Wyoming pushed EPA to delay study on fracking: report

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The governor of Wyoming pressed the top U.S. environmental regulator to delay its December, 2011 release of a draft study linking fracking for natural gas to contamination of drinking water, a news report said on Thursday.

Governor Matt Mead contacted Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa Jackson and persuaded her to delay for about a month releasing the study that found fluids used in hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, had likely polluted an aquifer in the small town of Pavillion, the Associated Press report said.

The delay gave state officials time to raise dozens of questions about the draft study and coordinate an "all-out-press" against the EPA in the weeks before the agency released the study on December 8 last year, said the report, which relied on emails obtained from a state records request and an interview with Mead, a drilling supporter.

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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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Local fracking control often lacking

Limited control

Local governments' ability to stop oil and gas development is murky at best, but they can make a driller's margins smaller, said Nathan Johnson, staff attorney for the Buckeye Forest Council, an environmental advocate.

Cities can levy their own fees and taxes on drillers operating within their boundaries, he said. They can refuse to accept brine, which is different from fracking fluid and sometimes used to treat dusty or icy roads, thereby forcing the company to store it or inject at their expense.

"Cities can pass their own severance taxes if they wanted," Johnson said, referring to the levy paid for removing a natural resource, such as oil or timber. "Another thing they can do, municipalities can take fines (for violating a regulation) and increase them."

Steve Strauss, a county commissioner in Muskingum County, said local government wants to be involved in the process and wants to be heard by the multi-billion dollar energy companies operating down the street.

Muskingum County has a notification system that keeps every official from the township level up abreast of activity.

As for control, Strauss said it may not be codified, but they have influence. He points to a stop sign on at the intersection of an access road for the well and Paisley Road near The Wilds.

Strauss said the county felt it was a safety issue to have these big trucks merging onto the main road without stopping first. Anadarko Petroleum Corp., the well's owner, agreed and a stop sign was put in.

"They want to be good neighbors," Strauss said.

Water impact

Devon Energy, an Oklahoma City firm, plans to pull 3 million gallons from the Licking River over the course of a week.

The water will be mixed with sand and chemicals and blasted underground at high pressure to break open the shale and allow natural gas, liquids and oil to escape.

Devon spokesman Chip Minty said they had considered buying water from landowners with ponds or drilling a well for water, but decided on the Licking River as the best option. They are following the state's protocol on water withdrawals, he said.

For every inch of rain over a square mile area, abo

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Reporting of fracking and drilling violations weak

WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. (CNNMoney) -- For Pennsylvanians with natural gas wells on their land, chances are they won't know if a safety violation occurs on their property.

That's because the state agency charged with regulating the wells -- the Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) -- does not have to notify landowners if a violation is discovered. Even if landowners inquire about safety violations, DEP records are often too technical for the average person and incomplete.

While some landowners would like more transparency around safety issues, as a group they are not pushing for stronger regulations. Landowners, who are paid royalties by the companies that drill on their property, generally want the drilling to proceed.

Violations: In February, CNNMoney spoke with four families in Lycoming County, Pa., about violations issued against natural gas wells on or near their property.

The families have a total of 26 natural gas wells among them. They've received royalties from the wells, ranging from the low hundreds to hundreds of thousands of dollars over the last few years.

How fracking works

Yet none said they had ever been notified by the DEP or any of the well operators that wells near their homes had been cited for what DEP's website said were 62 safety violations over four years.

"We had no idea that there were any violations," said Dan Bower, who lives next door to his mother, Jane, and her five wells.

"We should have been contacted or something," echoed Neil Barto, another well owner.

DEP says that in cases in which violations pose risk to human health, they "certainly notify landowners."

The violations range from simple things such as improper signage toserious infractions such as subpar cementing -- which according to DEP can allow gas to seep out of a well and in some cases "has the potential to cause a fire or explosion."

While the violations are posted online, the digital records are short on specifics -- most importantly whether a violation poses a health risk.

A time consuming process: If landowners want to inquire about all violations on their property, DEP says they should do an in-person file review of the state regulator's documents relating to each well.

The agency declined multiple interview requests, but assured CNNMoney that an in-person review would contain records of any communication with landowners about violations. CNNMoney conducted a file review in late March.

The process required a visit to the regional DEP office, which had to be scheduled weeks in advance. 

But even then, the details discovered were largely in legal and technical language.

In approximately 1,000 pages of documents for the 26 permitted wells, there was only one record of any communication DEP had with a landowner about a violation.

A letter was sent to indicate that a spill of fluid used for drilling on Jane Bower's property had been cleaned up, but the recipient's name was redacted.

Both Jane and Dan say they never received such a letter, even though DEP fined Chief Oil and Gas, the operator of the well at the time, $2,100 for the five barrel spill. There were no details of this spill on the DEP website.

The file review revealed there was also a spill of 294 gallons of 'frac fluid' at the same Bower well. The fluid is what is used in hydraulic fracturing, a process where water, sand and a small amount of chemicals, are injected into shale deep underground to fracture the rock and release gas.

There was no mention of this spill in DEP's online records, and the paper records did not clearly indicate whether the ground water was tested after the spill.

It is not clear from the physical records whether these spills, or any other violations reviewed, ever posed a threat to human health.

Obama tightens oil and gas drilling regulations

The well operator at the time, Chief, said it did not.

But David Yoxtheimer, a hydrogeologist at Penn State's Marcellus Center for Outreach and Research, said there's not enough information to say for certain.

He said that if the Bower spills had gotten into surface or ground water then they "could have a water quality impact of low to moderate severity," but that such a risk would depend on site-specific factors not available in the files.

Landowner apathy: Despite the violations, it's not clear that the landowners are doing all in their power to check for violations on their property. 

Neither the Bowers nor the Bartos have a computer to check for violations, and neither plans on changing that.

"I sure as hell am not gonna buy one to check DEP," Neil Barto said.

All four families continue to support the drilling and note it has been aboon to the local economy. The Bartos, who have six wells on their property, say they have made about $150,000 in royalties off of the wells on their property in the last three years.

Plus, increased regulation is not a priority for them. That's a fairly common viewpoint among landowners.

"In our experience, landowner groups have been focused on advancing expanded drilling to maximize royalty payment opportunities, and have generally been opposed to increased regulation," said Kate Sinding at the Natural Resources Defense Council.

And that, says the NRDC, could be delaying further regulation for the industry, or taking pressure off regulators to report violations more clearly.

"Advocacy for those kinds of protections would undoubtedly carry more weight were they to come from landowners themselves, as opposed to the environmental community," Sinding said.

-- with additional reporting by CNN's Poppy Harlow 

First Published: May 1, 2012: 5:24 AM ET

http://money.cnn.com/2012/05/01/news/economy/fracking-violations/index.htm

Sand County, the Sequel

Crystalline silica causes cancer. More specifically, crystalline silica dust is listed by both the World Health Organization and the U.S. National Toxicology Program as a known human lung carcinogen. Unlike tobacco smoke, silica dust does not provoke tumors via genetic mutations. Instead, its method of injury is to trigger inflammation and suppress immune functioning. It also causes silicosis, a disabling and sometimes fatal condition in which fibrous nodules fill the spongy pulmonary chambers, prompting infections and heart failure. For both reasons, crystalline silica is regulated by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. There are legal limits to how much silica dust a person operating a sandblaster can inhale.

Before midwestern sand counties were turned inside out—and towering, windblown dunes of powdery silica began appearing within view of people’s kitchen windows—the general public was not thought to suffer appreciable exposures. There are thus no standards for us. No research program has ever addressed the possible impact of silica dust on, say, pregnancy outcome or the lung development of children. Lack of study on public health effects means that the occupational carcinogen crystalline silica is not regulated as a hazardous air pollutant. At least not in Wisconsin and not at this writing.

A SAND COUNTY ALMANAC was published in 1949. In the same year, an oil-field service company called Halliburton fracked its first commercial well and so ushered in a new method for extracting oil and gas by using pressure, water, chemicals, and sand to blow up shale. The function of the sand is to hold the stone doors ajar so that the hydrocarbons can flow out and up.

But the shale boom didn’t really take off until 2005, the year that fracking received exemptions from most major federal environmental regulations (the now-famous “Halliburton loophole”). By 2008, Wisconsin sand had become a highly prized quarry. The Samson of silica, its grains were the ideal size, shape, and strength for propping open cracks a mile or more below the earth’s surface. And that’s how the nation’s Devonian bedrock became the new destination spot for Sand County. That’s how Aldo Leopold’s farm in central Wisconsin could end up fracking Rachel Carson’s childhood home on the Marcellus shale of western Pennsylvania.

In 2009, the last year for which data are available, 6.5 million tons of U.S. sand were mined, washed, processed, loaded onto trucks and trains, carried to wellheads, and shot into the center of the earth. Six and a half million tons is the approximate weight of the Great Pyramid of Giza. According to commodities analysts, that figure probably doubled in 2010 and likely doubled again last year.

http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/articles/article/6811

Trustee board wonders: Will law allow OU to say no to fracking?

OU legal and financial officials told members of the Board of Trustees Thursday that while the university is trying to stake out a position that it can veto any attempt to drill for oil and gas on its land, they don't know for sure whether state regulators will read a new law that way.

Ohio Substitute House Bill 133, which changed the rules on drilling for oil and gas on state-owned lands, is "very vague," Nicolette Dioguardi, OU associate director of legal affairs, told the board.

She said that based on the wording of the law, university officials believe they will have the last word on whether to allow drilling on OU-owned land, and they plan to assert that position. Whether the state will agree with that stance or not, however, remains to be seen, she suggested.

State regulators have interpreted a similar law, H.B. 278, as barring local governments from regulating oil and gas drilling operations in municipal or county limits in any way.

Stephen Golding, OU's vice president for finance and administration, however, echoed Dioguardi's assessment, saying the university will act on the assumption that it can say no to drilling if it so chooses.

"I would say that we are taking that position," Golding said, though he, like Dioguardi, said it's still unclear how the state will interpret the dictates of the new law.

"We're trying to do a delicate balancing act, if you will," he explained. "There are no rules… We are staking out a position. The question is, will that position be upheld?"

Dioguardi added that the board has a "window of opportunity" prior to June 30, to enter into leases under the terms it wants with any drilling companies. After that, the new commission process will kick in.

The state of Ohio is currently being eyed by the oil-and-gas industry for possible widespread drilling for oil and/or natural gas in deep underground shale beds, using the controversial "horizontal hydraulic fracturing" technique. It's popularly known as "fracking."

However, recent maps released by the Ohio Department of Natural Resources showing the prime Utica shale prospects in Ohio exclude Athens County from that area. Experts, though, seem to agree that nobody will know the local oil and gas resources until someone drills one or more exploratory wells. No permit applications for any such wells have been filed for Athens County.

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Energy company seeks water from eastern Ohio reservoir for fracking

By Bob Downing 
Beacon Journal staff writer

Published: April 17, 2012 - 10:25 PM | Updated: April 18, 2012 - 07:39 AM

The Muskingum Conservancy Watershed District is expected to vote Friday on allowing an energy company to tap into a lake in eastern Ohio for fracking water.

Oklahoma-based Gulfport Energy Corp. wants to take up to 11 million gallons of water from Clendening Reservoir in Harrison County to hydraulically fracture, or frack, a natural gas well it is developing.

The watershed district’s governing board will be asked to approve a temporary water agreement with Gulfport. The price has not been finalized, officials said.

Clendening Reservoir typically holds about 8.6 billion gallons of water.

A temporary pipeline would be built to move the water from the lake to the drilling site, district spokesman Darrin Lautenschleger said.

He said that would eliminate between 900 and 1,200 one-way trips by tanker trucks.

The district, based in New Philadelphia, signed a lease with Gulfport last year on 6,400 acres at Clendening Reservoir.

It was paid a signing bonus of $2,800 per acre plus a 16 percent royalty on any gas or oil produced.

From the signing bonus, the district is using $15.6 million to defray debts and make infrastructure improvements to recreational facilities, Lautenschleger said.

The water agreement with Gulfport marks the first contract approved by the district to provide water to a company drilling into Ohio’s Utica shale formation thousands of feet underground.

The pact would allow the district to cut off water delivery if recreational or environmental problems surface, Lautenschleger said, but officials do not anticipate any problems.

In the past, the district has provided water on a temporary basis for farmers suffering from major droughts, he said.

The watershed district has had inquiries from a dozen drilling companies about selling water from six of its reservoirs in eastern Ohio.

The district’s 18-judge panel, known as the Muskingum Watershed Conservancy Court, is expected to deal on June 2 with a selling price for water that could allow additional deals to advance.

Last month, the district signed an agreement with the U.S. Geological Survey to assess the effect of withdrawing water from three lakes: Atwood Lake in Carroll and Tuscarawas counties, Leesville in Carroll County and Clendening, Lautenschleger said.

That study would give the district a better idea what could happen if large volumes of water were sold to drillers, he said.

The district owns 54,000 acres of land and water in 13 counties, from the Akron area south to the Ohio River. Included are 14 reservoirs.

The other reservoirs where drillers have inquired about water are Leesville, Seneca­ville Lake in Noble and Guernsey counties and Tappan Lake in Harrison County.

Chesapeake Energy Corp., the No. 1 oil-gas player in eastern Ohio, is buying water from the city of Steubenville. It has also purchased water from other communities and from landowners with wells being drilled.

Some drilling companies have legally tapped water from small streams in eastern Ohio.

http://www.ohio.com/news/local-news/energy-company-seeks-water-from-eastern-ohio-reservoir-for-fracking-1.300894