New Report: Fracking Could Cause a New Global Water Crisis

New technology enabling the extraction of large quantities of oil and natural gas from shale and other rock formations could drive the world’s next great global water crisis unless it is banned, according to a new report released today by national consumer group Food & Water Watch. Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, combined with horizontal drilling, is poised to become a global environmental and public health threat as the oil and gas industry seeks more access to oil and gas trapped in rock formations far beneath the ground.

“Fracking is a dangerous American export that should be viewed critically by countries just starting to engage in the practice,” says Wenonah Hauter, Executive Director of Food & Water Watch. “Modern drilling and fracking have caused widespread environmental and public health problems, as well as posed serious, long-term risks to vital water resources.”

According to the report, Fracking: The New Global Water Crisis, countries around the world are grappling with how to address the push to drill and frack. In Europe, while France and Bulgaria have banned fracking in the face of strong public opposition, Poland has welcomed the industry. In China and Argentina, shale gas extraction is being developed with government support. In South Africa, pending an environmental review, a subsidiary of Royal Dutch Shell may be granted permission to extract shale gas.

The report also notes that while natural gas has been touted as a low-carbon fuel, recent scientific studies have shown that the growing dependence on shale gas is likely to accelerate global climate change in the coming decades.

http://www.northcentralpa.com/feeditem/2012-03-07_new-report-fracking-could-cause-new-global-water-crisis

Md. Senate committee hears fracking fee bill

ANNAPOLIS, Md. — Opponents of using new hydraulic fracturing drilling techniques in western Maryland joined state officials Tuesday in asking lawmaker to support a fee to fund a study of potential environmental impacts.

Industry officials, meanwhile, turned out in Annapolis to warn members of a Senate committee not to turn away what could be an economic boon for two western counties.

The $10-an-acre fee would apply to lands leased for hydraulic fracturing, a drilling method that extracts the gas by blasting through layers of shale rock with a combination of water and chemicals. The bill would use the fee to pay for a study commissioned by Gov. Martin O'Malley.

Sen. Brian Frosh, a bill sponsor, said the governor has asked a state panel to examine the impacts "but it can't fully do its work because it doesn't have the money."

Frosh told the Senate's Education, Health, and Environmental Affairs Committee that the bill authorizes the return of any money that isn't used.

The bill, however, also says owners can be asked to pay more if the study costs more than the fee raises.

Drew Cobbs of the Maryland Petroleum Council told the panel he was concerned the bill could hurt the state's ability to compete with surrounding states. West Virginia and Pennsylvania are already seeing a boom in the new drilling technique, but also complaints about its impact on the environment, particularly ground water.

Farmers who turned out for the hearing took both sides of the issue.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-505245_162-57392381/md-senate-committee-hears-fracking-fee-bill/

Will Natural Gas Become the 'Achilles' Heel' of Our Country?

After hearing Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar at the City Club of Cleveland on Feb. 14 speak about President Obama's vision for the new energy frontier, which is largely a full-steam ahead agenda for fossil fuel extraction, and then reading that more than 800,000 people signed a petition to their U.S. Senators to stop the Keystone XL pipeline and nearly2,000 people in Frankfort, Ky., called for an end to mountaintop removal coal mining that same day, it was clear that Obama's energy plan does not align with the sustainable energy future many Americans want.

Salazar said Obama's energy blueprint focuses on tapping into all of the energy resources of the U.S. and that the Department of the Interior will play a key role in mapping out a future that will bring about energy security for America.

He talked about renewable energy and the 41 solar energy manufacturing facilities in the U.S. and how this country is projected to be the number one solar energy market in the world by 2014. He also said that major strides have been made in wind energy, with more than 400 U.S. companies manufacturing components for the wind energy industry and one-third of all new electrical capacity in the U.S. coming from wind farms.

In 2009, there were no solar energy projects permitted on public lands. Today there are 29 commercial-scale solar projects and more than 5,600 megawatts of permitted renewable energy projects on public lands. Salazar said these projects are creating thousands of jobs and even making skeptics believe that we can actually capture the power of the sun to power our cities.

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FRACKING, FAIRNESS AND THE FUTURE

Excerpts:

"In New York, a memo from the New York Department of Transportation revealed that “Pavement structural damage done by the passage of a single large truck is equivalent to that done by about 9,000 automobiles.”xi Areas with heavy drilling are expecting 1.5 million heavy truck trips annually and could see an increase in peak hour trips by 36,000 trips per hour. A similar impact can be expected in Ohio. This type of traffic—on rural roads that aren’t designed for such loads— will quickly result in expensive maintenance costs In New York, a memo from the New York Department of Transportation revealed that “Pavement structural damage done by the passage of a single large truck is equivalent to that done by about 9,000 automobiles.”xi Areas with heavy drilling are expecting 1.5 million heavy truck trips annually and could see an increase in peak hour trips by 36,000 trips per hour. A similar impact can be expected in Ohio. This type of traffic—on rural roads that aren’tdesigned for such loads— will quickly result in expensive maintenance costs."

"The increased demand for housing has driven up rent in rural areas, which, in turn, has displaced many long-time residents. Areas that saw few homeless people have experienced a sudden increase in family homelessness and in families doubling or tripling up in their living quartersThe increased demand for housing has driven up rent in rural areas, which, in turn, has displaced many long-time residents. Areas that saw few homeless people have experienced a sudden increase in family homelessness and in families doubling or tripling up in their living quarters."

"In addition to being associated with possible health consequences, hydraulic fracturing is connected to multiple environmental concerns, such as increased air pollution and a probable contamination of local water supplies."

Read more at: http://innovationohio.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Fracking-Fairness-and-the-Future-Full-Report.pdf

Fracking gets its own "Occupy" movement

This is a story about water, the land surrounding it, and the lives it sustains. Clean water should be a right: there is no life without it. New York is what you might call a “water state.” Its rivers and their tributaries only start with the St. Lawrence, the Hudson, the Delaware, and the Susquehanna. The best known of its lakes are Great Lakes Erie and Ontario, Lake George, and the Finger Lakes. Its brooks, creeks, and trout streams are fishermen’s lore.

Far below this rippling wealth there’s a vast, rocky netherworld called the Marcellus Shale. Stretching through southern New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and West Virginia, the shale contains bubbles of methane, the remains of life that died 400 million years ago. Gas corporations have lusted for the methane in the Marcellus since at least 1967 when one of them plotted with the Atomic Energy Agency to explode a nuclear bomb to unleash it. That idea died, but it’s been reborn in the form of a technology invented by Halliburton Corporation: high-volume horizontal hydraulic fracturing -- “fracking” for short.

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New Study: Severe Health Impact of Fracking

By Bernhard Debatin

A new study on the Impacts of Gas Drilling on Human and Animal Health (*)shows that fracking fluids, methane gas exposure, and other gas-drilling related contamination can have a serious impact on the health of both humans and animals. The study, conducted by private practice veterinarian Michelle Bamberger and Robert E. Oswald of the Department of Molecular Medicine at Cornell University, investigated 24 different sites with gas wells, 18 of which were horizontal hydro-fractured wells. The researchers observed and documented severe changes in health of both humans and animals living close to these sites. The majority of the observed animals were cows; other animals included horses, goats, llamas, chickens, dogs, cats, and koi.

Bamberger and Oswald interviewed animal owners affected by gas drilling in six different states (Colorado, Louisiana, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Texas). In addition, they obtained lab test results and data from drilling companies and state regulatory agencies. The most striking finding of the study is the death of over 100 cows, caused by their exposure to fracking fluids or drinking of fracking wastewater that was dumped or leaked into freshwater sources. The researchers also frequently found reproductive problems, particularly lack of breeding and stillborn animals, often with congenital deformations. Other health effects on both animals and humans encompassed a wide range of symptoms, such as upper respiratory symptoms and burning of the eyes,  vomiting and diarrhea, rashes, nosebleeds, headaches, and neurological problems.

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Jobs not best benefit of Ohio shale drilling: OSU study

Natural gas drilling in Ohio offers several benefits, but enough new jobs to impact the state's economy isn't one of them, a new economic study released this week by Ohio State University says.

"Although we should not expect natural gas to be a big job creator, there are significant benefits to producing natural gas that are getting lost in the hype of job creation," co-authors Mark Partridge and Amanda Weinstein said.

The two largest benefits of opening up shale drilling in Ohio are the environmental benefits of cleaner gas displacing coal for power generation and lower electricity costs benefiting the state's massive manufacturing economy, the authors said.

Manufacturing accounts for 27% of Ohio's $477 billion economy, according to the state government; oil and gas production accounted for 0.4% in 2010.

The 27-page study examining the economic impact of drilling in the Utica and Marcellus shales in the state faults previous industry-funded studies that predict as many as 200,000 new jobs for the state for using impact models long discarded by academic economists for routinely overestimating job creation numbers.

A September study sponsored by the Ohio Oil & Gas Energy Education Program predicted oil and gas investment in Ohio would increase more than 20 times the current $988 million/year and create 205,520 jobs. (OSU professors participated in portions of that study also.)

Partridge and Weinstein said the number of permanent jobs is likely to be a more modest 20,000.

"Previous studies on the economic impacts of natural gas appear to have widely overstated the economic impacts," Partridge and Weinstein wrote. In addition to being funded by industry, "not the best sources of information for economic effects (regardless of the industry)", those studies ignore that oil and gas operations are three times more capital intensive than other industries, resulting in fewer jobs per dollar spent.

Those studies, primarily focused on the Marcellus' impact on Pennsylvania, also have ignored the displacement effects of gas drilling - be it coal miners laid off because power plants burn more gas or tourism workers eliminated because of drilling's effects on the environment - the study said.

Partridge believes Pennsylvania gained 20,000 Marcellus Shale-related development jobs between 2004 and 2010, much fewer than the 100,000 jobs reported in "industry-funded studies."

http://www.platts.com/RSSFeedDetailedNews/RSSFeed/NaturalGas/6787366