponents say they will sue if Stone Energy's application is approved.
Downstream communities that rely on the Delaware for drinking water are worried about the coming gas boom. New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg opposes any drilling in the watershed, while the Philadelphia City Council has asked the basin commission for an environmental study.
New York state regulators have put a moratorium on drilling in the Marcellus region, saying they won't approve permits until they are finished drafting new regulations.
Back in northeastern Pennsylvania, Matoushek, 68, a semiretired farmer who signed a lease with Stone Energy three years ago, said he is counting on royalty checks from gas production to help fund his golden years and secure the land for future generations of his family. As far he's concerned, the benefits far outweigh any theoretical harm.
"Without the approval, you're depriving me of the opportunity to derive an income from my land," he said.
His neighbors, Amy and Chuck Theobald, straddle both sides of the debate.
The longtime dairy farmers — Amy is fourth-generation — take pride in running their 200-head operation in an environmentally sustainable way. They worry that drilling will ruin the water, and that state government doesn't have the resources to adequately police the industry. They believe landowners who signed up early got fleeced.
But Amy also sees the Marcellus gas field as a way to reduce the nation's reliance on foreign sources of energy. And, with dairy prices in freefall and the Theobald farm hemorrhaging $6,000 a month, the couple are thankful they signed a 5-year lease with Chesapeake Energy Corp. that paid them $1,850 an acre.
"I'm not sure what we would have done to keep our heads above water," she said
Read more at the San Francisco Examiner: http://www.sfexaminer.com/nation/pristine-delaware-river-watershed-and-water-for-15m-people-are-at-issue-in-gas-drilling-clash-91413419.html#ixzz0lZj8E6Ra ____________________________________________________________________________


Marcellus Draft Plan Delayed-From Fox 40 WICZ: April 16, 2010
Whatever the pros and cons of gas drilling, word comes this week that New York State's review of the draft plan for drilling in the Marcellus Shale formation is being delayed.
The Department of Environmental Conservation blames heavy public response, both for and against, and staff shortages for the delay.
The DEC doesn't expect the draft plan to be finalized until late summer, or early fall.
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Proposed Gas Drilling in Marcellus Shale Continues to Spark Concern, Opposition

Submitted by Editor on Fri, 04/09/2010 - 11:57am.

Maegan Crandall
Central N.Y. Correspondent

TIOGA, Pa. — While some farmers and rural landowners meet with the National Association of Royalty Owners (NARO) and financial gurus advising how to manage the millions they could make from gas leases on their property, many others continue to fight for environmental and social accountability.

“As residents of north central Pennsylvania, we’ve had a lot of opportunities come our way in the last five years. There’s been a lot of wealth created so far, and I feel there is going to be a lot more created over the course of time. You’re going to have the potential to have a huge amount of money come in for you and your family. You don’t want this money to rule your life. As long as you create a process, you’re going to have this money for yourself and for future generations and it’s going to be very beneficial,” said Brian Pick, CFP wealth management advisor for Merrill Lynch, and gas lease signee.
However, future generations are also a concern for Don Barber, town supervisor in Caroline, New York, who is advocating that gas companies in New York develop safer means of extracting local resources before proceeding with drilling.

“Some of the chemicals they use for extracting the gas are endocrine disruptors and if that stuff gets in the environment it won’t affect you and me, it will affect the unborn and their children. It’s something that’s so insidious, why would we even be talking about having that stuff in our community?” he asked incredulously.

Environmental and health concerns rank high among local residents and anti-drilling advocacy groups. Joseph Heath, attorney and advocate for the sovereign Onondaga Nation people, works tirelessly to inform and educate on the inherent dangers that gas drilling — or fracking for short —imposes on the individual, the local community, and the surrounding environment.

“I know how difficult it is financially for farmers in rural New York so when someone says here is ten grand, and you have a chance to be a millionaire, it is a very difficult offer to reject. But, very few people realize this is not your grandfather’s gas well. These leases are very bad for the individual, and also will affect the community,” he said.

According to Heath, land owners are often victimized and it’s nearly impossible to read one of these leases without the help of a professional who understands mineral management.

“What we find when we look at them is that you give away so much that you really don’t understand. You give them the right to store gas under your property, you give them the right to run a pipeline wherever they want to. Unless you have been well-counseled with a lawyer that knows about natural gas leasing, you’re going to come out on the very, very short end of this with very few rights,” said Heath.

Regulation loop-holes regarding gas drilling are another concern. Heath points out that in 2005, the energy policy act was passed by the Bush-Cheney administration that exempted the gas industry from all the major provisions of federal environmental laws including the Clean Drinking Water Act, and the Clean Water Act.

“Why did we work so hard in the seventies and eighties to pass environmental laws and then have this industry that is dirtier than almost any exempted from it?” questions Health.
Currently, the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) is reviewing some 17,000 comments — with strong comments against it from the EPA region two, New York city, and the city of Syracuse all trying to protect their watersheds — to the supplemental generic environmental impact statement (SGEIS) which will ultimately regulate and allow large-scale fracking operations in New York state.

“We have a gap in the federal law, horrendous problems in the state law, and what can the towns do? Nothing. The state gets to make that call not the town. So the DEC is now evaluating those comments and will then decide if they can proceed with a flawed draft. The important thing is it doesn’t contain any one new regulation. It says we hope you do this, or you should do that. It also fails to even take into account the cumulative impact of this. One of these wells is very risky, but when you have as many as 10 or more thousand coming at us over the next decade, there are cumulative impacts —particularly water issues — that are not acceptable. We have a state process where a major gas pad will be less regulated than your local dry cleaner, “ said Heath.

Further — in what Heath calls a huge contradiction — the same DEC that is required to formulate these regulations, is also required to promote the gas drilling industry.
However, once the issues of regulation are determined and large-scale fracking is approved in New York, the dilemmas are far from resolved.

“What are we going to do with these millions and millions of gallons of fracking fluid? What you have is up to 7.8 million gallons of water being forcefully fed at incredibly high pressures — higher than a butane tank — down into a well with sand and hundreds of carcinogenic chemicals It’s millions and millions of gallons of highly polluted, radioactive, salty water. These are very problematic chemicals, and there is no place to treat a quart of this stuff let alone millions and millions of gallons. Pennsylvania is now generating 9 million gallons a day and they have no place to treat it. You can’t treat it in a municipal waste water plant. Until the DEC deals with the problem of what we’re going to do with these millions of gallons of highly polluted water, it’s ridiculous to start this,” said Heath.
Additional issues also continue to mount including where the gas companies will source the water for their operation, the wear and tear on roadways and bridges — 8,100 trips per well — paid by local tax payers, and the protection of cultural heritage resources — such as sacred sites owned by the Onondaga Nation.

“We’re trying to prevent our taxpayers from having to support this industry. They can use our roads to get to the gas pads. The roads weren’t made for heavy traffic, and we pay taxes to fix these roads. But when you’re talking thousand of trucks per well at legal weight or more, they roads can’t support that. The tax payers — without some kind of protection — would have to repair these roads. There are also areas around our community that are very special and they need to be identified and protected,” said Barber.

Finally, Heath stresses that the overall possible risks involved in fracking are too great and that we should instead be focusing on sustainable, proactive ways in which to produce our energy needs.

“It’s like gambling. This is not good government and this is not good thinking. This is what is wrong with democracy — allowing corporations to benefit. We’re so lucky to live in one of those few places in the world with access to clean water — clean drinking water for recreation, for farming, for wine making, for fishing. We’re going to throw that all away? It’s like gambling and it’s very short sighted,” he said.
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4-16-2010
PA DEP Takes Aggressive Action Against Cabot Oil & Gas over Dimock Township Methane Contamination
The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) is not happy with what it says is lack of progress on the part of Cabot Oil & Gas in the remediation of methane contamination of water supplies in Dimock Township, PA. The DEP blames Cabot for the methane contamination. Cabot claims they really aren’t at fault and are being unfairly blamed for a naturally occurring phenomenon (migrating natural gas).*

Today’s consent order from the DEP stipulates that Cabot must:

Plug three wells believed to be the source of the migrating methane gas—within 40 days. Install permanent water treatment systems in the affected 14 homes. Pay $30,000 per month in fines, starting in May, until all obligations are met. In addition:

The DEP is immediately suspending reviews of any pending Cabot permits to drill elsewhere in the entire state. Cabot is barred from drilling any new gas wells in Dimock Township for at least one year. From the DEP press release:

HARRISBURG — The Department of Environmental Protection today issued a sweeping order requiring Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. to take extensive actions and help the residents of Dimock Township, Susquehanna County, who have been affected by the company’s drilling activities.

Under the consent order and agreement, Cabot must plug three wells within 40 days that are believed to be the source of migrating gas that has contaminated groundwater and the drinking water supplies of 14 homes in the region. It must also install permanent treatment systems in those homes within 30 days.

Additionally, DEP Secretary John Hanger said his agency is immediately suspending its review of Cabot’s pending permit applications for new drilling activities statewide until it fulfills its obligations under the order issued today. Cabot also is barred from drilling any new wells for at least one year in the Dimock Township area.

Today’s action follows Cabot’s failure to abide by the terms of a November 2009 consent order and agreement with DEP.

“Cabot had every opportunity to correct these violations, but failed to do so. Instead, it chose to ignore its responsibility to safeguard the citizens of this community and to protect the natural resources there,” said Hanger. “I have ordered that all of Cabot’s permit applications for further drilling in any region of the state be put on-hold, indefinitely, until the region’s homeowners receive their new water treatment systems, the fines are paid, and the wells are plugged.

“Gas migration is a serious issue that can have dire consequences to affected communities and we will not allow Pennsylvania’s citizens to be put in harms way by companies that chose not to follow the law.”

During recent inspections, DEP identified five additional defective Cabot gas wells and another home water supply that has been affected by gas migration, bringing to 14 the number of impacted water supplies in the Dimock area. Hanger said DEP also will continue to investigate another 10 Cabot gas wells in the Dimock area over the next 85 days that could be sources of migrating gas and determine whether Cabot should be ordered to plug some or all of those wells.

The original November 2009 consent order and agreement directed Cabot to meet a March 31 deadline to fix defective cement and well casings on certain wells and to prevent the unpermitted natural gas discharge into groundwater that violated the state’s Clean Streams Law and the Oil and Gas Act. The company did not meet this deadline, while the migrating gas continues to impact water supplies at homes in a nine-square-mile area near Carter Road.

As part of today’s order, Cabot has also paid a $240,000 fine to the commonwealth, which has been deposited into the state’s well-plugging account. It also must pay $30,000 per month beginning in May until DEP has determined that the company has met its obligations under the 2009 order.

“Companies drilling in the Marcellus Shale have the legal responsibility to design and construct their wells to keep all gas contained within the wells and to prevent gas from moving into fresh groundwater. These standards are not mere suggestions or recommendations,” Hanger said. “Oil and gas companies doing business in Pennsylvania will follow the environmental rules and regulations put in place to protect citizens and our natural resources or face aggressive action by this department.”

Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. is headquartered in Houston, Texas with a mailing address in Pittsburgh.**
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Natural Gas Industry Proposes Rescue of Environmental and Parks Budgets

by Independent Oil and Gas Association of New York LAKEVIEW, NY (04/15/2010)(readMedia)--
Expedited auction of state land leases for Marcellus Shale exploration could yield $200 million for New York State in fiscal year 2010-11.

New York State could raise more than $200 million in fiscal year 2010-11 alone by expediting the auction of state land leases and the application approval process under a proposal being advanced by the Independent Oil & Gas Association of New York.

The industry recommends funds from the proposal be used to help restore cuts to the Department of Environmental Conservation's Environmental Protection Fund (EPF), and enable the Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation to open state parks and preserves this year. In addition, the funds raised could support additional staffing at several state agencies to oversee the review, approval and enforcement/oversight processes for Marcellus Shale applications and operations.

"New York is in a major fiscal crisis, including a budget deficit of more than $8 billion," said IOGA of NY Executive Director Brad Gill. "The oil and gas industry is offering to be part of the solution. Our industry wants to expand in New York and, unlike other industries and corporations, we are not looking for handouts from the state."

The governor and Legislature are nearing an agreement on the 2010-11 state budget, which will likely include significant budget reductions. The governor's spending proposal alone recommends the closure of 41 parks and 14 historic sites, and reducing the EPF by $69 million (from $212 million to $143 million). Complicating matters further, the National Parks Service has threatened to withhold millions of dollars in federal funding to New York is the state closes parks this year.

It would be the first time ever that New York parks would have to close, and the most significant proposed cuts to the EPF since its creation in 1993. The EPF is used to protect water and air quality, update sewage treatment facilities, support working farms, preserve historic heritage and revitalize waterfronts, monitor pesticide use, and more.

The DEC is poised to release a new environmental impact statement to regulate expanded natural gas exploration in the Marcellus Shale formation, which extends from New York's Western Catskills and Southern Tier into Pennsylvania and West Virginia. The Marcellus is America's largest natural gas deposit, and it carries the potential to greatly increase New York's energy independence, while vastly improving economic recovery and job creation.

IOGA's proposal is not unprecedented. In September 2008, the state sold land for oil and gas development and attracted an average bid of about $2,000 per acre from 18 energy companies for a total of 74,000 acres. A recent auction of natural gas lease rights on Pennsylvania's state land holdings raised $128.5 million – more than twice the amount anticipated. Sixteen energy companies bid an average of $4,020 an acre for access to six parcels totaling 32,000 acres.

IOGA estimates the state could receive at least $217 million in new revenue from the lease of less than 30 percent of leaseable land. Future proceeds from royalty payments could also be dedicated to fully fund the State Parks and EPF. IOGA's proposal also includes a recommendation to convene a committee of natural resources experts to identify potential sustainable locations.

The economic opportunities for New York are enormous. A report issued by the State Asset Maximization Commission in June 2009 determined that from 1999 to 2009, New York had collected $30.8 million in land, oil and gas leasing. Fully $16 million of this revenue was from energy industry bonus bids on DEC-managed lands in competitive lease sales held in 1999, 2003 and 2006, according to the SAM Commission.
New York State's leasing potential totals about 180,300 acres, with the possibility of receiving bids for its holdings at a range of $1,000 to $3,000 per acre. Possible leasing revenues could amount to between $180 and $540 million in future leasing revenues. The state also could collect revenue from royalty payments, the SAM Commission wrote.

"We are urging state lawmakers to appreciate the economic and environmental potential that a more robust natural gas exploration and extraction program would have on New York and its residents," Gill said. "They should not author or support any bills that stand in the way of progress."

IOGA of NY is a trade association founded in 1980 to protect, foster and advance the common interests of oil and gas producers, professionals and related industries in the State of New York. Visit IOGA on the web and sign a petition in support of natural gas exploration at iogany.org or marcellusfacts.com.
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April 12, 2010
From: Marcellus Drilling NewsLandowner News & Resources – Drilling for Natural Gas in the Marcellus Shale
Radiation Testing Shows Marcellus Shale Drill Cuttings are Safe for Chemung County.
NY Landfill Chemung County, NY officials have released a report they commissioned from an independent certified health physicist that show levels of radiation in the Marcellus Shale drill cuttings coming from Pennsylvania Marcellus drilling operations to the Chemung County landfill are “well below” U.S. Environmental Protection Agency standards for radiation.

The gist of the report is that the soil that the county landfill would accept from Marcellus Shale drilling poses no health threat from radiation, said County Executive Tom Santulli.
“These people are experts. They made it very clear that this material is less radioactive than the countertops in our houses and soil in our gardens,” Santulli said. “My message is simple—this stuff is not toxic. It’s no more radioactive than the soil in your garden and bricks on your house. All this testing verifies that. This is way below any EPA levels.
“This would be equivalent to taking dirt from your backyard and using it in landfill,” he said. “It can be used for cover. It’s that safe.”*

However, the debate still rages. Those opposed to drilling claim there is a significant threat to human health from the drill cuttings. County Executive Santulli says those opposed “have zero credibility” on the matter with no facts to back up their claims.
For more information on both positions, see the full article in the Star-Gazette.

*Elmira Star-Gazette (Apr 11) – County study says soil from gas drilling is safe
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Hydrofracking hits campaign trail
By Robert Harding

Saturday, April 10, 2010 11:48 PM EDT

When I interviewed Steve Levy this week, one of the questions I asked him was whether or not he supported hydrofracking and drilling the Marcellus Shale in New York.
It was an important question because of this area of the state and the issue's significance. The short answer I wrote in my interview with Levy was he announced his support for drilling. Here is the long answer.
“This is a golden opportunity to wean ourselves off foreign oil and to dramatically spur economic development in the upstate New York region and particularly the Southern Tier region,” Levy told me. “Pennsylvania is clobbering us right now, taking advantage of the supply while we sit on our hands. There is so much revenue that can be generated by exploration. We could easily put in place the safeguards we would need to ensure our environment remains sacrosanct.”
Levy continued: “The folks up here in this region I see like the potential of economic development and they are going to monitor this because this is their drinking water and lake systems. We've got to get moving and get the state's regulatory stonewalling out of the way so that Pennsylvania doesn't get all the benefits of tapping this major reserve. Upstate communities are dying and it's good for our economy and if you do it right, it can be good for the environment.
The Marcellus Shale has great appeal and there are oil and gas companies looking to drill what Independent Oil and Gas Association of New York Executive Director Brad Gill called the second-largest natural gas reserve in the world.
“To put it in perspective, this place is a world-class natural gas resource,” Gill said of Marcellus Shale.
“In Pennsylvania, a study found drilling could have a $1.4 billion economic impact to the state in 2009 alone and we projected hundreds of millions of dollars in tax revenues and tens of thousands of jobs.
The industry employs 5,000 people in New York and with new drilling, that will jump to 20,000 or 30,000. It can be an economic game-changer for our state and our country.”
Gill believes the environmental safeguards are already in place for new drilling and the use of a process called hydraulic fracturing, or hydrofracking for short. He also said New York currently imports 95 percent of its natural gas. New York could become a net exporter of natural gas, as is the case in Pennsylvania.
Among the hopes for natural gas explorers is opening up parts of the Marcellus Shale that also lies within watersheds providing drinking water, including a portion of the shale in the Catskills where the New York City watershed is located.
Jay Simpson, staff attorney with Riverkeeper, an environmental group focused on clean water issues, said his group is not anti-drilling but does not want to see drilling in areas that could impact drinking water.
“We believe natural gas serves a role for our long-term energy future and can be a bridge to wean us off foreign oil,” he said.
“But based on what has happened in other states, there are certain areas where drilling shouldn't happen.”
One area Simpson cited is Skaneateles Lake, which provides drinking water to the city of Syracuse. Simpson believes the risks of damaging water supplies far outweigh the benefits of any drilling happening in these areas.
Nothing is set in stone with Marcellus Shale drilling. Gov. David Paterson has said he supports drilling and the Department of Environmental Conservation completed a draft Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Statement (SGEIS) that was more aligned with Gill's position, discussing economic impacts and the need to protect the environment.
Before this, hydrofracking was a hot-button issue. Now, it's appearing that it will become a major issue on the campaign trail this year.
Online producer Robert Harding's Eye on Albany column will appear Sundays in The Citizen. Head to auburnpub.com/blogs to read his Eye on Albany blog online. Harding can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 220 or robert.harding@lee.net ___________________________________________________________________
Environmental group wants drilling postponed

By Steve Israel

Times Herald-Record

Published: 2:00 AM - 04/08/10

New York should not issue new rules to allow gas drilling until a new federal study — which will take at least two years — determines whether that drilling is safe. So says a leading environmental group, Catskill Mountainkeeper, based in the western Sullivan County hamlet of Youngsville; the hamlet, like the rest of Sullivan and parts of Ulster, sits on the gas-rich Marcellus shale.

"Why wouldn't (the Department of Environmental Conservation) wait? It's only common sense," says Ramsay Adams, executive director of Mountainkeeper, which like other local and national environmental groups — and New York City — says the horizontal drilling method of hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," pollutes drinking water.

The Environmental Protection Agency study, which began in Washington, D.C., Wednesday with a session to set up its parameters, will focus on everything from the impact of fracking on the nation's water supplies to the transportation of the chemically treated fluids taken from the ground during the process.

The DEC will not comment "at this time" on waiting for the EPA, said a spokeswoman for the agency, which is still reviewing more than 10,000 comments submitted on its proposed regulations.

But the number of those comments — and the often heated public hearings on the issue — are an indication of how much is at stake. The Marcellus shale not only sits below one of the country's most environmentally sensitive and populated areas, the New York City watershed, but also contains one of the most lucrative gas deposits on earth.

The gas industry wants to start drilling as soon as possible.

While opponents cite polluting accidents in Pennsylvania and western states, the executive director of the state's industry trade group points to its "proven track record in New York" — and previous federal studies, which critics say are industry-biased and outdated. Plus, the DEC's proposed regulations will be "more stringent" than current rules, which are already the toughest in the country, says Brad Gill of the Independent Oil and Gas Association of New York.

Waiting much longer to drill will cost the state millions, since companies are already shifting their sights to Pennsylvania.
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Drill down, to the truth ---From the Times-Union.com Website
First published in print: Wednesday, April 7, 2010

One of the natural gas industry's selling points on why New Yorkers should welcome drilling of the vast Marcellus Shale is that the method of choice, hydraulic fracturing, has never contaminated a drinking well or water supply, or caused any environmental mishap in this state.
Never. That's a pretty definitive word, allowing no exceptions. But in this case, it may require an asterisk. Or a bunch of them.

The state Department of Environmental Conservation has so far supported the industry's assertion. But now comes Walter Hang of Ithaca, a researcher who runs a company that tracks and maps environmental problems. He's also an anti-drilling activist.

Mr. Hang says that the DEC's records are missing some 20 years worth of county health department reports on water and gas problems in three counties in western New York -- Allegany, Cattaraugus and Chautauqua. Those included 135 oil and natural gas incidents in Chautauqua County alone, Mr. Hang says. In some instances, he says, water was contaminated with brine. In others, drinking water could be ignited.

Whether these incidents were tied to hydraulic fracturing -- a process by which a mix of water and chemicals is injected into deep rock, causing it to crack and release trapped gas -- is not yet known. The DEC says only that it is looking into Mr. Hang's correspondence.

That's certainly better than not looking into these issues, which may have been the case all these years. It turns out that Mr. Hang is not the first person to sound the alarm; this may merely be the first time DEC heard it.

The records Mr. Hang produced, for example, show that six years ago, a Chautauqua County Health Department water resource specialist wrote that his agency had "investigated numerous complaints of potential contamination problems resulting from oil- and gas-drilling activities."

The specialist, Bill Boria, said there were "suspected ground water contamination problems resulting from oil and gas drilling activities and hydrofracturing."
And, he added, the reported complaints "are probably just a fraction of actual problems that occurred."

That would be a far cry from never.

There are really two issues here.

First, DEC needs to determine whether gas drilling -- particularly the hydraulic fracturing method that the industry wants to use to tap the gas-rich Marcellus Shale -- has contaminated wells or water supplies in New York, or caused any environmental problem here. If "never" is actually "sometimes," it clearly has more work to do persuading the public that drilling on such a large scale would be safe.

And second, the agency that's supposed to be monitoring New York's environment, and the natural gas industry, needs to explain why reports of environmental problems in three counties over two decades come as a surprise.
The issue:

Reports of gas drilling problems surface after assurances that the industry's record is clean.

The Stakes:

Where drinking water supplies are involved, there isn't much margin for error.
To comment: tuletters@timesunion.com, or at http://blogs.timesunion.com/opinion

Read more: http://www.timesunion.com/AspStories/story.asp?storyID=919132&category=OPINION#ixzz0kSV7VuqW
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Tighter controls pushed on Marcellus shale drilling

Wednesday, April 07, 2010

By Don Hopey, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Marcellus shale drilling waste water containing high concentrations of dissolved solids poses a "real threat" to Pennsylvania's rivers and streams, and the state should approve new regulations to control it, according to Department of Environmental Protection Secretary John Hanger.

Mr. Hanger said the increase in total dissolved solids, or TDS, pollutants from natural gas drilling, mining discharges and other sources has already impaired and degraded major sources of drinking water and harmed aquatic life.

"The treating and disposing of gas drilling brine and fracturing wastewater is a significant challenge for the natural gas industry because of its exceptionally high TDS concentrations," said Mr. Hanger, who addressed the state House Republican Policy Committee on the subject in Indiana, Pa., today

"Marcellus drilling is growing rapidly and our rules must be strengthened now to prevent our waterways from being seriously harmed in the future," Mr. Hanger said.
New regulations governing water discharges into the state's rivers and streams would limit TDS concentrations to 500 parts per million and also set discharge limits on sulfate, chlorides, barium and strontium that would take effect Jan. 1, 2011.

A final vote by the state Environmental Quality Board on the regulation is scheduled for May 19. If the EQB approves the regulations, they would go to the state Independent Regulatory Review Commission for a vote.
Don Hopey: dhopey@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1983.
Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10097/1048546-100.stm#ixzz0kSKiVjxb
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Natural gas boom brings riches to a rural town
Jon Hurdle WELLSBORO, Pennsylvania Mon Apr 5, 2010 3:20pm EDT Reuters
WELLSBORO, Pennsylvania (Reuters) - At a windswept rail yard at Wellsboro in northern Pennsylvania, dozens of railcars wait to load thousands of tons of sand onto trucks that will take the cargo to natural gas rigs across the state.
The freight railroad, which runs 35 miles north to Corning, New York, had its busiest year in more than two decades in 2009, fueled by demand from a booming natural gas industry, which uses sand in hydraulic fracturing operations.
Revenue doubled last year for Wellsboro & Corning Railroad, owned by Tom Myles and sons Tom Jr. and Bill, and the sand-hauling contracts that began a year ago are due to double revenue again in 2010 and make up 80 percent of business.
It's a windfall for the Myles -- who bought the railroad's rolling stock for $750,000 in January 2008, expecting to serve two local manufacturing companies -- and for Wellsboro, which has a population of about 3,200, and its surrounding farms.
"This is a huge opportunity for us to operate at these levels," said Bill Myles, manager of the railroad's operations. The company has just spent $1.5 million on four powerful new locomotives, is laying new track and has hired new workers.
Like many rural towns, Wellsboro is getting rich from the rush to develop the Marcellus Shale, a formation stretching from New York to West Virginia that contains enough natural gas to satisfy U.S. demand for 20 years or more, experts say.
It is expected to become the most productive of America's shale gas fields.
The boom has also transformed the lives of some local farmers who, after struggling financially for years, now find themselves with six- or seven-figure checks from the gas companies in return for leasing their land for drilling.
Tim Gooch, a partner in the Wellsboro office of the accounting firm ParenteBeard LLC, recalled a dairy farmer client who had run up about $500,000 in debt over 20 years because of depressed milk prices and rising farm costs.
But then in 2008, the farmer got a gas-lease check for $800,000, allowing him to pay off his debts and own his 300 acres outright for the first time, Gooch said.
"Some of them have had tears in their eyes, thinking they may have to give up the farm," said Gooch. "The gas checks have allowed them to stay on their land."
Energy companies are paying around $2,500 an acre -- a lump sum of about $375,000 for a typical 150-acre farm, he said. And more money will also flow into local economies from gas royalty payments, which are yet to be paid in significant quantities.
'TIP OF THE ICEBERG'
Surging Marcellus gas demand tripled applications for Pennsylvania drilling permits this year to 5,200; produced twice the expected revenue from a recent auction of state lands for drilling, and encouraged Exxon Mobil to bid $31 billion for drilling company XTO late last year.
In Tioga County surrounding Wellsboro, the biggest local operator, East Resources Inc., drilled 42 Marcellus wells in 2009 and expects to sink another 200 this year. The company and its affiliates employ about 60 people in the county and it expects its work force there to grow by 30 percent in 2010.
Bob and Marsha Chesko own the Sherwood Motel in downtown Wellsboro and say it was full, or nearly so, throughout the 2009/10 winter -- an unprecedented experience in their seven years there -- due to an influx of workers at nearby gas rigs.
In previous years, the hotel's winter occupancy struggled to reach 40 percent and traditionally depended largely on the summer trade of tourists visiting the picturesque northern Pennsylvania countryside.
The Chesko's previously set aside money from the summer tourist trade to see them through lean winter months, but this year the jump in winter business has allowed them to meet running and renovation expenses without dipping into reserves.
And with the expected growth in the area's gas industry, Bob Chesko said: "It's just the tip of the iceberg. Some say it's going to be a 20-year project."
But some Wellsboro locals have raised concern over damage to roads from heavy truck traffic, worries about possible water contamination from the chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing, and unease that their quiet rural life style is being lost.
"I caught myself feeling very sad," said Mary Worthington, treasurer of the local chamber of commerce, as she recently watched a constant stream of gas-industry trucks and mud-spattered pickups grind past her town-center office.
But Todd Coolidge, branch manager of Citizens & Northern Bank in Wellsboro, where the median income of $38,000 is well below the state average of $50,000, said those worries are outweighed by the new gas money.
Business has picked up at gas stations, auto repair shops, restaurants, realtors, and even the local movie theater, said Coolidge, adding, "I have seen so many businesses that it has touched in a positive way."
(Editing by Michelle Nichols and Todd Eastham)
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Natural Gas Set to Gain as Exxon Bets $28.5 Billion (Update2)

March 29, 2010, 5:30 PM EDT
By Reg Curren

March 29 (Bloomberg) -- Exxon Mobil Corp. is making a $28.5 billion bet on natural gas, this year’s worst-performing energy commodity, just as hedge funds amass their biggest wager on prices falling.

If history is a guide, the acquisition of XTO Energy Inc. may make Irving, Texas-based Exxon the winner. Its purchase of Mobil Corp., announced in December 1998, came three weeks before crude bottomed at $10.35 a barrel and then surged to $25 a year later. While speculators have helped drive gas down 31 percent this year, everyone from Goldman Sachs Group Inc. to ConocoPhillips says prices are headed higher.

The combination of faster economic growth, demand for cleaner-burning fuels and higher coal prices may spur demand from factories, power plants and chemical makers, which account for 60 percent of gas consumption. Goldman Sachs, which cut its forecast this month, projects a price of $6 per million British thermal units in 12 months, up more than 50 percent from $3.842 on the New York Mercantile Exchange today.

Demand will rebound with the economy, ConocoPhillips Chief Executive Officer Jim Mulva told investors and analysts March 24 at a conference in New York. “We see natural gas prices in the short term somewhere in the neighborhood of around $5, but ultimately longer term, we see it more in $6 to $8,” he said.

This year, the only Reuters/Jefferies CRB Index commodity that has fallen more is sugar, down 37 percent. Speculators had sold a net 186,983 futures contracts worth about $7 billion in the week ended March 16, based on Commodity Futures Trading Commission data and April futures prices. Inventories rose 11 billion cubic feet to 1.626 trillion in the week ended March 19, 8 percent more than the five-year average, according to the Energy Department.

Growing Economy

The industry is setting up for a recovery, with the U.S. economy forecast to grow 3 percent this year and next, according to 53 responses to a Bloomberg survey.

Since Exxon Mobil agreed to buy Fort Worth, Texas-based XTO on Dec. 14, Total SA in Paris, Tokyo’s Mitsui & Co. trading company and U.S. coal miner Consol Energy Inc. in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania, have purchased stakes in U.S. fields that contain shale gas.

Output from shale wells, in fields where rock formations are fractured and injected with water, sand and chemicals to release trapped gas, drove production gains last year. Advances in drilling technology are cutting production costs. Shale purchases over the past two years exceed $48.4 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

Shale Deposits

XTO gets more than 20 percent of its production from the Barnett shale deposit in Texas, the largest in the U.S. It’s also planning to boost drilling in the Marcellus Shale, a formation in parts of Pennsylvania, New York and West Virginia.

“It’s not a price play, obviously, because we never do that,” Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson said in a conference call with investors and analysts on Dec. 14, when the purchase was announced. “It’s an efficiency play. And as you know, we believe you get a lot of efficiency benefits out of scale.”

Houston-based ConocoPhillips, the third-largest U.S. oil company, plans to accelerate development of the Eagle Ford shale formation in Texas, Mulva said.

Gas prices in North America will probably stay in “the range of $4 to $8” per million Btu, Marvin Odum, president of U.S. operations for The Hague-based Royal Dutch Shell Plc, said at a conference in New Orleans on March 24.

For now, gas is disappointing investors. Futures prices peaked at $15.78 per million Btu in December 2005 and rose as high as $13.694 in July 2008, before the recession caused prices to collapse to a seven-year low of $2.409 in September 2009.

Competing With Coal

The price slide may have made the fuel competitive with coal for U.S. electricity generators for the first time since September, according to Cameron Horwitz, an analyst at SunTrust Robinson Humphrey in Houston.

Coal costs for electricity producers, after factoring in variables including the variety of coal, power-plant efficiency and storage, may exceed $4.20 per million Btu, based on data compiled by Bloomberg.

U.S. gas demand may rise as much as 12 percent over the next 10 years as President Barack Obama turns his attention to climate change, Chris Goncalves, director of Washington-based Navigant Consulting Inc., said in London on March 22.

Gas is the least-polluting fossil fuel, producing about half the carbon dioxide of coal when burned, according to the Energy Department.

U.S. gas production reached 26.3 trillion cubic feet in 2009, up 2.2 percent from the previous year, while industrial demand slumped 7.7 percent in the recession, Energy Department data show. Stockpiles hit a record 3.837 trillion cubic feet at the end of November.

Supply Gains

“The ability to get more natural gas supply on line is going to mitigate upward price pressure even as the economy recovers,” said Jason Schenker, president of Prestige Economics LLC, an Austin, Texas-based energy consultant who expects gas futures to average about $4.85 per million Btu in 2010. “It’s possible we could move lower from current price levels over the next couple of months.”

Liquefied natural gas may also damp gains as imports rise 45 percent in 2010 to about 1.8 billion cubic feet per day, according to Energy Department estimates.

The number of gas drilling rigs working in the U.S. may be about to level off, said Chad Friess, an analyst with UBS Securities in Calgary. There were 941 rigs working in the U.S. last week, an increase of 42 percent from a seven-year low in July, according to Baker Hughes Inc.
“The U.S. rig count may be approaching a plateau, given resilient gas production and receding prices,” he said in a March 4 report.

Price Shock

Speculators and consumers of the fuel may be setting themselves up for a price shock by underestimating the strength of the U.S. economy and ignoring the 2.21 trillion cubic feet of gas sucked from storage this past winter, when demand peaked, said Tom Orr, the research director at Weeden & Co., a brokerage in Greenwich, Connecticut.

“A lot of economically sensitive companies are moving up now, like DuPont and Dow,” Orr said. “I wouldn’t short gas here because you’re going to work through some of the oversupply as the economy continues to recover.”

On Jan. 26, DuPont Co., the third-biggest U.S. chemical maker, reported profit that topped analyst estimates on increased orders for automotive plastics and electronics materials. Dow Chemical Co. shares have more than tripled in the past year.

“When Exxon bought Mobil in the ‘90s you saw a spate of big boys getting bigger,” said Scott Hanold, an analyst at RBC Capital Markets in Minneapolis. The XTO purchase signals a $6.50 long-term average price for natural gas, Hanold said.

“You’re probably near the bottom,” he said. “Prices are depressed because of the near-term glut of gas. While it’s pretty bearish now, you will see it improve.”

--With assistance from Mario Parker and Joe Carroll in Chicago, Edward Klump in Houston, Jim Polson, Moming Zhou and Jack Kaskey in New York and Ben Farey in London. Editors: Bill Banker, Joe Link

To contact the reporter on this story: Reg Curren in Calgary at rcurren@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dan Stets at dstets@bloomberg.net

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Defending U.S. Shale Plays from the EPA Energy
By Keith Kohl

Saturday, March 27th, 2010

Welcome to Energy and Capital's weekend edition — our insights in investing, as well as the top stories this week from Energy and Capital and our sister publications.
It's a whole different story when it comes to developing our unconventional shale fields.
One of the growing debates waging in the unconventional oil and gas scene is the subject of hydraulic fracturing. As you know, the process came under scrutiny in New York this year, as opposition mounted over drilling in the city's watershed.

Of course, the issue seems to be nothing more than a publicity stunt.
In fact, drilling in the city's watershed is almost a non-issue. The only company with leases in that area — Chesapeake Energy — has continually said the company isn't interested in drilling there.

Let's be serious, they're not going to ban drilling in the Marcellus shale formation. The U.S. shale basins are one of the few reasons to be bullish on natural gas, as well as one of the best opportunities for investors — especially when the supply glut eases.
Here are some of the latest headlines to cross my desk:

Former President George W. Bush recently praised the technological advancements made in order to develop unconventional natural gas sources across the U.S. Of course, this isn't exactly a shock for Energy and Capital readers... We've been covering the rise of U.S. shale plays since the Barnett started gaining fame back in 2006.

Need more proof that the shale boom hasn't lost any steam? Here's a look at the number of shale rigs operating vs. the U.S. land rig count. Then again, we're not the only ones that recognize the role that shale gas will play in the future.
In another move to increase their shale gas position, Statoil recently shelled out $253 million to Chesapeake for approximately 59,000 net acres in the Marcellus shale formation. Some of you might remember when Statoil purchased 600,000 Marcellus acres from Chesapeake back in 2008.

Last week, I reported on the reasons why the EPA is trying to control by regulating the hydraulic fracturing process. So far, the industry seems unconcerned. The American Petroleum Institute reiterated its position on debate: "... hydraulic fracturing is a safe and well understood technology for producing oil and gas."
Enjoy your weekend,
Keith Kohl
Energy and Capital
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From March 24, 2010--
This Summer Drilling is coming to Wayne County
From: Marcellus Drilling News Landowner News & Resources – Drilling for Natural Gas in the Marcellus Shale Newfield Exploration Set to Drill 10 Wells in Wayne County, PA
This Summer Drilling is coming to Wayne County, Pennsylvania this summer according to officials with Newfield Exploration. They are waiting for approvals from regulators to begin drilling up to 10 exploration wells. If those wells show promising results, they will likely be turned into full production wells.
A Houston-based natural gas production company is laying the groundwork to fulfill its promise to drill up to 10 exploration wells in northern Wayne County this summer, with permits now trickling into the state Department of Environmental Protection.
Newfield Exploration Co., which partnered with international oil and gas production firm Hess Corp. to develop a 140,000-acre leasehold in Wayne and Susquehanna counties, recently filed for its first four natural gas drilling permits in Damascus and Manchester Twps.
The company has three pending drilling permits in Damascus Twp. [Wayne County] and one pending permit in Manchester Twp. [York County], according to state environmental regulator records. These permits, filed in late February and March, are on track to be approved by late April or May.* *The Scranton Times Tribune (Mar 24) – Gas driller seeks permits for Wayne County wells
25 Mar 2010: Report
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Hits Roadblock in New York City
by bruce stutz
Hydro fracturing is a profitable method of natural gas extraction that uses large quantities of water and chemicals to free gas from underground rock formations. But New York City’s concerns that the practice would threaten its water supply have slowed a juggernaut that has been sweeping across parts of the northeastern United States.

The highly productive method of natural gas extraction known as “hydro fracturing” has spread rapidly across the United States in recent years, opening up vast new reserves in Texas, Wyoming, Pennsylvania, and other states.
Last fall, however, the process — also known as “fracking” — ran headlong into opposition from New York City. And for now at least, stiff resistance from the city, which fears the contamination of its pristine water supply in upstate New York, seems to have slowed the momentum behind this highly touted — and highly controversial — drilling technique.
The city’s 90-page inventory of the possibly dire impacts of hydraulic fracturing has now become primary source material for a growing environmental backlash to the gas industry’s rapid assault on the huge gas-rich geological formation known as the Marcellus Shale, which underlies large portions of rural Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and New York State.
Acting in part on concerns raised by the New York City report, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced last week that it would Estimates that the Marcellus Shale held 350 trillion cubic feet of natural gas set off a gas leasing frenzy.conduct a nationwide study to assess the environmental damage caused by hydro fracturing. The EPA’s larger conclusion — that the potential impacts of hydraulic fracturing on human health, the environment, water supply, water quality, wastewater treatment, air quality, and management of radioactive materials, “warrant further scientific and regulatory analysis” — was not one the industry wanted to hear.
The EPA study may well lead to tighter controls over this loosely regulated practice, and could impede the spread of hydro fracturing. The drilling method involves forcing a mixture of water, chemicals, and sand at high pressure down a well bore and into the dense surrounding rock. There, it creates small fractures that release the previously trapped reserves. The problem is, however, that the technique also uses large quantities of water — anywhere from 3 million to 8 million gallons per well — some third to half of which emerges from the fracking process tainted by numerous contaminants and chemicals. If that water isn’t properly stored and treated, it poses a risk to surface water, wells, and underground aquifers.

The Bush administration, acting on a widely criticized EPA study that did not even test water samples, concluded that fracking was safe and in 2005 exempted gas drilling from regulation under the Safe Drinking Water Act. Fracking was already widespread in Texas and Wyoming, but in recent years concerns began to grow over the environmental impact of the technique. Some western landowners claimed the drilling had polluted their wells or streams and poisoned their cattle; others claimed to have been exposed to toxic fumes seeping out of the wells. The industry, which refused to identify the chemistry of its fracking fluids for proprietary reasons, protested that these were isolated incidents, the result of poorly managed operations.
Then, in 2008, estimates that the Marcellus Shale held 350 trillion cubic feet of natural gas — enough, at the present rate of consumption, to cover the nation’s natural gas needs for 15 years — set off a gas leasing frenzy in the Marcellus region. Fracking wells began sprouting in the East.
Last year, however, New York City — concerned about the spread of hydro fracturing into the city’s 1,585-square-mile watershed in the Catskill Mountains and upper Delaware River basin — hired a team of geologists to assess fracking’s impact. Although the city’s watershed makes up only 8.5 percent of New York State’s share of the Marcellus region, the city’s study raised a large red flag as scientists argued that significant risk of water pollution was endemic to the fracking process.
“Intensive natural gas well development in the watershed,” the study said, “brings an increased level of risk to the water supply: risk of degrading New York City had thrown a wrench into a fully stoked industrial machine.source water quality, risk to long-term watershed health... risk of damaging critical infrastructure, and the risk of exposing watershed residents and potentially NYC residents to chronic low levels of toxic chemicals.” The city’s report said that while a single well may be environmentally benign, the risks become unacceptable “when evaluated in the context of hundreds or thousands of other wells.”
Wes Gillingham, program director of Catskill Mountainkeeper, said of the report, “One of the reasons industry could get away with these incidents is that there was a lack of science. New York City used reputable geologists and came up with the science.”
In a letter to the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, the EPA agreed with the city’s concerns and further stated that, “While protecting the New York City watershed is important... we also have concerns about water quality throughout the state. Just because fewer people rely on upstate water resources does not imply that these supplies are not worthy of protection.”
Not long after the EPA made itself heard anew, a “Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals Act” was introduced in Congress. Known as the FRAC Act, it would return to the EPA jurisdiction over hydraulic fracturing nationwide.
New York City, it turns out, had thrown a wrench into a fully stoked industrial machine.
Only a few years ago, before the Marcellus Shale became a household name across rural West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and New York, this deep sedimentary formation was mostly known only to geologists. They knew it lay a mile and more below the surface of the Appalachian basin and stretched north from West Virginia to Lake Erie and east across the Appalachian mountains, the Allegheny, Susquehanna, and Delaware river valleys, and into southern New York. They knew it formed some 350 million years ago as the organic-rich deposit of an ancient river delta and that, compressed over time beneath sandstone, siltstone and shales, it had produced hydrocarbons, especially in the form of natural gas.
What they didn’t know, until recently, was how much gas it held. Twenty years ago they would have said, “not much.” And what was there, they would have said, was hardly worth tapping since the Marcellus was a tight-fisted formation, its gas either trapped between fine and densely-packed grains or adsorbed into its organic matter. The relatively low cost of natural gas and the high cost of fracking — wells can cost a few million dollars and more — also led to the Marcellus reserves remaining untapped.
But the realization two years ago of just how much gas the Marcellus Shale contained changed the economics. A “play,” as the industry calls it, in the Marcellus Shale seemed plausible. What made it practicable was a new technology developed in the early 1990s for use on drilling rigs in waters Landowners in job-scarce rural counties imagined their leases bringing Beverly Hillbillies payoffs.off the Gulf Coast: A motor attached to the drill bit allows it, once it reaches its final vertical depth, to be turned 90 degrees and to bore horizontally. A few of these horizontal wells, each sometimes running as much as a mile from the vertical well bore, allows fracking to extend far into the surrounding rock. While each well might now require millions — instead of thousands — of gallons of fracking fluid, this combination of hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling made drilling into dense shales like the Marcellus eminently doable and profitable. What also made it irresistible was the fact that the price for a thousand cubic feet of natural gas had risen to more than ten dollars.
Energy companies began a rush to lease lands over the Marcellus Shale. States predicted new jobs and big revenues. Politicians concerned over the country’s dependence on foreign oil saw a large and untapped source of domestic fuel reserves. Landowners in job-scarce rural counties imagined their leases bringing big Beverly Hillbillies payoffs, such as the ones that had come to many landowners in the West. Some conservationists, including the Sierra Club, saw the possibility that such reserves would make natural gas — with fewer CO2 emissions than coal or oil —the transitional energy of choice until wind or solar power took over.
In 2008, drilling began in West Virginia and Pennsylvania. New York State, recognizing that its regulations did not address either the new technology or the expected intensity of drilling effort, imposed a temporary moratorium and quickly drafted an environmental impact statement that it hoped would soon allow drilling to commence. The industry, including Exxon-Mobil, was touting widespread gas development in the Marcellus Shale.
Then New York City’s report rang up the numbers: Each well pad will take up 5 to 7 acres including roads, pipelines, and storage facilities. There will be 6 to 10 wells per pad. The well bore will go down some 3,000 to 7,000 feet and horizontal sections will extend laterally for 2,000 to 6,000 feet. The fracking process requires, at minimum, several million gallons of water per well. Since the wells will be far from any municipal supply, getting this water to the well will require 800 to 1,200 tanker truck trips or on-site water. If this water is drawn from the city’s watershed it will mean less water in its reservoirs, especially in times of drought. (Eight million gallons of water is equivalent to 320,000 ten-minute showers.)
New York City’s study also estimated that 4 million gallons of frack fluid will contain anywhere from 80 to 330 tons of chemicals per well. Much of that water returns to the surface over several weeks of fracking. This “flowback” contains both the original — and unidentified — frack fluid chemicals, as well as dissolved hydrocarbons, benzene, heavy metals, and naturally occurring radionuclides, including uranium.
These millions of gallons of hazardous flowback waste need to be collected, The fracking process requires, at minimum, several millions of gallons of water per well.safely stored on site, and then trucked from the well site to an industrial wastewater treatment plant. New York State has only two treatment plants capable of handling the wastewater, and neither is anywhere near the Delaware River watershed. The nearest, according to the Delaware River Basin Commission, is outside of Philadelphia, some 200 miles away.
The city was not impressed with the industry’s claims that hydrofracking poses little risk to underground aquifers. Although the main well and its horizontal bores will be far below any freshwater aquifer, New York City’s analysis found that natural faults and fractures in the underlying geological formations “can and do serve as conduits that facilitate migration of contaminants, methane, or pressurized fluids from deep formation towards the surface.”
The city’s final word, as its Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner, Paul Rush, put it, was “no”: no water withdrawals and no fracking “in the New York City watershed or anywhere near its infrastructures.”
Not long after the city’s report was issued, Chesapeake Energy — a major player in the Marcellus Shale that holds leases on properties in the city’s watershed — vowed it would not drill on any of them.
MORE FROM YALE e360
CO2 Capture and Storage Gains a Growing Foothold
The drive to extract and store CO2 from coal-fired power plants is gaining momentum, with the Obama administration backing the technology and the world’s first capture and sequestration project now operating in the U.S. READ MORENew York City’s concerns are unique. As it has since 1915, city water runs untreated through more than a hundred miles of tunnels into New York City taps. Anything that might affect the quality of that water and require it to be treated could cost the city billions of dollars. And yet, the city’s description of its watershed as a “pristine, largely undisturbed landscape” applies to much of the 18,000 square miles overlaying the Marcellus Shale in New York State. Most of this southern tier region, as it is known, is sparsely populated: small towns surrounded by forests and farmland.
While the sight of oil and gas rigs scattered across the landscape may be a familiar and even comforting one to those who live in the southwestern U.S., it’s an unfamiliar — and often disconcerting — vision for those living in the relatively pristine environs of the Catskills. And while some upstate New Yorkers see the possibility of new jobs and incomes, others fear the fragmentation of forests and farmland, the costs of maintaining roads and services, the ruination of the landscape, and the possible contamination of their streams, rivers, and wells.
“Fracking gets all the headlines,” says the Mountainkeeper’s Gillingham, “but one of the biggest impacts will be the industrialization of the landscape.”

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Feds Weigh in on Hydrofracking -- From Kip at the Bay Ridge Journal

Mayor Bloomberg praised the federal Environmental Protection Agency's decision last week to investigate the impact of hydraulic fracturing ("fracking" or "hydrofracking") for natural gas in the city's watershed as a "positive step toward protecting local water quality".
The Marcellus Shale, a source of natural gas, runs through New York State. Governor Paterson has opened the area to natural gas drilling using the controversial hydrofracking method.
There is growing evidence from other states suggesting that hydrofracking, which pumps millions of gallons of pressurized water and chemicals into the ground, pollutes local water sources.
Last year, the city's own study found that hydrofracking in our watershed could contaminate our water supply with toxic chemicals. To deal with the threat of contamination, the city would have to build a filtration plant that would cost taxpayers at least $10 billion.
Because each area facing the threat of hydrofracking is unique, Bloomberg has asked the EPA to look at the impact of hydrofracking in a variety of settings -- including those, like New York City, where water is not filtered.
From the city's perspective, said Bloomberg, drilling in our watershed, which supplies more than 1 billion gallons of drinking water a day to more than 9 million people, is not a chance worth taking.
The press release from NYC.Gov.

Posted by Kip at 8:21 PM
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From pressconnects.com
EPA to determine effects of hydraulic fracturing
By Brian Tumulty •btumulty@gannett.com • March 19, 2010, 8:00 pm

WASHINGTON -- The Environmental Protection Agency has begun a $6 million study of the practice of injecting chemical-laden water into shale deposits in order to release natural gas.
The two-year study of the natural gas industry's use of hydraulic fracturing will be the first of its kind. An earlier EPA study essentially was a survey of existing literature and was criticized by environmental groups.
"We hope this will take a much harder look at what are the chemicals being used in the process of hydraulic fracturing and how this impacts our water supplies and our communities," said Katherine Nadeau, water and natural resources program director for Environmental Advocates of New York.
EPA officials are using $1.9 million in this year's budget to begin the work and are requesting money from Congress in the 2011 budget to complete it, according to EPA spokeswoman Ernesta Jones.
"Our research will be designed to answer questions about the potential impact of hydraulic fracturing on human health and the environment," Paul Anastas, assistant administrator for EPA's Office of Research and Development, said in a statement.
Hydraulic fracturing was exempted from the Clean Water Act under a 2005 energy bill that passed a Republican Congress and was signed into law by President George W. Bush.
Environmental concerns and a potential economic bonanza from hydraulic fracturing have divided neighbor against neighbor in many communities in New York and Pennsylvania, where a major natural gas reserve has been identified in a geological formation known as the Marcellus Shale.
Oil and gas companies have signed numerous drilling leases in both states. But New York has imposed a moratorium -- conventional and some small vertical wells are exempt -- while the state Department of Environmental Conservation updates its regulations. A draft update document drew almost 14,000 public comments last year. It's not clear when the state agency will move to enact final regulations. ------------------- An estimated 1,500 to 2,500 drilling permits likely will be issued annually in the New York section of the Marcellus Shale once the moratorium ends, according to Environmental Advocates of New York.
Natural gas drilling is expected to have a long-term impact on the Southern Tier and Western New York economy because the Marcellus Shale could produce gas for at least 30 years, according to Rod Howe, executive director of the Community and Rural Development Institute at Cornell University.
Development of well sites will bring new residents to many small communities, with new RV parks, motels, and rentals that will change the local culture, Lowe said.
Against this backdrop, congressional Democrats are trying to reregulate the industry through legislation introduced by Rep. Diana DeGette of Colorado and Sen. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania.
Their bill, known as the FRAC Act (Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals Act), would amend the Safe Drinking Water Act to repeal the exemption that allows drillers to inject fluids into wells near drinking water sources. It also would require drillers to disclose the chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing operations that help break open small fissures in the shale, allowing natural gas to escape to the surface.
Thirteen members of the New York House delegation and both senators are cosponsors. But the EPA study and a crowded congressional calendar make it unlikely the legislation will pass this year. "It's going to take a while," Casey said of his Senate bill. "It's a function of what's in front of it -- health care, job-creation bills, appropriations, financial and regulatory reform, climate change."
Casey said advocates on both sides -- oil and gas industry executives opposed to new regulations and environmental groups concerned about water quality -- are visiting his Capitol Hill office. The EPA study was requested by Congress in the 2010 budget.
Bruce Vincent, president of the Independent Petroleum Association of America and director of Swift Energy in Houston, described the study as a compromise designed to prevent congressional action on the FRAC Act. Vincent expects the EPA will conclude what earlier studies have found -- that injecting water into gas wells for hydraulic fracturing is safe.
Rep. Louise Slaughter, D-Fairport, supports holding off on legislation until the EPA releases its findings. "I'm a person who appreciates scientific evidence," she said. Rep. Maurice Hinchey, D-Hurley, indicated in a recent interview he would press the House Energy and Commerce Committee to move forward with legislation without waiting for the EPA study. "There's a lot of things around here that make progress more difficult," Hinchey said. "Progress around here is something that you have to struggle and work for."
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For Immediate Release
Contact: Mike Morosi
202-225-6335
March 17, 2010
Hinchey Statement on Initiation of EPA Study on the

Risks Hydraulic Fracturing Poses to Drinking Water Supplies
Washington, D.C.-- The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) tonight informed various stakeholders that it will announce tomorrow the commencement of the first phases of a comprehensive research study to investigate the potential adverse impact that hydraulic fracturing may have on water quality and public health. Congressman Maurice Hinchey (D-NY) tonight applauded the start of the EPA's study. Hinchey authored the provision that urged the EPA to conduct the study after questions were raised regarding the safety of the natural gas drilling process.

Along with Congresswoman Diana DeGette (D-CO), Hinchey is also the co-author of the FRAC ACT -- Fracturing Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals Act, which would close the loophole that exempted hydraulic fracturing from the SDWA and require the oil and gas industry to disclose the chemicals they use in their hydraulic fracturing processes. Currently, the oil and gas industry is the only industry granted an exemption from complying with the SDWA.

"I am very pleased to learn that the Environmental Protection Agency has decided to commence a study that will examine the risks hydraulic fracturing poses to drinking water supplies in New York and across the nation. This is an important step towards ensuring that natural gas drilling is done in a way that protects our environment, vital natural resources and public health. It is also a necessary step since the EPA's 2004 study on the matter was marred by biased data influenced by senior officials in the previous administration.

"Last year, I authored a provision that was approved by Congress, which urged the EPA to conduct this study after serious questions were raised regarding the safety of the natural gas drilling process. While the production of natural gas is necessary and certainly has an important role to play in our national energy policy, it's imperative that we do everything we can to ensure our drinking water supplies are not contaminated. I applaud the EPA's decision to begin a serious investigation into this matter and will continue working to protect our environment from the chemical concoctions being pumped into the ground by energy companies. Understanding the risks that hydraulic fracturing poses to drinking water supplies is critical to guiding future policies and regulations that will safeguard the public."
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Ban gas drilling on county property
By Dan Hust-- Sullivan County Democrat
MARCH 16, 2010
MONTICELLO — Legislators on the Public Works Committee unanimously agreed Thursday to ban gas drilling involving hydrofracking on all county-owned properties.

Citing environmental, water quality, traffic and property impact concerns, the resolution says no such drilling will be allowed “until such time as the potential long-term, cumulative and indirect environmental and public health impacts are adequately addressed and appropriate mitigation measures are identified.”

An accompanying resolution was also approved on Thursday, urging Congress to “amend pertinent federal laws to adequately safeguard the environment and the public from any environmental and health risks associated with hydrofracking.”

Both resolutions will go before the full Legislature this Thursday for official approval. The meeting is open to the public and will be held at 2 p.m. at the Government Center in Monticello.
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Sunday, March 14, 2010 MARCELLUS SHALE; A PERFECT RESPONSE
MARCELLUS SHALE; A PERFECT RESPONSE A Must Read Blog on Marcellus Shale Drilling Dr Ron Bishop’s comments on draft Supplemental GEIS
Dr Ron Bishop’s comments on draft Supplemental GEIS

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We must take full advantage of Marcellus Shale By David Copley
Updated: March 14, 2010, 6:32 am /
Published: March 14, 2010, 12:30 am
Buffalo Evening News Newspaper

It’s impossible to overestimate the importance of natural gas production in the Marcellus Shale that underlies large parts of New York State and Pennsylvania.
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Brooklyn Reps Tell Paterson: Protect Our Drinking Water! by Harold Egeln (edit@brooklyneagle.net), published online 03-11-2010
Clarke, McMahon, Weiner: Public Health Outweighs Economic Gain By Harold Egeln

Brooklyn Daily Eagle BROOKLYN – Don’t harm our city’s drinking water! That’s the urgent message by six members of the city’s congressional delegation -- three of them from Brooklyn -- sent to Gov. David Paterson on Tuesday, a day after he held a town hall meeting at Brooklyn Borough Hall.
See entire article:
http://www.brooklyneagle.com/categories/category.php?category_id=31&id=34080
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Natural Gas Drilling Map
From: http://www.dailyyonder.com/take-gas-leave-roads/2010/03/08/2626


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Drilling proponents, foes square off in New PaltzText Size:
By Steve Israel
Times Herald-Record
Posted: March 09, 2010 - 2:00 AM

NEW PALTZ — Why has natural-gas drilling been discussed and debated, praised and protested everywhere from a youth center in the western Sullivan County hamlet of Callicoon to the halls of Congress — and, on Monday night, at SUNY New Paltz?

Because whether folks are for or against it, just about everyone agrees that drilling the gas-rich Marcellus shale, which sits beneath Sullivan and parts of Ulster counties, will profoundly change lives.

"A game changer," said Scott Rotruck, a vice president of Chesapeake Energy. He was the only pro-drilling member of the SUNY New Paltz panel that included two representatives of environmental groups, the executive deputy commissioner of the Department of Environmental Conservation and the chairman of the New York City Council's Environmental Protection Committee. Rep. Maurice Hinchey, D-Hurley, was the keynote speaker.
Proponents such as Rotruck once again said drilling is medicine for an ailing New York.

"It will immediately provide jobs and energy and economic independence," he said.

Those against it — including New York City and most of the crowd of some 200 Monday night — again said drilling, or specifically, the horizontal drilling technique called "fracking," will pollute the water and scar the pristine land atop the shale.

"The industrialization of the landscape," said Kate Sinding, senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council, pointing to incidents of pollution in Western states.

The debate has intensified over the past few months, as the state prepares new regulations for drilling.

But Monday night, several speakers said the proposed rules fall short — even though the DEC is still reviewing more than 10,000 comments on them and apparently incorporating changes.

"This document should not be approved," said Hinchey, who noted, "While I'm not opposed to drilling, it must be done with the most oversight and regulation."

Sinding — like Wes Gillingham of Catskill Mountainkeeper — called for the DEC to start the regulations process over again because there's no analysis of the "cumulative impact" of drilling.

All of which makes the DEC's job of balancing environmental protection with the development of natural resources even tougher.
"It's an extremely complicated process," said the DEC's executive deputy commissioner, Stuart Gruskin.

sisrael@th-record.com

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From: Oil & Gas Investments Bulletin
Fracking Fluids Part I: A Controversy Coming to an Energy Investment Near You by admin on March 4, 2010
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From: Liz Bucar's Blog: Breathing is Political March 5, 2010 Post
Gas Drilling : Sullivan County’s Hazards Mitigation Plan
In early January 1987, emergency sirens in Cochecton, Lake Huntington and Callicoon shattered the cold afternoon.* The children and I stared fearfully at the Plektron© where it sat on its living room shelf crackling with meager details. Like any good fire chief’s wife, I didn’t pick up the phone to call him. He’d ring us the minute he had a chance.

Slowly, painfully, news reached us. A train had derailed just behind the Callicoon hospital on route 97. A chemical had spilled and was filling the air with caustic vapor.

Snow and mud were making access difficult. All we knew for certain was that several train cars had jumped the track and were lying on their sides.

For hours, the nature and toxicity of the chemical remained unknown but our husbands, brothers and sons were having trouble seeing and breathing. The Ladies Auxiliaries prepared coffee and sandwiches that remained undelivered. We were banned from the site. Our unanswered questions floated in the air around us, “Where’s Conrail? What kind of poison is it? What’s happening to our men?”

Barely two miles south of the spill, as our eyes and throats began to tingle, we learned that young Doc Salzberg had rolled up his sleeves and was helping to evacuate the hospital. There were too few ambulances for speed or efficiency.

The baby in my belly kicked as my own fear rose. At some point, I remembered to feed his brother and sisters and thanked the fates we weren’t amongst the families being forced from their homes.
That was the night we learned there were serious holes in our county-wide disaster response.

Within weeks of the incident, local leaders, representatives of ConRail and our Congressional representatives gathered at the Cochecton Firehouse and began to rectify the situation. It was an admirable and worthy effort on the part of a small county with minimal resources and to this day, I couldn’t be more grateful for the care our leaders showed.

Fast forward to 2010 and Sullivan County is asking residents to help update its All-Hazard Mitigation Plan by completing and returning its Hazard Mitigation Questionnaire by March 31, 2010. According to Sullivan County’s Division of Planning and Environmental Management, “[The questionnaire] can be mailed, faxed or emailed to Michael Brother at Barton and Loguidice, the consulting firm that is conducting the plan update. His contact information is listed on the first page of the questionnaire.”

Although the questionnaire does not address gas drilling or hydraulic fracturing specifically, comments concerning the gas extraction industry and its potential for disastrous accidents can be appended at the last page of the questionnaire.

In December 2009, the Cornell Law School Water Law Clinic submitted its comments on the Draft Supplemental Generic Impact Statement (dSGEIS) issued by New York State’s Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC). The report stated, “...[DEC's] current staffing incapacties must be remedied….To demonstrate the critical need for additional field staff, principal tasks specifically identified in the Chapter 7 of the dSGEIS are summarized in the 15-page Memorandum…”

In turn, the Memorandum states unequivocally, “…. The scope and extent of these tasks are clearly beyond the capacity of the DEC.” (Cornell comments dsgeis) (Cornell Law School WLC Memo)

During Mayor Calvin Tillman’s recent tour of upstate New York and Pennsylvania, the DISH, Texas official was asked, “If a well catches fire in Texas, do local firefighters get called in?”

“No,” he answered. “We go to the scene but even emergency responders aren’t allowed on a site. Even if they were, most don’t have special training. If a relief valve goes off, our emergency responders show up and just wait for the guy to turn it off. We can’t get access.”

According to the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) 2000 report on compliance in the Oil and Gas Extraction Industries, “Oil and gas extraction facilities are inspected much less frequently (46 months between inspections on average) than facilities in most other industries… and the enforcement to inspection ratio (0.05) is among the lowest of the included industries.” (Page 121: Environmental Protection Agency’s Compliance Assistance Notebooks: Oil and Gas Extraction Industry) In a chart on page 120 of the report, the “enforcement to Inspection Rate” in Region 2 (including New York State) was 0.17% while Region 3’s rate (including Pennsylvania) was .04%. (More recent data was unavailable at the site.)

So, if oversight and enforcement of the gas drilling industry “is beyond the capacity of the DEC,” and the enforcement ratio was already abysmal during Clinton’s “boom times” in the 1990s, what disaster mitigation can we expect now in cash-strapped Sullivan County relative to gas drilling and hydraulic fracturing?

Here are a few clues:

if residents see a possible gas drilling spill or other emergency, we’re encouraged to call the EPA’s newly-established TIPLINE (877-919-4EPA) or email the Agency at eyesondrilling@epa.gov
of the 30-plus gas extraction States in the US, only Pennslvania and New York have no severance tax on the industry. States that have the tax use its revenue for, among other things, community services and infrastructure;
under emergency conditions, the FRAC Act (S1215 – 5 sponsors, HR2766 – 51 sponsors) would require gas extractors to reveal the fracturing toxins used at a particular site. Unfortunately, it’s nowhere near passage and consequently, there is no reason to believe emergency personnel would know the nature of the chemical soup confronting them.

Nonetheless, as Sullivan County’s Manager, David Fanslau says, “Federal law requires that the municipalities of Sullivan County develop and implement local hazard mitigation plans in order to obtain future FEMA grant monies for hazard mitigation. These plans must be updated every five years. Upon final approval from FEMA, Sullivan County and each participating municipality must formally adopt and approve the plan.”

In light of FEMA’s requirements and the potential harm from drilling activities, Breathing suggests the following:

Download a copy of Sullivan County’s current Disaster Mitigation Plan and complete the Hazard Mitigation Questionnaire. It isn’t complicated and won’t take long! (Be sure to append your concerns about gas drilling on its final comment page);

Download and read a copy of “A Gas Drilling Research Task Force Report for Sullivan County.” (Its emergency mitigation recommendations are excerpted below this article);**

Let the Sullivan County Legislature know whether those mitigation recommendations satisfy your concerns in the event of a gas drilling accident in our county;

Encourage the Sullivan County Legislature to hold public meetings where residents can hear from, and ask questions of, our Commissioners of Public Health, Public Works, Planning and the County’s emergency responders;
Ask your Town, Village and County representatives if they were present in Narrowsburg on February 19, 2010 when Mayor Tillman met with local officials to discuss his and his residents’ experiences with the gas industry in DISH, Texas;

Ask your County Legislator to propose and/or support a Resolution demanding that New York State maintain a moratorium on gas drilling until cumulative impact studies have been conducted on the industry and drilling; until Congress completes its investigation of the industry’s practices; until residents can be assured of adequate oversight and enforcement of the industry; until New York State has a severance tax which can be used to train emergency personnel and maintain our infrastructure; and until the FRAC Act has been passed and communities have full-knowledge of the toxins we’ll confront in an emergency.

Some County Legislators can be be contacted here and if you’re not sure which District is yours, look on this Legislative District map.

Individual Town websites will have contact information for your Supervisor and Town Board.
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**Sullivan County’s Gas Drilling Task Force Report. Its Emergency Mitigation portion is excerpted here:

“Along with impacts to local road infrastructure, emergency management issues are another concern at the local level. Interviews with Emergency
Management counterparts in other parts of New York State indicate that gas drilling companies have been very good to allow the emergency services (police, fire and EMS) to attend training sessions which explain how and where a drilling operation will be set up to include a site visit and hands on question sessions. In summary, our investigation has shown that most natural gas production wells are located in the Western part of the state and the Emergency Service agencies in those counties have reported no fire or health hazardous to be associated in there areas for the past twenty plus years. A few safeguard measures and protocols must be instituted:

We must be provided with a list of operational telephone numbers and email addresses of management contacts and especially emergency contacts that can be called in the event of an incident near or at a drill site.

Each well site will need a 911 address and access information (gate and lock locations plus access) to ensure that emergency response units can access the site. As will be discussed in the section to follow, the driveway permit process at the town level can be integrated with 911 addressing provided by the Sullivan County Division of Planning. As will be discussed in the next section, the driveway permit forms will need to be revised to require a site plan showing the drilling site and driveway access, as well as photos of the site before construction, after a well is installed and after any subsequent change (e.g., when a well is capped or abandoned) requiring a change in or addition to the NYS DEC permit).

Interface with NY Alert to inform Sullivan County residents of a chemical spill or gas fire.

Communicate with the public about the importance of registering on-line with NY-Alert to secure receipt of notifications of emergencies.
Transportation of waste water/or fracing fluid should be reviewed with emergency response agencies by each operator of a drill site.
Emergency management personnel should have access to, or know, the contents of the fracing fluids, to know how to treat injuries and protect the health of emergency personnel and medical staff.

For the purposes of health treatment by EMS units and hospital ER’s, the exact contents of the fluid should be on record so that proper treatment is made available.

Municipal emergency management staffs need to interact with DEC Region 3 Office and the Mineral Division of the DEC to understand the use of blow out preventers during drilling operations to understand how to control unexpected flows of gas which could result in fires. Along with the DEC, municipal emergency management staff should witness a blow out preventer test prior to drilling.

Local emergency management personnel should understand the gas flaring procedure and the layout of flow lines. As for pipeline transport of product through the existing natural gas line or new lines as built, we already have emergency reporting information and training as to how to response to a natural gas line break. This information is updated yearly by the Columbia Gas Transmission Company with their contractor for safety:Paradigm Liaison Services, Wichita, KS.
***************

*Here’s a NY Times reference to what we subsequently learned was an acetaldehyde spill behind the Callicoon Hospital in 1987:
DERAILMENT IN UPSTATE NEW YORK CALLICOON, N.Y., Jan. 4 (AP) -Twenty-seven cars of a Conrail freight train derailed in a wooded area near the Delaware River this evening, discharging a hazardous chemical from one car and forcing the evacuation of several homes and a small hospital, state police officials said.
****************

Resources you might find helpful as you fill out the County’s Hazard Mitigation Questionnaire:

Environmental Protection Agency’s Emergency Planning and Community-Right-To-Know Act

Environmental Protection Agency’s Compliance Assistance Notebooks: Oil and Gas Extraction Industry


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DEC rules ensure adequate protection for the state's air, land and water.
by Independent Oil and Gas Association of New York ALBANY, NY (03/03/2010)(readMedia)-- Proponents of natural gas exploration petitioned the governor, lawmakers and regulatory agencies and lawmakers to allow drilling to be expanded in New York's Southern Tier and Western Catskills.
More than 4,300 people have so far signed an online petition already, which reminds elected officials and regulators that harvesting clean-burning natural gas in New York will heat our homes, spur our economy, reduce our dependence on foreign oil for decades to come and bring thousands of job and billions of dollars to New York.
The petition, sponsored by the Independent Oil & Gas Association of New York, will remain open to those interested in urging decision-makers to form objective and scientific opinions on whether expanded natural gas exploration is right for New York. It is available at www.marcellusfacts.com.
"We are very pleased that many so right-minded New Yorkers have spoken up." said Brad Gill, IOGA of NY executive director. "New York's leaders have to focus on this tremendous opportunity for our communities and our state, instead being distracted by bad science and misinformation being spread by obstructionists who don't actually understand our work and history of environmental stewardship."
The petition follows a Jan. 25 outdoor rally in Albany, where 700 landowners and supporters raised their voices in support of natural gas extraction through a process known as hydraulic fracturing – or "fracking." The delegation represented 23 landowner groups and 17,500 families.
The fracking process will help release natural gas locked in the Marcellus Shale formation by injecting pressurized water, sand chemicals and other ingredients to shatter the rock. It occurs deep underground and far from groundwater and surface water, and it has been performed safely in New York and nationwide for decades.
IOGA-NY was founded in 1980 to protect, foster and advance the common interests of oil and gas producers, as well as professionals and related industries in the State of New York.
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Dave ColavitoFreelance writer
Posted: March 2, 2010 10:31 AM Governor Paterson's Parting Shot
Fracking , Marcellus Shale , Natural Gas Drilling , New York , Sullivan County , New York News

There's no question New York State faces unprecedented budgetary challenges, so it's understandable that policy makers would be searching far and wide for potential revenue generators. However recent developments should cause all state residents to ask, "at what cost"? For Sullivan County, that cost is too high.

State Senator John Bonacic and Town of Thompson Supervisor Tony Cellini deserve credit for standing on the side of fiscal prudence. They recognize that pumping $6 million into infrastructure upgrades associated with renovating the Concord Hotel at this time is a waste of taxpayer dollars.
They recognize what's widely acknowledged; the Concord project is on life-support, and that's being generous, considering it's been a year since any pulse has been detectable there.

The Governor's decision to release this money is beyond difficult to understand because Sullivan County is in the midst of its own unprecedented fiscal crisis: a new jail estimated at $80 million, $36 million for landfill monitoring and maintenance over the next 30 years, and, by my math, an estimated $42 million in landfill debt service through 2022 - all this in addition to whatever reductions will be mandated from Albany.

We could have used that money to address these real issues facing our communities. But the Governor decided to fund a project that arguably may never see the light of day. Taken by itself it's indicative of the same run-away spending he has cited as the cornerstone for New York's economic woes, and exemplifies the dysfunction and double-speak that so many have sadly come to expect from Albany.

But you can't take this by itself, because it's not alone.
Governor Paterson is also pushing, hard, for natural gas extraction from Sullivan County and surrounding areas proximate to the New York City watershed. This, in spite of serious concerns expressed by agency professionals and the public that the risks have yet to be adequately addressed. The party line has been drilling is safe and will be tightly regulated. But regardless of where you stand on this issue, the Governor's 34% proposed reduction in Department of Environmental Conservation's funding contained in his submitted budget is cause for more than just concern.

We do not yet know how much of this proposed reduction will make its way into DEC's Division of Minerals Resources, the division responsible for ensuring compliance with State regulations. We do not yet know how many gas wells will ultimately get drilled in the Marcellus Shale formation. What we do know is that while the folks at Minerals may be fine folks, they are still just folks, not endowed with superhuman attributes. Our State's 14,000 active wells and 2,500 active mines already place responsibilities for over 1,000 mineral sites per Division inspector. With deep budget cuts likely and a significant increase in responsibilities, you don't need to be a genius to understand how that math will go.

Governor Paterson has decided not to run for office in November. I am asking that he take into consideration, in a credible way, the needs of area residents who don't have the luxury of running anywhere. Sullivan County residents will be living here long after he leaves office.

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From pressconnects.com of Binghamton, NY
DEC standards high
February 28, 2010, 12:00 am
The controversy about drilling in the Marcellus Shale reserves hit the state legislature in Albany big time on Jan. 25. One TV station estimated 700-plus people came to demonstrate their support for this new gas industry in a rally that took place in the pouring rain.
Given the scaremongering of the environmental extremists who have weighed in on this issue, the most important disclosure at this rally was the fact that more than 10,000 wells have been drilled in New York over the last two decades under present regulations with only one minor incident involving methane seepage which was corrected within three days.

This safety record is a testament to the professionalism of the DEC and the high standards already incorporated into state law with respect to natural gas exploration and production.

Noel van Swol: President
Sullivan-Delaware Property Owners Association


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Marcellus Already Drilled Plenty In New York State; Not A Threat To Water Supply March 1st, 2010 by ndarbonne |
“…The major amount of the Marcellus play will not be underneath the New York City water supply anyway….”
There has been plenty of drilling through the Marcellus shale in New York—enough to estimate the potential for recoverable gas reserves from the rock—says Dr. Terry Engelder, professor of geosciences at Pennsylvania State University, and Ralph Williams, principal and founder of well analysis and petroleum engineering firm Reservoir Visualization Inc.

If the Marcellus has been penetrated a great deal already why would penetrating it now create any new threat to water supply there? “You are asking a question that really verges on the political rather than the scientific,” Engelder says in the webinar “Marcellus G&G—The View From The Subsurface” presented by OilandGasInvestor.com and UGcenter.com and now available for viewing on demand.

“As far as I can tell, the major hold-up (in drilling the Marcellus) in New York state involves the fact that some of the Marcellus occurs underneath the Catskill Mountains water supply to New York City. Gas production there is always the concern the environmentalists have. Until the (gas-drilling) operators (and I) can convince the public that the fear over hydraulic fracturing and its ability to pollute ground water—until that is abated, until the public becomes convinced and has confidence in the facts we have—then the politicians will remain uneasy.

“It is a PR job that needs to be done and I am confident that, eventually, the politicians will come to understand that, first of all, the major amount of the Marcellus play will not be underneath the New York City water supply anyway and, secondly, subsurface activity at the depth the Marcellus is found is not in any way going to endanger the near-surface water supplies.”
In the past 29 months, Engelder has discussed the Marcellus’ potential in 129 forums before more than 7,000 industry and non-industry members. He estimates that 117 Appalachian Basin counties could become economic for Marcellus pay, and he estimates the ultimate recovery (EUR) after 50 years of production decline at 867 trillion cubic feet (Tcf) of gas on a P10 basis and 220 Tcf on a P90 basis.

The economic production he forecasts would come from 17 New York counties, 42 in Pennsylvania, 18 in Ohio, 39 in West Virginia and one in Maryland. His estimate is based on assumption of a power-law rate-decline model in which 70% of the sections produce and spacing is 80 acres.
Engelder says a great deal about the Marcellus in New York is known from penetrations of it in developing the Oriskany sandstone gas-storage fields. “I remind you that the Oriskany is below the Marcellus so, as a consequence of that type of drilling activity, we know about a lot of the details. Some of the real cross-sections show the Marcellus.”

Some areas especially pop. “It is very clear that, in areas such as Broome County…Tioga County and Chemung County, I think that’s an area where I think the Marcellus will work very well, providing that the state legislature lets the operators do their thing there, which has so far been a problem.”
Williams’ firm has data on more than 3 million U.S. oil and gas wells, including 30,000 wells that have penetrated the Marcellus. He says Marcellus well data is especially transparent in New York. “We have a lot more control in New York. First, the Marcellus is a lot shallower and actually goes to outcrop (there). Now how far the black shales and hot (high API gamma ray) shales do continue to outcrop where they transition from gas-bearing to water-bearing will be determined as drilling progresses up into New York, but you definitely have all of the Marcellus intervals active in New York and should be productive.”

Could any of New York’s Marcellus gas be drained via wells in Pennsylvania? “Absolutely none,” says Engelder. Williams adds, “I concur with Terry on that question. If you look at other shale plays, they’re down-spaced to 160s- and 80-acre spacing to drain these reservoirs, so it’s going to take a lot of drainage points and they don’t drain large distances.”
Engelder concludes, “The Marcellus represents one of the world’s greatest opportunities for gas-shale production, and America itself is set up to capitalize on this with other (shale) plays…One of the challenges for the operators…is to further engage the politicians to help them come to the understanding of the magnificence of this particularly resource and the opportunity it offers in American industry to expand and…to slow down the flow of cash out of America. To bring in (foreign) petroleum, it seems to me to be so unnecessary given the size of the resource America has in the form of natural gas.”

Williams, who presented in the webinar while in the field in Pennsylvania, says of the Appalachian Basin, “This is an amazing basin. It is one of the venerable basins and, as we talk to the people and the operators here, it’s been a long time coming for the Appalachian Basin to be in the spotlight for the U.S. and there is a lot of hydrocarbon in the Marcellus and the many other zones in all of the basins in the country and we look forward to developing that.”

For more details on Appalachia’s Marcellus play, including state-by-state and county-by-county estimates for economic production potential, click to the webinar “Marcellus G&G—The View From The Subsurface” now available for viewing on demand.

The webinar includes transcript and slides from the DUG-East conference panel “Meet the Marcellus: Geology, Geophysics, and Potential,” including remarks by Dr. John (Jack) A. Ward, executive vice president, E&P, for PetroEdge Energy LLC, on “Marcellus Shale Porosity Distribution Based on Regional Mapping;” Williams on “The Detailed Stratigraphic Framework of the Marcellus Shale;” James Coleman, U.S. Geological Survey, Eastern Energy Resources Team, on “Examination of Potential Factors Affecting Successful Exploration and Production;” and Doug Pferdehirt, president, reservoir-production group, for Schlumberger, on “Completions in the Marcellus Laterals.”

Nissa Darbonne (ndarbonne@hartenergy.com), E-Editor, Hart Energy Publishing; Oil and Gas Investor, A&D Watch, Oil and Gas Investor This Week, OilandGasInvestor.com Today, OilandGasInvestor.com, A-Dcenter.com, UGcenter.com, UGcenter.com Today, EPmag.com, E&P Buzz, PipeLineandGasTechnology.com, PGT News, HartFUEL.com, FUEL.

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Cracking Down on Fracking

Mike Markham of Colorado has an explosive problem: His tap water catches fire. Markham demonstrates this in a new documentary, “Gasland,” which just won the Sundance Film Festival Special Jury Prize. Director Josh Fox films Markham as he runs his kitchen faucet, holding a cigarette lighter up to the running water. After a few seconds, a ball of fire erupts out of the sink, almost enveloping Markham’s head.

Mike Markham of Colorado has an explosive problem: His tap water catches fire. Markham demonstrates this in a new documentary, “Gasland,” which just won the Sundance Film Festival Special Jury Prize. Director Josh Fox films Markham as he runs his kitchen faucet, holding a cigarette lighter up to the running water. After a few seconds, a ball of fire erupts out of the sink, almost enveloping Markham’s head.
The source of the flammable water, and the subject of “Gasland,” is the mining process called hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking.”
Fracking is used to access natural gas and oil reserves buried thousands of feet below the ground. Companies like Halliburton drill down vertically, then send the shaft horizontally, crossing many small, trapped veins of gas and oil. Explosive charges are then set off at various points in the drill shaft, causing what Fox calls “mini-earthquakes.” These fractures spread underground, allowing the gas to flow back into the shaft to be extracted. To force open the fractures, millions of gallons of liquid are forced into the shaft at very high pressure.

The high-pressure liquids are a combination of water, sand and a secret mix of chemicals. Each well requires between 1 million and 7 million gallons of the fluid every time gas is extracted. Drillers do not have to reveal the chemical cocktail, thanks to a slew of exemptions given to the industry, most notably in the 2005 Energy Policy Act, which actually granted the fracking industry a specific exemption from the Safe Drinking Water Act. California Congressman Henry Waxman, chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, has just announced an investigation into the composition of the proprietary chemicals used in fracking. In a Feb. 18 letter, Waxman commented on the Safe Drinking Water Act exemption: “Many dubbed this provision the ‘Halliburton loophole’ because of Halliburton’s ties to then-Vice President Cheney and its role as one of the largest providers of hydraulic fracturing services.” Before he was vice president, Dick Cheney was the CEO of Halliburton.

In an earlier investigation, Waxman learned that Halliburton had violated a 2003 nonbinding agreement with the government in which the company promised not to use diesel fuel in the mix when extracting from certain wells. Halliburton pumped hundreds of thousands of gallons of toxic, diesel-containing liquids into the ground, potentially contaminating drinking water.
According to the Department of Energy, there were more than 418,000 gas wells in the U.S. as of 2006. Since the Environmental Protection Agency lacks authority to investigate and regulate fracking, the extent of the pollution is unknown. Yet, as Josh Fox traveled the country, becoming increasingly engrossed in the vastness of the domestic drilling industry and the problems it creates, he documented how people living near gas wells are suffering water contamination, air pollution and numerous health problems that crop up after fracking. It’s personal for Fox: He lives in Pennsylvania, on a stream that feeds into the Delaware River, atop the “Marcellus Shale,” a subterranean region from New York to Tennessee with extensive natural gas reserves. Fracking in the Marcellus Shale could potentially contaminate the water supplies of both New York City and Philadelphia. Fox was offered almost $100,000 for the gas rights to his 19 acres, which led him to investigate the industry, and ultimately to produce his award-winning documentary.

There is virtually no federal oversight of fracking, leaving the budget-strapped states to do the job with a patchwork of disparate regulations. They are no match for the major, multinational drilling and energy companies that are exploiting the political goal of “energy independence.” The nonprofit news website ProPublica.org found that, out of 31 states examined, 21 have no regulations specific to hydraulic fracturing, and none requires the companies to report the amount of the toxic fluid remaining underground.
Reports indicate that almost 600 different chemicals are used in fracking, including diesel fuel and the “BTEX” chemicals: benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene and xylenes, which include known carcinogens.

Dr. Theo Colborn, zoologist and expert on chemical pollution from fracking, appears in “Gasland,” saying, “Every environmental law we wrote to protect public health is ignored. ... We can’t monitor until we know what they’re using.”

Fox ends “Gasland” with an excerpt of a congressional hearing. Rep. Diana DeGette, D-Colo., and Rep. Maurice Hinchey, D-N.Y., aggressively question gas industry executives about water contamination. The two have submitted a bill, the proposed FRAC Act, which would remove the “Halliburton loophole,” forcing drillers to reveal the chemical components used in fracking. It’s time to close the door on the Cheney energy policy and take immediate steps to protect clean water.

Denis Moynihan contributed research to this column.
Amy Goodman is the host of “Democracy Now!,” a daily international TV/radio news hour airing on more than 800 stations in North America. She is the author of “Breaking the Sound Barrier,” recently released in paperback and now a New York Times best-seller.
© 2010 Amy Goodman
Distributed by King Features Syndicate
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From: New Tang Dynasty Television-February 20, 2010
To Drill or Not to Drill: A Dilemma for New York State
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Published by the Times-Herald Record 02-21-2010
Texan warns Sullivan about gas drilling--Read Article Here
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Thursday, February 18, 2010
If New York Doesn't Drill for Gas, Let Them Buy West Virginia's
New York has been reluctant to allow horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing in the Marcellus Shale, because of concerns about contamination of underground water supplies. I think those fears are completely unwarranted, but they are driving significant opposition.
Here's an open letter to the citizens of New York from Jerry Simmons, leader of a royalty owners group based in Tulsa. He explains why the drilling is not a danger, and the economic benefit that is posed by the drilling. Frankly, I hope he fails to change any minds in New York, for the reasons he gives at the end of his letter. I'd just as soon see that money being paid to West Virginia royalty owners. New York will keep burning gas, wherever it comes from.
Times-Herald Record 02-18-2010
Bonacic, NYC in face-off over gas-drilling banSenator says city should buy landowners' drilling rights
By Steve Israel
Times Herald-Record
Posted: February 18, 2010 - 2:00 AM
If New York City wants to ban gas drilling in its vast watershed — and it does — it should pay those who want to lease their land to gas companies, says state Sen. John Bonacic, R-C-Mount Hope.

For months, the city and environmental groups have called for a ban on natural gas drilling in the watershed, a small portion of which sits in Sullivan County.
Drilling there would pollute the city's unfiltered drinking water, New York City politicians such as
Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the city's Department of Environmental Protection say.
Gas drilling talk on SaturdayMayor Calvin Tillman of DISH, Texas will speak about the negative affects of gas drilling on his town at a public health and gas drilling panel discussion 4 p.m., Saturday, at the Delaware Youth Center, Callicoon.
But the state has resisted the calls for a ban in its proposal for new regulations in the gas-rich Marcellus shale. Since 70 percent of the land in the watershed is privately owned, a ban would be illegal, state Department of Environmental Conservation Commissioner Pete Grannis has said.

Now, Bonacic, who says drilling is safe, is calling the bluff of the city — and environmental groups, who hope a watershed ban would mean a drilling ban throughout the state.
"Let them buy the development rights," he says. "For those landowners who want to sell their gas rights, let the city pay the same market rate to keep the land undeveloped. We buy agricultural development rights for tracts of land we want to preserve. Let those who oppose the lawful exploration and extraction of gas in the Catskills (do the same)."
While the city's DEP points out that it has already invested $541 million to buy watershed land, it did not directly address Bonacic's proposal, except to reiterate the "unacceptable threats" of drilling to drinking water.

"We look forward to continuing a dialogue with elected officials and all stakeholders to protect the watershed during this process," said a statement by Environmental Protection Commissioner Cas Holloway.

But Bonacic, born and raised in Manhattan, says the call for a ban on watershed drilling is one more example of the city's insensitivity to the rights of upstaters.
"If New York City can stop development of energy sources in the Catskills," he said, "they can diminish the value of people's land without compensation."

sisrael@th-record.com


ADDED: 2-17-2010
New York State Senator Thomas K. Duane (D, WF) 29th Senate District
DRILL WATCH LINK HERE

SULLIVAN COUNTY PARTNERSHIP PRESENTS:
A Regional Effort to Identify Opportunities to Improve SEQRA
Thursday, March 11th - 4 PM
Bernie’s Holiday Restaurant – Rock Hill
RSVP to cori@scpartnership.com by March 4th
An initiative-- (Regarding Natural Gas Drilling in Sullivan County, NY ) paneled by Pattern for Progress, the DEC and Scenic Hudson has resulted in draft recommendations regarding potential improvement to the implementation of SEQRA in the Hudson Valley and Catskills.
Comments are due by March 17th. This roundtable meeting will allow developers, lawyers, engineers and other stakeholders to share experiences, air thoughts and contribute ideas that can be distilled into comments which will be sent to the panel for review
before suggestions are forwarded to the DEC Commissioner.
Confirmed Speakers:
Jonathan Drapkin, President of Pattern for Progress
Willy Janeway, Regional Director of Region 3 DEC



From the River Reporter Newspaper: VOLUME XXXVI No. 05 Narrowsburg, NY February 4, 2010
The incident at Robson well

We probably all agree that if gas drilling is to be done in the Upper Delaware, a precious watershed that provides fresh water to 25 million people, it needs to be done in a prudent manner, with good oversight and rapid remediation of any problems. And with that as our goal, the recent train of events at the Robson well site in Wayne County, PA are extremely troubling. The timeline of events at the Robson well suggests that the regulatory system in Pennsylvania, as it currently stands, has some dangerous gaps that must be repaired if this region is to have a reasonable hope of preserving the quality of its soil, water and air.
Gap number one is the fact that the company in question, Chesapeake Energy, LLC, did not apparently notice or report the damaged vegetation which provided the clue that contamination may have occurred. This is one type of gap we can’t ever expect to be completely closed. While there is a growing movement of some energy company stockholders to make sure that corporations act in an environmentally responsible manner, for-profit corporations are fundamentally designed to get certain jobs done and maximize profits for their shareholders; we cannot assume that they will always monitor the consequences assiduously, as was borne out only too clearly in the case of the Millennium Pipeline in Sullivan County.
It is precisely because this first type of gap can occur that regulatory agencies are necessary. But here’s where the second gap occurred: the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) did not detect the potential problem either. Their first notification came in the form of an email from Tom Kane of The River Reporter. We, in turn, only knew about the danger signals at Robson because a citizens’ group, Damascus Citizens for Sustainability (DCS), took the extraordinary step of chartering an airplane to fly above the site and take photographs. This type of chain of circumstances is scarcely one that can be relied upon to be repeated in future instances. (Though it is worth noting that the Environmental Protection Agency has recently established a hotline to encourage citizen vigilance and provide a place to report problems with natural gas drilling. See page 4.)
In order to be sure to detect similar incidents, the DEP would have to have plenty of boots on the ground. But currently there is only one oil-and-gas inspector and one water-quality inspector assigned to the office overseeing the Wayne County area. Some improvement can be expected: Governor Ed Rendell has just announced that there will be funding for a substantial state-wide increase in DEP personnel. It remains to be seen, however, if the increase in inspection personnel in particular will be substantial enough to keep an adequate eye on the thousands of new wells for which applications have been filed.
Another step that might help close the gap in detecting problems would be a strict protocol for inspecting wells at the time of closure. The agency told us that it does eventually inspect completed well sites, though it also said that “there is no requirement to do so.” But the Robson case tells us that such inspections are not necessarily conducted expeditiously, which means that any problems that do occur will have time to fester, migrate or, as in the instance of air contamination, become untraceable. We also think that if the DEP does not currently have to conduct such inspections, then there should be a new law or rulemaking that makes it mandatory.
The final gap in the regulatory system revealed by the Robson well incident is in transparency. After being notified of the potential problem, the DEP did nothing to communicate either with the DCS or with the general public, via the press, about the results of its inquiry. It was only in response to a specific request of ours that we obtained the updates published in our story “Contaminant confirmed at Robson site” (see December 24, 2009 issue).
Especially in the early days of gas drilling in our area, it is crucial for regulatory agencies to be completely and proactively open with regard to any pollution problems that occur. It is only in the light of such full disclosure that the best mechanisms can be developed going forward for monitoring, preventing and, where prevention fails, remediating pollution at drilling sites.
The Robson well was only the second natural gas well drilled in our area. Statistically, that’s far from enough to conclude that we can expect a 50 percent failure rate in handling toxic-spill incidents. But it is more than enough for us to urge regulatory agencies to study and learn from the failures that occurred, and to do whatever it takes to see that the Robson mistakes are not repeated with the thousands of new wells expected to come on line.


Pa. tightens gas-drilling regulationsMore inspectors, new rules aim to boost public's safety
By MARC LEVY
The Associated Press
Posted: January 31, 2010 - 2:00 AM FROM THE TIMES HERALD RECORD
HARRISBURG, Pa. — Pennsylvania is taking new steps to ensure public safety amid a rush to drill into what geologists believe could become the nation's largest natural gas field, Gov. Ed Rendell said Thursday.
The state plans to hire more inspectors to monitor a growing number of well sites and is writing tougher rules to prevent gas from leaking into nearby homes and water wells, Rendell said.
He called them "decisive, progressive protections for the people of Pennsylvania."
Among other things, 68 new well inspectors would be hired to join the more than 100 already on staff. The proposed new rules would also lower maximum well pressures, raise standards for well cement and pipes, and require drilling companies to restore water supplies they pollute.
More inspectors neededOne of the concerns of environmentalists in New York, which is proposing new regulations for drilling, is that the state doesn't have enough staff to inspect future wells.
The rules were available on the Web site of the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, which is accepting public comments on them for 30 days before it plans to submit them to a rule-making board.
An industry group, the Marcellus Shale Coalition, said in a statement that it supports the state's moves, as did several environmental groups that say drilling could put the environment and public health at risk without more protection.
However, Erika Staaf of PennEnvironment pointed out that the proposed rules were drafted without the public's input.
Myron Arnowitt, director of Clean Water Action's Pennsylvania chapter, said more staff is also needed for the department's other bureaus, such as its water-quality division.
"One of our concerns is that a lot of the impact from the drilling is found in our rivers and streams and our drinking water," Arnowitt said.
Gas rush is onIn the past three years, dozens of gas companies have flocked to Pennsylvania in hopes of tapping into the huge Marcellus shale gas formation that lies beneath much of the state.
All told, the department has issued more than 2,500 drilling permits since the beginning of 2005, when the current wave of activity on the gas field began. Thousands more could be issued this year.
Meanwhile, the industry has drilled or is drilling more than 1,000 wells. Department staff conducted fewer than 15,000 inspections last year on the more than 120,000 active oil and gas wells in Pennsylvania. Environmental concerns Exploration of the Marcellus shale formation to date has not been without what critics call environmental consequences.
In early January, the department fined Atlas Energy Inc. $85,000 for alleged violations at 13 well sites in southwestern Pennsylvania from late 2008 through July 2009.
Atlas did not take all precautions to prevent runoff, and it spilled diesel fuel and other industrial fluids onto the ground, the department said. In addition, the department determined last year that 13 residential drinking-water wells in northeastern Pennsylvania were polluted by Cabot Oil & Gas Corp.'s nearby drilling.
Cabot agreed to pay a $120,000 fine.
Times Herald-Record staff writer Steve Israel contributed to this report.

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FROM: THE SULLIVAN COUNTY DEMOCRAT 1-26-2010
Reaction to NYC's stance on gas drilling Part 2 of 2
By Dan Hust
SULLIVAN COUNTY — December’s unveiling of a report on gas drilling by the New York City Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) struck local advocates and officials differently.
As specified in the December 29 Democrat, the report indicated deep concerns over drilling’s potential environmental impact to New York City’s upstate watershed, which includes the Town of Neversink and tiny portions of the towns of Fallsburg and Liberty.
As a result, the city is pushing for a ban on gas drilling in the entire West-of-Hudson watershed spanning much of the Catskills – even though the majority of property within that watershed is privately owned.
The NYS Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) has now closed its public comment period and is expected to finalize new drilling rules in mid-2010.
Meanwhile, we solicited comments from several locals about the report and the DEP’s stance. All but the following were included in this past Friday’s edition:
Ramsay Adams and Wes Gillingham are the executive director and program director, respectively, of Catskill Mountainkeeper, a Youngsville-based environmental advocacy group.
“As previously reported in this paper, the New York City Department of Environmental Protection has categorically stated that drilling in the New York City drinking water supply area must not be allowed,” said Adams.
“They base this conclusion on the findings of two independent expert consulting groups commissioned by the city to study the potential of gas drilling in the New York City watershed. The experts’ opinions are that ‘high-volume hydrofracking and horizontal drilling pose unacceptable threats to the unfiltered fresh water supply of nine million New Yorkers.’
“We don’t blame New York City for wanting to protect their water supply, and we support the work they have done to help determine the risks. But the big ‘a-hah’ moment here is that all of Sullivan County and all of New York State are exposed to the same risks, and no drilling should take place anywhere in the state until it can be proven safe.
“The science cited by the DEP is corroborated by geologists, biologists and hydrogeologists hired by Catskill Mountainkeeper” and others, Adams added.
“Our experts say that the potential for long-term contaminant transport to the near-surface aquifers is real. They unequivocally state that injecting fluids into the shale will definitely cause conditions that make transport of contaminants from the shale to surface aquifers possible. This is a total contradiction of what the DEC and the gas industry have been telling us for the last 2 years.
“But the largest red flag yet for the proposed gas drilling in New York State comes from PEF/Encon, the union that represents the roughly 2,000 DEC staff. Today they called on the DEC to slow down and hold off on permitting for gas wells until there’s more information and the holes in the dSGEIS are filled.”
According to Catskill Mountainkeeper’s Program Director Wes Gillingham, “What is wrong for New York City is also wrong for Sullivan County.… While recent discussions have been focused on the science, it is very important not to forget what the impact of drilling will be on the communities here in Sullivan County.
“With the responsibility falling on to local governments for road maintenance resulting from drastic increase of heavy vehicles, for hospitals that will have to cope with accidents, for fire and emergency response personnel, etc., our local infrastructures will be incredibly stretched and very likely broken.”
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FROM: THE SULLIVAN COUNTY DEMOCRAT 12-31-2009
City’s concerns with drilling extend to entire county
By Dan Hust
NEW YORK CITY — According to the New York City Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), gas drilling in the New York City drinking water supply area must not be allowed.
“Based on the latest science and available technology, as well as the data and limited analysis presented by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC), high-volume hydrofracking and horizontal drilling pose unacceptable threats to the unfiltered fresh water supply of nine million New Yorkers,” said Acting DEP Commissioner Steven W. Lawitts last week.
“New York City has invested $1.5 billion to protect the watershed and prevent degradation of the water supply, and to maintain its Filtration Avoidance Determination (FAD),” he continued. “The known and unknown impacts associated with drilling simply cannot be justified.”
The DEP has also demanded the DEC redo its draft Supplemental Generic Environmental Impact Statement (dSGEIS), for which public comments are being accepted through this Thursday.
The dSGEIS, when finalized next year, is intended to add to the existing GEIS regulating drilling statewide, addressing new technologies including fracking and horizontal drilling.
Most drilling companies interested in New York – especially in Sullivan County, where potential yields from the gas-rich Marcellus Shale are estimated to be high – have been waiting for the DEC to finish the SGEIS and define the new regulatory landscape.
However, DEP considers the dSGEIS flawed and incomplete, not taking into enough account cumulative impacts nor specific impacts to the city.
DEP officials are basing their concerns on a study they commissioned via two consulting groups. For the past year, the consultants have researched available data on drilling in areas across the U.S., including the recent surge in activity in Pennsylvania.
They’ve concluded that even the presence of one gas well in the city’s 1,585-square-mile West-of-Hudson watershed could endanger one or more of the six reservoirs and associated tunnels.
Concerns noted in the 90-page report swirl around contamination of the water supply, not just by polluted surface water and spills but by underground migration via aquifers and, more significantly to the city, infiltration of chemicals used in the fracking process via fault lines in the rock – some of which apparently intersect the various water tunnels crossing the Catskills.
“Tunnels were designed to keep water in, not to withstand external pressures,” noted DEP Deputy Commissioner Paul Rush in his recent comments to the city’s Water Board.
The city is also worried about what it fears will be a mass “industrialization” of the watershed area, with estimates of potential wells topping 6,000, leading to as much as 7 million truck trips over the next two decades. Consultants based these estimates on activity in the Barnett,
Haynesville and Fayetteville shale plays in the U.S.
For those worried about gas drilling’s environmental costs, the report is significant because it identifies potential impacts that would obviously not be limited to the city’s watershed. (Only the Town of Neversink and tiny slivers of the towns of Liberty and Fallsburg are included in that watershed in Sullivan County.)
For now, however, county officials are waiting on the DEC to take the next step.
County Planning Commissioner Luiz Aragon pointed out that the county has already submitted its comments on drilling to the DEC, sharing some of the concerns raised by the DEP (though the county’s comments were submitted before the DEP’s report was released).
“The question remains,” Aragon concluded, “what will be done with those comments?”
Comments are being accepted through December 31 and can be e-mailed to dmnsgeis@gw.dec.
state.ny.us, mailed to dSGEIS Comments, Bureau of Oil & Gas Regulation, NYSDEC Division of Mineral Resources, 625 Broadway, Third Floor, Albany, NY 12233-6500, or submitted online at www.dec.ny.gov/cfmx/extapps/SGEISComments.
Copies of the DEP report and related comments can be obtained at www.nyc.gov/html/
dep/html/press_releases/09-15pr.shtml.
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City Officials Say Drilling in Watershed Has Risks

By SINDYA N. BHANOO-New York Times
Published: December 23, 2009
New York City environmental officials said Wednesday that months of scientific research had indicated that hydraulic drilling for natural gas upstate could contaminate the watershed serving the city.
The study, undertaken by the city’s Department of Environmental Protection, also showed that the drilling could damage infrastructure, including aqueducts, the officials told the city’s water board at a briefing.
In a forceful letter to the State Department of Environmental Conservation on Tuesday, the city’s acting environmental commissioner, Steven W. Lawitts, called on the state to withdraw its draft regulations approving the drilling. Yancey Roy, a spokesman for the state agency, said it had no comment.
The draft regulations apply to a technology called hydraulic fracturing in the Marcellus Shale region of New York, which includes the city’s watershed region in the Catskills. The watershed area spans a million acres and provides unfiltered drinking water to about 8.2 million people in New York City and a million people in Westchester, Putnam and Dutchess Counties.
A public comment period on the rules, released by the state environmental agency in September after months of discussions, ends on Dec. 31.
Already concerned about the watershed, the city’s environmental department hired scientists and environmental engineers who specialize in gas drilling last January to research the potential impact of the drilling. The report concludes that drilling is dangerous for several reasons.
Extracting gas from the shale involves blasting water mixed with chemicals into the rock at a high pressure, which causes the natural gas to flow out. But the process results in significant amounts of wastewater, which can contaminate water supplies and damage the infrastructure, the report found.
Twenty percent to 50 percent of the chemicals used in extraction ends up in the wastewater, for which the state has no disposal method, said Paul Rush, the department’s deputy commissioner, who presented the report at the briefing.
He added that the projected operating costs would increase water rates for New York City residents by at least 30 percent because an increase in filtering costs.
Mr. Rush said the environmental engineers and scientists hired by the department collected data from hydraulic fracturing in other states to draw their conclusions.
“We took a technical look at this and made a decision based on the science,” he said.
Citing data from drilling in Fayetteville, Ark., the scientists estimated that drilling in the New York watershed could result in hundreds of tons of chemicals per day seeping through the watershed over a 20-year period.
Substantial industrial development would be needed to dig and maintain the 3,000 to 6,000 wells in the watershed, the report said. Maintenance alone could result in up to 600,000 trips by truck per year within the watershed’s boundaries, it said.
Responding to rising public concern, the Chesapeake Energy Corporation, which owns the lease to drill in the watershed, announced in October that it did not plan to drill in the watershed under its lease.
Nonetheless, hundreds of New York City residents turned out in November to protest hydraulic drilling at a state hearing on the draft regulations. Eric A. Goldstein, a senior lawyer for the Natural Resources Defense Council and an advocate for protection of the watershed, said Wednesday that Chesapeake’s promise meant little.
“It’s nonbinding, it’s temporary and it only applies to one company,” he said at the water board’s meeting. “Other companies could take over the lease, or Chesapeake could choose to go in and drill if they renew the lease.”
Mehul Patel, a member of the water board, also spoke out against the drilling at the meeting. “We’re trading off the most precious natural resource we have,” he said. “It’s appalling to me that the state would consider this.”
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Jeffersonville, NY 12748
Natural gas drilling is an issue here in Sullivan County, NY-- perhaps a big one. The Marcellus Shale Formation may significantly impact just about everything in our little piece of God's Green Earth. Keeping current is prudent.
The implications for real estate here are considerable. The debate will most likely continue for years to come. Check here from time to time to follow the thread.
For articles on this topic from the Times-Herald Record Daily Newspaper:
http://search.recordonline.com/?q=gas%20drilling&source=thr
View my blog at: http://catskills4you.blogspot.com/ for opinons on this and other topics relevant to Sullivan County Catskills Real Estate.
John Kavaller-Realtor and Licensed NYS Agent
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From: New York State Senator: JOHN J. BONACIC
November 11, 2009
The issue of natural gas drilling is of growing importance to the people of the Catskills and Hudson Valley. As you may be aware, the so-called Marcellus Shale is home to large deposits of natural gas. The Marcellus Shale region in New York can be seen on this map:
http://www.dec.ny.gov/energy/46381.html
The State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) has provided an extensive amount of information on gas drilling on their website:
http://gasleasing.cce.cornell.edu/
It is important that landowners contemplating leasing their land for natural gas development, and the neighbors of those who are leasing their land, are aware of the right questions to ask when it comes to natural gas exploration and drilling.
Several organizations have published informative guides on issues relating to natural gas exploration. Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has offered this guide on oil and gas leases and also has published a list of eight tips landowners should always think about when it comes to gas leasing.
Cornell Cooperative Extension has also created a natural gas development resource center on their website for landowners to use.
Links to both Attorney General Cuomo's publications and Cornell Cooperative Extension's Natural Gas Development Resource Center are found below:
http://www.oag.state.ny.us/bureaus/environmental/pdfs/Gas%20Brochure%20-%20final%20rc%20edit%208.20.pdf
http://www.oag.state.ny.us/bureaus/environmental/pdfs/gashandout-single.pdf
http://gasleasing.cce.cornell.edu/
If you are contemplating leasing your land rights for natural gas exploration, I urge you to read the information contained on those websites prior to signing a lease. While those guides are no substitute for obtaining independent legal advice, they are very solid starting points to make sure you ask the right questions, receive top profit if you do choose to lease your land, and protect your land.
In addition to those guides, I have introduced legislation (S.6269), which requires the DEC to consider bonding requirements for natural gas drillers to protect peoples' water supply. Although the DEC tells us that it is very unlikely any water supply could be contaminated, I still feel it is important to property owners that their water be protected.
I strongly believe the United States needs energy independence. The natural gas in the Marcellus Shale can help with that independence, and diminish the need for projects like NYRI, which threatened our region for three years. I encourage any landowners who are considering leasing their land (and any neighbors of those who are considering leasing), to read the guides linked to this email, make an informed decision to both protect your property, and receive the economic benefits you are entitled to if you choose to lease your land.
Sincerely,
JOHN J. BONACIC
State Senator