Friday, June 18, 2010
FRAC ACT up for debate
"Ithaca, NY – On the heels of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s recent trip to Ithaca, Congressman Maurice Hinchey (D-NY) today urged the Speaker to bring his Fracking Responsibility and Awareness of Chemicals (FRAC) Act up for debate and a vote in the House. Hinchey’s bill would would close a loophole created in the Energy Policy Act of 2005, which he voted against, that exempted hydraulic fracturing from the Safe Drinking Water Act. The FRAC Act would also 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 exempt from the Safe Drinking Water Act."Keep reading More:
Up for Votes: NEW YORK moratorium on hydraulic fracturing
"TITLE OF BILL: An act to establish a moratorium upon conducting hydraulic fracturing pending the issuance of a report thereon by the federal Environmental Protection Agency; and providing for the repeal of such provisions upon the expiration thereof
PURPOSE OR GENERAL IDEA OF BILL: This bill seeks to place a moratorium upon the activity of hydraulic fracturing until such time as the environmental protection agency has released there report on the effects of hydraulic fracturing on ground water and freshwater supplies.
SUMMARY OF SPECIFIC PROVISIONS: Establishes a moratorium on conducting hydraulic fracturing for the extraction of natural gas or oil until 120 days after federal environ mental protection agency. JUSTIFICATION:
On March 18, 2010 the EPA announced that it will be conducting a compre hensive 2-year research study to investigate the potential adverse impact that hydraulic fracturing may have on water quality and public health, including the potential impacts the hydraulic fracturing mixture may have on water quality. Hydraulic fracturing is a process that involves vertical and horizontal drilling and fracturing of underground formations to facilitate withdrawal of natural gas or oil, from shale and other geological formations. In general, the process involves injecting fresh water, fracturing fluids and sand into the formation, withdrawing the gas and separating and managing the leftover waters. The fracturing fluid itself is made up of dozens of chemicals that act as a lubricant for the sand. These chemicals can include potentially dangerous petrol compounds. Millions of gallons of water, sand and frac turing fluid are needed to fracture a natural gas well. New York State must continue to be vigilant where questions of water quality and public health are concerned and must have all available information before allowing a questionable practice such as hydraulic fracturing to take place without fully knowing the potential dangers. My legislation will place a moratorium on such activity until the EPA study has been completed and the results know to the public.
PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY: New bill.
PURPOSE OR GENERAL IDEA OF BILL: This bill seeks to place a moratorium upon the activity of hydraulic fracturing until such time as the environmental protection agency has released there report on the effects of hydraulic fracturing on ground water and freshwater supplies.
SUMMARY OF SPECIFIC PROVISIONS: Establishes a moratorium on conducting hydraulic fracturing for the extraction of natural gas or oil until 120 days after federal environ mental protection agency. JUSTIFICATION:
On March 18, 2010 the EPA announced that it will be conducting a compre hensive 2-year research study to investigate the potential adverse impact that hydraulic fracturing may have on water quality and public health, including the potential impacts the hydraulic fracturing mixture may have on water quality. Hydraulic fracturing is a process that involves vertical and horizontal drilling and fracturing of underground formations to facilitate withdrawal of natural gas or oil, from shale and other geological formations. In general, the process involves injecting fresh water, fracturing fluids and sand into the formation, withdrawing the gas and separating and managing the leftover waters. The fracturing fluid itself is made up of dozens of chemicals that act as a lubricant for the sand. These chemicals can include potentially dangerous petrol compounds. Millions of gallons of water, sand and frac turing fluid are needed to fracture a natural gas well. New York State must continue to be vigilant where questions of water quality and public health are concerned and must have all available information before allowing a questionable practice such as hydraulic fracturing to take place without fully knowing the potential dangers. My legislation will place a moratorium on such activity until the EPA study has been completed and the results know to the public.
PRIOR LEGISLATIVE HISTORY: New bill.
Article: Nestle to begin draining millions of gallons of Arkansas River water
"If things go according to plan, in about a month someone at Nestle Waters North America will turn a valve and water will begin running out of a pipeline near Buena Vista and will splash into an empty 8,000-gallon tanker truck. It will take roughly an hour for the truck to fill, and then another truck will take its place. The water will run 24 hours a day, filling approximately 25 trucks each day, every day.
The trucks will drive 120 miles to a Nestle bottling plant in Denver where the water will be used to fill hundreds and thousands and millions of little plastic Arrowhead Springs water bottles, which will then be trucked to convenience markets, grocery stores, movie theaters, and sports palaces around the West. Each month, Nestle will fill roughly 40.4 million 16.9 ounce bottles with the water from the area’s Nathrop spring. By the end of a year, 65 million gallons of Arkansas Valley water will have been driven to Denver, bottled, driven somewhere else, and sold." -Continued
The trucks will drive 120 miles to a Nestle bottling plant in Denver where the water will be used to fill hundreds and thousands and millions of little plastic Arrowhead Springs water bottles, which will then be trucked to convenience markets, grocery stores, movie theaters, and sports palaces around the West. Each month, Nestle will fill roughly 40.4 million 16.9 ounce bottles with the water from the area’s Nathrop spring. By the end of a year, 65 million gallons of Arkansas Valley water will have been driven to Denver, bottled, driven somewhere else, and sold." -Continued
"Although they represent only a small fraction of the total wells drilled in Pennsylvania, Marcellus Shale wells accounted for a quarter of all enforcement actions brought by the Department of Environmental Protection last year.
The DEP, which inspects oil and gas wells and cites operators for violations, chose to pursue 173 enforcements against Marcellus Shale drillers, resulting from 638 shale violations recorded in 2009. Enforcement actions typically lead to fines and/or settlement agreements."
Read more: Marcellus Shale hit with one-quarter of Pennsylvania enforcement actions in 2009 - Pittsburgh Business Times
The DEP, which inspects oil and gas wells and cites operators for violations, chose to pursue 173 enforcements against Marcellus Shale drillers, resulting from 638 shale violations recorded in 2009. Enforcement actions typically lead to fines and/or settlement agreements."
Read more: Marcellus Shale hit with one-quarter of Pennsylvania enforcement actions in 2009 - Pittsburgh Business Times
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Houston-based Weatherford Fracturing Technologies supplied the chemical, according to a Materials Safety Data Sheet provided by La Plata County Manager Shawn Nau’s office.
Cathy Behr fell gravely ill in April, several days after treating a worker who walked into Mercy Regional Medical Center doused in ZetaFlow.
Weatherford guards the chemical’s components as a trade secret, and Behr said the company wouldn’t share information with her doctor while she was suffering from heart, lung and liver failure, plus kidney damage and blurred vision.
A Weatherford spokeswoman did not return a call Friday afternoon.
It is not clear where the ill worker was employed or where the original spill happened, and Mercy officials are prohibited by health privacy laws from talking about his condition. It’s not known whether he recovered or even survived.
The worker’s supervisor gave the Materials Safety Data Sheet to Mercy’s emergency room staff. Based on that information and the nauseating smell of the worker’s clothing, nurses summoned the fire department and locked down the ER, but not before Behr had inhaled the chemical fumes.
The Durango Fire & Rescue Authority responded, and firefighters set up fans to clear the air, said spokesman Dave Abercrombie.
"We didn’t do any hazmat cleanup at all. All we did was ventilate," Abercrombie said.
The original spill that sickened the worker didn’t happen in Durango Fire & Rescue Authority’s jurisdiction, he said.
The five-page data sheet advises people handling ZetaFlow to wear goggles and chemical-resistant clothing and boots. Inhalation of the chemical can lead to headaches, dizziness, low blood pressure and low oxygen levels in the blood, according to the data sheet.
Behr has mostly recovered, she said.
Weatherford is a global oil and gas services company that posted $1 billion profits on $7.8 billion in revenue in 2007. Its headquarters are in Houston, with other headquarters planned for Dubai, Singapore and Moscow, according to its 2007 annual report. It has offices in Farmington. "-Read Much more here:
"ALLENTOWN, Pa. -- Pennsylvania environmental regulators on Thursday banned an energy company from drilling in the state until it plugs three natural gas wells believed to have contaminated the drinking water supplies of 14 homes.
The Department of Environmental Protection said Houston-based Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. has failed to abide by the terms of a November 2009 agreement to clean up the contamination in Dimock Township in Susquehanna County, where residents say their wells have been polluted by methane gas and other contaminants."-
The Department of Environmental Protection said Houston-based Cabot Oil & Gas Corp. has failed to abide by the terms of a November 2009 agreement to clean up the contamination in Dimock Township in Susquehanna County, where residents say their wells have been polluted by methane gas and other contaminants."-
"In today's National Park Service incident reports, an ominous mention of oil-tar balls and mats washing up on Padre Island National Seashore in Texas. No confirmation yet if this is BP Deepwater Horizon oil or not. If it is, that's bad—obviously—since it would mark the first landfall far to the west of the well site.
More alarming in the report however was the perplexing mention of the release of 116 critically endangered Kemp's Ridleys sea turtle hatchlings from that same beach where oil was washing ashore on that same day.
Even if the oil-tar on Padre Island doesn't bear the Oilpocalypse signtaure, I can't help but ask: Why are they releasing turtle hatchlings anywhere into the Gulf of Mexico at this point? Exactly what future do they imagine lies ahead for these rarest of all sea turtles, 116 of whom may hold the key to survival of the species?
Here's the incident report in its entirety:
http://motherjones.com/blue-marble/2010/06/why-are-critically-endangered-sea-turtle-hatchlings-being-released-oil"
More alarming in the report however was the perplexing mention of the release of 116 critically endangered Kemp's Ridleys sea turtle hatchlings from that same beach where oil was washing ashore on that same day.
Even if the oil-tar on Padre Island doesn't bear the Oilpocalypse signtaure, I can't help but ask: Why are they releasing turtle hatchlings anywhere into the Gulf of Mexico at this point? Exactly what future do they imagine lies ahead for these rarest of all sea turtles, 116 of whom may hold the key to survival of the species?
Here's the incident report in its entirety:
http://motherjones.com/blue-marble/2010/06/why-are-critically-endangered-sea-turtle-hatchlings-being-released-oil"
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