New Proposal on Fracking Gives Ground to Industry

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration on Friday issued a proposed rule governing hydraulic fracturing for oil and gas on public lands that will for the first time require disclosure of the chemicals used in the process.

But in a significant concession to the oil industry, companies will have to reveal the composition of fluids only after they have completed drilling — a sharp change from the government’s original proposal, which would have required disclosure of the chemicals 30 days before a well could be started.

The pullback on the rule followed a series of meetings at the White House after the original regulation was proposed in February. Lobbyists representing oil industry trade associations and individual major producers like ExxonMobil, XTO Energy, Apache, Samson Resources and Anadarko Petroleum met with officials of the Office of Management and Budget, who reworked the rule to address industry concerns about overlapping state regulations and the cost of compliance.

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Grisanti proposes fracking safeguards

State Sen. Mark J. Grisanti on Friday announced legislation that would prohibit treatment of water from hydraulic fracturing at public facilities statewide, create a tracking program for the waste and enact other environmental safeguards.

But Grisanti, chairman of the Senate Committee on Environmental Conservation, said he would not support or oppose the controversial gas drilling process until the state completes its final environmental impact study.

“It’s preliminary,” he said. “It’s too early to tell.”

As Grisanti was confronted by environmental activists demanding a complete ban on fracking, his chief political opponent called for more education on the issue before any action is taken.

“We need to see the full scope of their final draft of regulations before we rush to start the drilling,” former Erie County Legislature Chairman Charles M. Swanick said as he urged consideration of alternative energy methods.

While four environmental groups lauded Grisanti for the environmental safeguards, a vocal cohort of anti-fracking activists and Occupy Buffalo protesters gathered Friday in the Mahoney State Office Building to pepper him with questions about the effects of fracking.

“I have encountered no single is-

sue as critical, controversial and important as high-volume hydraulic fracturing,” Grisanti said. “Should the DEC ultimately decide to allow for [fracking], I strongly believe environmental safeguards are needed.”

Green groups Citizens Campaign for the Environment, Earthworks, Environmental Advocates of New York and Natural Resources Defense Council applauded Grisanti for “recognizing the lack of oversight and real dangers associated with fracking wastes.”

But organizers from Food&Water Watch, who held large anti-fracking signs during Grisanti’s news conference, said it didn’t go far enough.

“There is more to fracking than the waste it creates, and these bills do not take that into consideration,” said Rita Yelda, the group’s organizer. “The legislation introduced by Senator Grisanti is full of loopholes and would fail to protect Western New Yorkers from fracking’s threats to our health, economy and environment.”

Dan Cantor, executive director of the Working Families party, said the bills “pave the way” for statewide fracking to begin.

If passed, the legislation would appear to put an end to efforts to treat the fracking fluid at wastewater treatment plants in Niagara Falls or North Tonawanda, which officials have said are capable of treating such water.

“In my opinion, they don’t have the capacity,” Grisanti said. “They can pretreat it, but you don’t want the end result to be dumped in the Niagara Gorge.”

He said a private treatment plant is being built in Pennsylvania to treat the fracking water from Pennsylvania, Ohio and other places where the Marcellus Shale makes gas drilling especially lucrative.

Grisanti’s legislation also aims to prohibit the use of wastewater for road-and land-spreading; create an oil and gas waste tracking program stronger than one proposed under the draft environmental impact statement; strengthen notification requirements for wastewater spills and create a geographic information system for the public on gas and oil production.

The state Department of Environmental Conservation is expected to finalize its environmental impact statement and could make a decision on fracking as early as July.

http://www.buffalonews.com/city/communities/buffalo/article799997.ece

Fracking Democracy: Why Pennsylvania's Act 13 May Be the Nation's Worst Corporate Giveaway

Pennsylvania, where the Declaration of Independence and U.S. Constitution were signed and where the U.S. coal, oil and nuclear industries began, has adopted what may be the most anti-democratic, anti-environmental law in the country, giving gas companies the right to drill anywhere, overturn local zoning laws, seize private property and muzzle physicians from disclosing specific health impacts from drilling fluids on patients. 

The draconian new law, known as Act 13, revises the state’s oil and gas statutes, to allow oil companies to drill for natural gas using the controversial process known as hydraulic fracturing or fracking, where large volumes of water and toxic chemicals are pumped into vertical wells with lateral bores to shatter the rock and release the hydrocarbons. The law strips rights from communities and individuals while imposing new statewide drilling rules.

 

“It’s absolutely crushing of local self-government,” said Ben Price, project director for the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund, which has helped a handful of local communities—including the city of Pittsburgh—adopt community rights ordinances that elevate the rights of nature and people to block the drilling. “The state has surrendered over 2,000 municipalities to the industry. It’s a complete capitulation of the rights of the people and their right to self-government. They are handing it over to the industry to let them govern us. It is the corporate state. That is how we look at it.”

 

“Now I know what it feels like to live in Nigeria,” said recently retired Pittsburgh City Council President Doug Shields. “You’re basically a resource colony for multi-national corporations to take your natural resources, take them back to wherever they are at, add value to them, and then sell them back to you.”

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Hickenlooper May Be in Bed With the Oil Industry, But Coloradans Have His Wake-up Call

Governor Hickenlooper had a few particularly cozy days with the oil and gas industry the other week. First, he appeared in industry-funded ads in newspapers and on radio stations across the state, proclaiming that no water in Colorado had been contaminated by fracking. After being forced to issue a weak mea culpa amid cries of ethics violations over his unabashed hawking of the oil and gas industry, Hickenlooper then claimed that fracking fluids are edible: "You can eat this -- the CEO of Halliburton took a big swig of this thing. And not to be outdone, I took a swig of it myself."

Then, the governor issued an Executive Order to create an industry-dominated task force that will examine how to take local control away from communities across the state that don't want drill rigs near homes or their children's schools.

And now, satisfied with a job well done, Governor Hickenlooper jetted to Houston, Texas, to be the keynote speaker of an industry conference touting fracking.

If these antics have you thinking that Governor Hickenlooper no longer represents the people of Colorado and works full-time for the oil and gas industry, you're not off base: Governor Hickenlooper took over $75,000 from the oil and gas industry for his gubernatorial campaign.

Even so, the grassroots movement that opposes fracking in Colorado is starting to win. Up and down the Front Range -- from Colorado Springs to El Paso County, from Erie to Longmont to Boulder County -- communities are standing up to pass moratoria on fracking. Why? Because their air quality is 10 times worse than Houston, Texas, as a result of oil and gas drilling. Or because there is a fracking well being planned 350 feet from their children's elementary school. Or because their home values have plummeted due to proposed fracking in their neighborhood.

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From Gung-Ho to Uh-Oh: Charting the Government’s Moves on Fracking

Fracking has only recently become a household word, but government involvement with the drilling technique goes back decades. President Obama haschampioned the potential of natural gas drilling combined with more regulation. While there has been mounting evidence of water contamination, few regulations have been implemented. The graphic below traces officials' moves -- and levels of caution -- over time.

Follow the link to follow the chart: http://www.propublica.org/special/from-gung-ho-to-uh-oh-charting-the-governments-moves-on-fracking

Salazar hints at fracking disclosure

CLEVELAND, Feb. 15 (UPI) -- A lack of transparency over the chemical makeup of hydraulic fracturing fluid might strike a blow to the shale gas industry, the U.S. interior secretary said.

The United States has some of the richest deposits of shale natural gas. Critics say that chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, fluid could contaminate waters supplies.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said the department was preparing rules that would require companies to disclose the composition of fracking fluids and call for tighter regulations to protect the environment.

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APNewsBreak: Ohio AG seeks tougher drilling laws

By JULIE CARR SMYTH 
Associated Press

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COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) -- Ohio's top law enforcer is seeking tougher environmental sanctions on polluters in the oil and gas industry and full disclosure of the chemicals used in the drilling technique called fracking.

In an Associated Press interview Wednesday, Attorney General Mike DeWine further called for his office or another state agency to be empowered to help landowners with complaints about lease agreements for drilling.

He said a recent legal review by his staff revealed "Ohio's laws simply are not adequate" in the three areas.

DeWine said civil penalties in the state should be raised from a maximum of $20,000 for the duration of a violation to $10,000 a day. That would bring fines in line with states such as Pennsylvania, Colorado and Texas.

He says other states also require chemicals be disclosed.